With a Cherry On Top

Sunday brought another birthday party for another friend of Elan's, and by "friend," I mean they have been in the same class for two years, and Elan calls the kid "my friend," and yet I've never witnessed a word spoken between them. Actually, they just kind of ignore each other. But who am I to profess to understand the depths and nuances of toddler friendships?

I was slightly apprehensive about this particular party because the birthday boy's mother has mentioned to me, on several grocery-store run-ins, how "cliquey" she finds the kids' class, and I know she's said the same thing to Kevin's mom, and I've a sneaking suspicion that she's talking about the clique of Elan and Kevin. My nerves were doubled when Elan informed me that if Kevin was not at the party, he didn't plan on participating in any of the fun.

Luckily, the birthday boy's mother also told me to feel free to bring Ariel, and since none of the parents seem to leave their children at these events, out of apprehension of another, more social kind I managed to convince Y to come as well. I don't have much to talk about with most of the other parents, somehow, and always find myself standing around awkwardly in his absence, eventually succumbing to the magnetic pull of major faux pas.

The entertainment turned out to be another inflatable waterslide/moonbounce on the front lawn. We'd come prepared with swimsuits for the boys, but Elan took one look at the millions of wet, dirty, bouncing children, and shook his head.

"I am NOT going on that 'hing," he said. "I'm going to find Kevin."

Ariel immediately made his way to the snack table, filled his palms with Ruffles and Mike n' Ikes, shoving them into his mouth at a rate that suggested he might never have another such opportunity again. Y and I looked at him, then at each other, and decided to let it be.

We stood back, watching the little bathing suit-clad bodies jump and slide, jump and slide, in vivid contrast to Elan, who stood fully-dressed, his arm slung across Kevin's shoulders, whispering conspiratorially in his ear.

"Those kids," I asked Y, gesturing towards the moonbounce, "They're normal, right? That's what normal kids do, right? They just dive into the 'kid' thing and have fun?"

"Yes, they are normal," Y replied. "But I get where Elan's coming from. I'd never have fallen for that thing when I was his age, either."

Great, I thought. It's not even a fluke. I'm busy manufacturing stand-outs with, well, a stand-out. What did I expect?

We found our way over to a 4-inch patch of shady (and muddy) grass and plopped down on it, making polite conversation with other parents. Ariel, emboldened, perhaps, by the massive amount of sugar coursing through his veins, had decided to change into his Hawaiian-print trunks and venture into a kiddy-pool, so I focused my attention on him.

Soon, however, I heard commotion to my left, and the high-pitched voice of one of the other mothers going, "Hey! Excuse me! Stop that. Put that down. Whose kid is this??!"

I didn't have to look up to know that she was asking about Elan - I just had a feeling. But I did look up, and what I saw was Elan, Kevin, and Kevin's siblings squatting on the sidewalk near where the parents and babies sat, football-huddled around some overturned rocks surrounding a bush.

At a swim party, Elan had convinced his cronies to look for bugs instead. And they'd found a dead, perfectly-conserved dragonfly corpse, which Elan had raised in the air, prize-fighter style, to garner some well-deserved kudos. In the face of the yelping mom.

To me, it wasn't scary. I mean, it was kind of beautiful, all red, and shiny and stuff. But the other parents appeared not to be accustomed to that sort of thing, so after a moment of pretending to have never seen Elan before in my life, I realized I was expected to step in.

"Elan! Kevin!" I admonished. "That's disgusting!"

"It might be diseased..." I heard one parent whisper.
"That's dangerous, what they're doing..." Another murmured.
"What kind of parent lets their kid..." Okay, I might have made that one up. Such is the doing of intense paranoia.

These parents were obviously a little spoiled, and I didn't really understand the HUGE fuss, but I got the boys to stop turning over rocks in shrubbery that didn't belong to them and move on. The poor, mummified dragonfly wound up in the street.

Soon, it was time to cut the cake. I was pleased to see that Elan wasn't too shy to elbow his way to first-row positioning, that he was compelled by some part of tradition, although I knew he didn't like cake. We sang Happy Birthday, me standing behind my son, hands on his shoulders, Y and Ariel still splashing in the pool. The birthday boy's mother started handing out slices of cake, the kids wrestling for their shares, and I noticed she looked just as harried and distressed as I'd felt when doing the same at Elan's party. I noticed, too, that Elan was standing directly in front of her, his hand waving just like those of his friends, politely but repeatedly asking, "Can I have that piece? Can I have some? Could I have some cake?"

And I thought, well, the kid might not be that adventurous when it came to leaving the house, he might not even be willing to play at his best friend's place unless I stay the whole time, but hey, he's certainly not shy! And even though you're supposed to embrace however it is that your child turns out, I was relieved that while a little different, maybe, Elan wasn't afraid to speak up for himself. One less social hurdle.

My reflections were interrupted, however, when I realized that Elan still hadn't been given any cake, even though he was standing right under the cutter's nose. I watched as kids came up to her out of nowhere, never waiting in line, asking for specific pieces in specific sizes as well as ones for their mothers, and were rewarded immediately. Elan was still asking, but he wasn't shouting, and he wasn't whining, and while I was proud of that, I felt myself getting more and more pissed off as this woman seemed to deliberately ignore him.

I couldn't help thinking about how diplomatically I'd handled cake distribution, how, though terrified of the mob-mentality forming around me, I'd handed out slices in the order in which they were requested, and I CERTAINLY didn't discriminate against the "cliquey" kids.

I quickly derided myself for reading so much into the situation. Told myself I was crazy.

Then, watching the excitement on Elan's face fade into bewilderment, I got mad again. There were only two or three kids still hanging around the table - it had quieted down! Yet she was still ignoring my child.

Sometimes you have to take matters into your own hands. I pushed in front of Elan, about to make him heard, when the mother decided she couldn't possibly handle the madness anymore, and handed the knife to one of the other dads. Who, bless his heart, handed Elan a paper plate full of the now-tainted cake right after serving his own kid.

Maybe it was irrational, maybe it was all in my head. But it's hard to stay rational when it's your kid you imagine is being affected. Too disgruntled to be near the other parents sitting the lawn, I parked on a chair at the cake table, soon joined by Y and Ariel, and we helped ourselves to the remainder of the Thomas the Train-frosted confection. As expected, Elan only ate one bite before surrendering his plate to me, but, I reminded myself, that wasn't really the point.

Whatever, I thought, immaturely. This blows.

We left, and once buckled into his booster seat, Elan sighed happily. "Mommy? I really loved that party."

Thank G-d, it occurred to me, resting my foreheard on the car window, It's the adults who carry the burden.