Here’s this week’s Smartmom from the award-winning Brooklyn Paper:
Smartmom is thinking of getting the Oh So Feisty One a cellphone. On Sunday, they went into two shops on Seventh Avenue just to look at them.
Nokia. Samsung. LG. Motorola. Smartmom watched as OSFO studied every model on display. She even picked up a Blackberry.
“I don’t think you need that,” Smartmom said, grabbing the ubiquitous businessman’s device out of her hand. Yeesh.
At one store, OSFO made a beeline for a lavender Sony Ericsson Music Phone.
“This is the one I like,” she told Smartmom decisively.
“Excellent choice,” said the salesman behind the counter. He seemed eager to close the deal.
Patience, young man, Smartmom wanted to say. We’re just BROWSING.
The cellphone will be a gift for OSFO’s fifth-grade graduation, which is just around the corner. OSFO has already selected her outfit.
And, apparently, her present.
This impromptu shopping couldn’t be timelier, given that recent Lenore Skenazy column in the New York Sun in which she admitted that she allowed her 9-year-old son to ride the subway by himself.
Readers ended up concluding that Skenazy won’t win the “Mother of the Year” election any time soon.
But Smartmom understood Skenazy’s dilemma. Kids need to be given some breathing room at some point — and New York is the safest city in America — so whether the kid is 9 or 12, at some point, he is going to have to get on the subway, stand clear of the closing doors, and figure it all out.
Smartmom isn’t ready to let OSFO make such a subterranean journey, so the cellphone seems to be a good compromise.
And they certainly could’ve used that cellphone last week when Smartmom got stuck on the Upper West Side with Manhattan Granny, who was having dental surgery. She knew she wouldn’t make it back to PS 321 by 3 pm.
She called Hepcat, who was at an important meeting at the Edgy Web Design Firm in Soho, and couldn’t leave.
Smartmom did what she usually does when she’s running late for pick-up: she called a friend’s babysitter to ask if she could take OSFO home.
But that didn’t work. The babysitter was on vacation. Oops.
At 3:15, a panicked Smartmom called OSFO’s friend hoping that they were together.
“No, she’s not with me,” her friend said.
“Do you know where she is?”
She didn’t. At 3:30 or so, Smartmom got a call from Hepcat. The oh so resourceful Oh So Feisty One had gone into the office and called Hepcat’s cellphone. He told her to sit tight; he was on his way. Super Daddy!
Smartmom found herself seething with jealousy wondering why OSFO had called her dad and not her.
Then she got teary thinking of her little girl waiting for her in the school’s backyard. Isn’t that the most awful feeling in the world? Waiting and waiting for your mom to pick you up, you go through all of the stages of grief: anger, resentment, pathos, acceptance, but then a little more anger and pathos (Smartmom is summoning up memories from her own childhood now. Here come the tears).
Truth is, OSFO was fine. The backyard is a lively place after school with the many familiar faces of parents and friends.
After a while, OSFO got bored waiting in the office and discovered that she had the house key that Smartmom gave her a few weeks ago (with a cute domino key ring) in her bag.
The latch key kid called Hepcat (again!).
“I’ll meet you at home,” she said. And that’s what she did.
Long live cellphones. And 11-year-olds who are ready to walk home and let themselves in!
Smartmom doesn’t know what they’d do without Teen Spirit’s cellphone. At 16, he’s on a very long leash and the phone helps them keep tabs on him (especially when he’s out as late as 2 am).
“Where are you?” Hepcat always asks in lieu of hello.
“I’m sleeping at Eric’s,” Teen Spirit tells him. He always seems to be at Eric’s.
“Does this Eric guy really exist?” Hepcat always asks Smartmom when he gets off the phone. “Do we know where he lives, who his parents are?”
Eric is a real person, Smartmom tells him. His parents are very nice. But with a cellphone, a kid could say he’s anywhere. There’s really no way to trace it unless you get one of those GPS attachments for the phone.
And Smartmom isn’t ready for that level of helicopter parenting. You might as well put a tail on your kid or put a wire on his best friend.
The cellphone, ultimately, gives Hepcat and Smartmom what they really crave: the illusion of control. If they can hear his voice, they figure he’s probably not lying in a pool of his own blood in Union Square. Or Herald Square. Or even Bartel-Pritchard Square.
They can even say parental things and boss him around.
Smartmom reckons that OSFO will actually need a cellphone when she goes to middle school next year. It’ll help them feel like they’re watching over her even when they’re not.
She can already imagine OSFO’s voice on her outgoing message. “Please leave a message after the beep…”
Beep. I love you, OSFO. Come home soon. I miss you…
