If there is one word I’d use to describe myself, it would be an observer.
I prefer to live my life on the outskirts of society. I’m perfectly happy to simply press my nose against the glass and people watch. I really have no desire to interact with people in general – I’m sure there’s a psychological reason for that, but I truly enjoy just sitting back and … observing.
I’m thinking I should apologize for that … but I won’t. *grin*
There is one group of people in particular that I really love watching. Unfortunately, I don’t get a chance to watch them very often and when I do, I have to do so while pretending I’m doing something else.
The group?
PTA moms.
Now before you go and get the wrong idea about me, I’m not one of THOSE moms. I don’t attend meetings. I don’t obsess about whether my child is eating too many carbs. I don’t care to compare my offspring with any growth charts – either physical or mental. I don’t wear “mom” pants (well actually, I do on occasion when I’m feeling bloated), I don’t drive a mini-van (well actually, I used to), and I certainly don’t care if I’m caught out in public not wearing any lipstick – in fact, I think I’ve worn lipstick exactly six times my entire life and then for only 30 minutes because any longer and it dried in the creases of my lips and I felt like the Joker from Batman.
But that’s another issue, apparently.
I have attended a few meetings though. And the few times I’ve gone I’ve been treated like a leper. You have to understand that the fact that I even WENT to begin with was a big deal to me because I’m a terribly shy person in real life and walking into a room full of strange women who will be curious to check out the new girl thereby giving me the once/twice/thrice over makes me physically sick.
But I sucked up my apprehension and I went.
And no one talked to me.
And yes, I made attempts to join conversations.
The PTA Moms saw me, analyzed me and found me wanting, unfortunately.
But that didn’t stop me from participating in my sons’ schools. I still went to class parties, I still helped clean up and then I accidentally got recruited to help out with the school website.
I’ve been designing and maintaining school websites ever since.
So, I guess you could call me an OBSERVANT PTA Mom. I’m doing my part, just not a part that anyone can SEE.
And that suits me JUST fine.
However, I do occasionally have to deal with the bitches on occasion.
And I’m not calling them female dogs to be insulting (well, maybe a teeny-tiny bit), but rather, PTA moms (at least the PTA moms in my sons’ schools), are like a pack of female dogs. They stick together, they snarl at outsiders, they protect their territory and they pee on you when you get too close.
Oh, and you’re forced to step over a pile of poo occasionally, too.
This past Friday, I took MK to pick his schedule up from school. This is the last year I’ll really have to deal with PTA because by the time kids get into high school, parents have realized that PTA doesn’t have the money or the resources to make that big of an impact on the kids anymore; the kids would prefer to hang out with their friends or get a job and buy a car as opposed to doing anything school related by that point in their lives.
Or they appeal to the student council who take matters into their own hands and bypass the PTA entirely.
But elementary school and middle school – still an issue.
After MK picked his schedule up, we made the table rounds. We bought his assignment book, then we went to another table to order a school hoodie.
The moms were nice enough on the surface. But underneath the thick foundation and heavy powder, their true personalities bled through and it was that sugary, sweet fake nice, you know? The plastic smiles, the vacant/shifty eyes because they are constantly on the prowl for someone more important than you, and the barely concealed snobbery as they attempted to disguise the onceover they gave you as you’re standing there, sweating because you decided to wear something halfway fashionable and the school doesn’t have air conditioning and you just roamed the halls looking for MK’s locker and classrooms and now you’re being stared at and it’s making you nervous thereby causing your pores to ooze more salty goodness down your face thereby smearing the carefully applied makeup you put on for the first time all summer in order to impress this pack of female dogs.
Good times.
I know I sound bitter, and I don’t really mean to, but let’s just say, I’ve been shunned one too many times. I’ve tried to fit in and was rejected. The other moms simply don’t like me, for some reason.
But believe it or not, I’m not that upset about it. Instead, I’m content to observe their petty attitudes from afar …
… and wish, on some teeny-tiny level that I was part of the pack.
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It’s fun!
Write From Karen 