For a few moments, as I sip my morning coffee and check e-mail, a wave of paranoia and adolescent insecurity washes over me when I learn, through the listing of conflicts while organizing a Girl Scout event, that two of my daughter’s best friends have been invited to a birthday party and she has not. My child is perfect and so I wonder; Is it me?” Do I not host enough playdates? When I talk to the other parents at after school pick up, do I say the wrong things? Are we a weird family?
Our weekend is already full. Between soccer and piano and Girl Scouts, (Not to mention Sakura Matsui at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden that I was hoping to drag my family through in the time between the soccer game and the piano lesson) it would be a major complication if we had to squeeze a birthday party into the Saturday schedule. Besides, my daughter is already going to a birthday party on Sunday.
I don’t even know whose birthday party my child is not invited to. It might not even be one of her friends. It might be a younger boy’s birthday party, the friend of a sibling. Both of the girls with the birthday party conflict have brothers and live on the same block.
My daughter is oblivious and it’s not my problem.
And yet, I can’t help but worry about it, for at least as long as it takes to finish my cup of coffee.
This is an original NYC Moms Blog post.