This Nonsense

So let me just vent for a sec.

I was out to dinner with my mom and my son, who is three years old, at a "family friendly" establishment when some passive aggressive fuckery happened. Usually my son does pretty well when we go out to eat - especially if queso somehow is involved. There wasn't any queso here though, that was just a fun fact.

Anyway, so we are sitting and eating and he's got his coloring page and the three crayons they give every kid, like any other place. It was an earlier than normal dinner so the place wasn't horribly crowded. He's got some chicken fingers and fries, my mom got a salad (I think), and I was eating my favorite bang bang shrimp type dish with fried rice that is fucking bombbbbb! Brb while I drool for a minute 🤤

So my mom and I are talking about random stuff and my son about done eating, so like any other three year old he starts to get bored and decides he wants to get off the chair. I'm an assertive mom but I was sort of half-assed with my "honey you need to sit back down" since it wasn't a full house. I'm like whatever he's fine for right now. Pick my battles. Sometimes he actually listens without testing me first so I save the tough love for when it's really necessary - and trust me it does get used. So he starts off just sort of walking around the table but he's not disturbing anyone and I'm not finished eating yet so I let him carry on. But then of course he gets bored with that and decides he wants to go jump on a nearby empty booth. Circling around our table is one thing but jumping around another is lots of NOPE, so the assertiveness quickly surfaced and with it came a "GET BACK OVER HERE" in a quiet but very serious tone of get-your-ass-back-here-I-am-not-fucking-playing-right-now.

Now mind you, I'm the type of mom that's not afraid to let my child make a scene in public when he doesn't get his way. You mad because you can't have that piece of candy? Cool story bro, you'll live. I'm also not a fan AT ALL of just shoving a tablet in front of a child's face just to shut them up, because that's hella negative reinforcement. And I don't like tablets and phones, etc. at the table because I believe children need to learn how to be civilized without apps in front of their face.

However, we were in a country club, so me acting a fool to stop my child from acting a fool isn't exactly the "proper" way to go about handling things. A count to three followed by a swift smack on his behind would have been the talk of the town and I didn't want to embarrass my mom. They've been members for years and the staff has known me since I was a teenager, seen me through my pregnancy, watched my son grow, etc. So I was trying with my best efforts to keep my cool for my family's sake.

After he switched gears to really shifted to being an ultimate three year old, deciding that listening to me wasn't going to happen during that time, my mom whips out her phone and opens one of his favorite apps, which is a xylophone app that usually occupies him. I wanted to stop her but at the same time I was like ok if this is what works right now then so be it. He ran right over and climbed in his chair and happily danced to the beat of his own tune. After a moment I realized the volume was kind of loud, and more people had come into the dining area, so I said to my mom that we should probably turn it down a little. She agreed and turned the volume down and then handed the phone back to him.

THEN. A gentleman from the staff walks over, carefully places a card on the corner of the table between my mom and me, then walks away without a word. I picked up the card and this is what it said:

Let me tell you. The level of self control to hold back the ratchet that I wanted to unleash over this, I'm talking like sit in silence for a moment to collect my thoughts, close my eyes and take a deep breath to keep myself from following this asshole outside type self control, is something I'm still really not quite sure how I managed. I'm blunt to a fault. This was the most passive aggressive shit I have ever seen, and I don't do well at all with passive aggressive. I was very close to standing up and saying to him "oh my bad, would you rather my kid jump up and down on your empty booths and cause even more of a scene because surely I can make that happen," but I opted not.

My kid was acting a fool, and my mom handed him an electric xylophone so we wouldn't further disturb your guests. He could have maybe evaluated the situation first and walked over to politely inform us of the policy, and kindly ask us to maybe turn the volume down more. But no. He's going to just hand us a card to passively ask us to shut the fuck up.

Families have always been allowed at this country club. Like I said, my folks have been members for over a decade. But for this shit to happen at this "family friendly" establishment was ridiculous. Toddlers don't give a single shit about all your fancy rules and guidelines. If you're going to call yourself "family friendly" then don't get upset when my toddler decides to act a fool. And unless I'm genuinely disrupting your other guests, don't try and stop me from handling it to avoid causing an even further scene. My mom joked and said maybe next time we should just bring a real xylophone and see how they feel about it, and I have to admit I kind of want to just to be a dick! We could have let him do whatever he wanted and run around your whole dining area, but we didn't. You're welcome for giving a fuck.

End rant. Thanks for reading.

- The Whiskey Mom