Upper West Side

The Upper West Side is a funny place. My blogger app on the iPhone just deleted everything I wrote in the past 15 minutes. Awesome. I'll summarize--the UWS has lots of families, including mothers of infants and nannies of young children, all of whom gather at the new Whole Foods. Which is also where I eat lunch every day. I'm working on this. I brought my own lunch two days this week. Yay! Accomplishment! But it is still hard for me to stay away. It is too easy to just say, I'll go there. Though as it's warmer, I think I'll try to get to Central Park more often. So some of it is paying for a place to sit.

Anyhow, it is also an interesting (if sometimes obnoxious) place to people-watch. There are lots of children, and then their caretakers, who, as mentioned previously, are anything from new, young hip moms to nannies. The nannies are nearly always minorities, often older, always women. Sometimes there are families. It is always incredible how many people, in the middle of the day, are hanging out at Whole Foods. So. Many. Do these people not have jobs, I wonder? How? Can I do what they're doing? Obvs there are lots of folks on their lunch breaks. Recently, they've been census workers. Also lots of construction workers (there's a huge construction project going on all around). There are also often people sitting on laptops (mostly macs), engaging in some level of work. I want their jobs. But anyway. Today these few things collided in a new type of person. The parent who brings their kid to Whole Food to do work.

Before describing this woman, I should mention that New York City has a wide variety of dress styles. People can dress pretty slouchy and go unnoticed, more or less. There are just so many people. And no one cares. But this woman took slouchy to a whole new level. It looked not like she'd just rolled out of bed but that she'd been wearing the same outfit for a few days, probably not having showered for that whole time. I should mention she was white, as are many of the Whole Foods frequenters. And there was something very hippy about her--it was more intentional than accident that she seemed so unkempt. I can't put my finger on why I assume this. And maybe I'm wrong. But she had a computer. And a nice stroller. And she was white, quite honestly, and also in good shape (not overweight). Probably wearing sandals. Luke Chacos or something. I can't remember, but I wouldn't be surprised. Anyhow, when I first sat down, I saw a little blond child exploring the seat next to me where a young woman, maybe even in her late teens, sat, shooting me frequent uncomfortable glances, arms intentionally kept close to her body. She made sure not to give the child any encouragement, clearly not thrilled he was imposing on her space. It took me a bit, regardless, of observing the two of them interact to realize they were not together; he, oblivious to her very adult (or adolescent) body language saying, "uh, what?! are you doing here..."; she, unsure how to react to someone so inattentive to his or her child that they didn't notice her clear discomfort. Mostly it took time because there was no other adult anywere nearby who the child did seem attached to. Until the disheveled woman approached and nonchalantly noted, "if he gets annoying, just give me a wave, " before returning to the world of some networked world via her laptop, five tables over.

Cue look in my direction of severe discomfort.

I shrugged. Gave a look of uncertainty. What IS the ettiquite for people who disregard their children, at your expense?but the child wasn't bothering me. If he were, I'd be assertive, take his little hand and walk him back over to his mommy. The little boy grabbed the SmartWater bottle on the table. Uncomfortable young woman is finally motivated to do something besides give looks of alarm. She takes the bottle from him.

He left after a few minutes, toddled over to the trash cans and cleaning chemical cupboard (really. I come here every day) and began pulling down the sign, "This is NOT a trash can," that everyone disregards. In his defense, he did figure out how to put it back, placing the Velcro parts together. I guess someone has taught him to be responsible. More evidence to the intentionality of his mother's harried dress.

It was at this point I noticed that said child looked in line with his mother. Though to top off his severe bed-head, he wore a cloth diaper, or hippie-underwear, over his clothes. Which, really, is just kind of icky. It was probably clean. But still. Odd. Mom finished up whatever she was working on. The super-uncomfortable victim of the child's innocence and naivete of social norms left. All was well.

But the incident really does make me think about children, culture, acceptable behavior. The mother obviously was not paying attention to how her child was affecting others. And I don't think you should be paranoid about that, which is all too easy to do, but, really. It was so blatant how freaked out the young woman sitting next to me was, and the feeling I got from the mother's comment was that she wanted to feel like she'd offered an out, when really she just didn't want to watch her child.

I do think the young woman disturbed by the child's presence bears some responsibility in speaking up, or explaining to the child that hanging out in someone else's space (or, at least, HER space) is not really acceptable. Obviously there was a line, with him grabbing her water bottle, but she was clearly uncomfortable before that. And she could have told the mother that she was really not okay with the kid being all up in her grill, probably especially since his mom didn't seem to be really paying attention to him. When I have been in that position, I have felt responsible--like if the kid did something dangerous, I would need to tell them to stop. Which is part of why I would bring the kid over to its parent. Or at least talk to him or her (the child).

But I found it to be an interesting dilemma. Also that it's totally inappropriate to bring your child to Whole Foods to do work and behave as though you are in your own home, where other people who may or may not be made to feel uncomfortable by your child's presence and your inattentiveness. Or maybe I'm being too paranoid, and not letting others just be responsible for themselves, and know where their lines are and how to draw them.