6:21 p.m. - 2012-04-29
mcdonalds women
Took the kids to the McDo playplace this afternoon. I like it there because it is pretty much physically impossible for the kids to wander off or fall off something, but I dislike it because I always feel like the other parents are sizing me up and finding me wanting. You wouldn't think a person could feel inferior at McDonalds, but keep in mind that this is Connecticut. There are a lot of doctors and lawyers, and doctors' wives and lawyer's wives, who take their kids to McDonalds between violin lessons and tennis lessons on the au pair's day off.
They wear $500 cashmere sweater sweats and yammer incessantly into cell phones about the difficulty of an up-to-par preschool so far from "the city." (NYC, of course...) and that their three year old isn't taking enough enrichment courses.
Their hair is perfect, and their nails are perfect, and their makeup is perfectly and tastefully applied so as to look like they're not wearing any. I find myself worrying about my grammar when I talk to my kids, which is ridiculous because I write for a living, so I think my grammar is OK. My pronounciation, maybe not so -- like most Americans, normal Americans, I say "yer" instead of "your." Etc.
I wear an old blue windbreaker and jeans, both with paint them. I have never gotten a manicure in my life and I don't think I've gotten my hair cut in at least five years, although I do occasionally whack off an inch or so now and then in front of the bathroom mirror. My hair is very long and slightly wavy, so I figure it doesn't matter too much if the cut isn't perfect.
My hair is way too long to look current or fashionable, forget "done."
I don't think I like white women my age very much. I am always more comfortable around people who are different enough from me that they (or I) don't compare and judge. I suppose I am the one doing the comparing and judging and projecting it onto them -- that's what any good psychologist would say. I prefer people who are significantly older or younger, different race, different ethnic background, different gender, different anything and everything. I really do like people, it's just people like me I'm uncomfortable with. I'm probably not that different than those women in McDo who make me uncomfortable, except that I dropped out of college and then out of the success competition, and I dropped out of competitive parenting before I ever started. I like my choices until something triggers me feeling inferior, and then I suspect that I'm just a loser, not a dropout by choice.
Maybe I am.
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