The "Unhappy" Neighbor

Every school morning, I send my son to the bus stop on the corner across the street. I stay in the garage since his younger sister is never dressed by the time his bus comes. I originally was carting her across the street to wait for her brother's bus, but she had strep and I thought I might, so in order to not infect the other children and parents, I decided to wait in the garage. Now I do that all the time, as it has removed the stress of all three of us getting ready in time to catch the bus. I also didn't feel right about leaving the premises if my daughter was still asleep or inside playing. My neighbor across the street does the same, she sends her son across the street, while she supervises him crossing the street (which I do too).

I have a neighbor who lives a few houses down. Unlike most stay-at-home moms, she seems to have a great disdain for working mothers. When I used to wait at the bus stop in the morning with my son, she would make comments about her parenting skills since she was a stay-at-home mom. I recall one time she made a big deal about 'as a good parent, she could never leave her children in the care of others'. She loves to talk about her stuff, and sometimes others.

Anyway, this past week, for some reason she just felt the need to begin talking about what I think is an upcoming party. Since I am across the street, she has to talk extremely loud - which she does - for me and my neighbor to hear. She began by saying something about her list, and how the other two mothers who were at the bus stop were on it. I was walking back into my garage to put something away, when she yelled, "but not that one over there on the corner". I stopped, turned around, came back out of the garage and just looked at her with an expression of 'what is wrong with you?' My other neighbor's house is not on corner, so that left me as the obvious person she had been speaking about. At that same moment it dawned on me that the other comments she had practically yelled in the past were about me and my kids. Now mind you this happens before the kids are picked up. So the kids can hear everything, including my son. Lucky for me he is oblivious to her as are all the other kids, except maybe her children.

Later that morning I drove my daughter to her day care center on the way to work. As I was pulling in, I just started to laugh. I was giggling thinking about the pre-high school behavior this neighbor exhibited. Even high school students and some middle school students are past the need for such behavior. I mentioned what happened to my other half, and he pointed out to me that there was an article the other day in the paper about competition between stay-at-home moms and working mothers. Now I am not one who competes against others, I don't need others to 'lose' so I can feel I have won. I have my own goals and I compete against my own internal standards. I prefer heart felt Thank You's to any material token of achievement.

My other half commented that such juvenile behavior was mentioned in the article, as something that tends to happen to some stay-at-home moms who are actually jealous of their working counterparts. I believe that happens to a very small minority. I don't know, if she is jealous per se, since she has no idea of the accolades and respect I have earned from my coworkers, customers and competitors. If she did know, then I could see the jealousy angle. But I really think deep down inside she is very unhappy about her life and for some reason can only feel good about herself by tearing others down. I guess for her, she only feels she wins if she puts someone else down. I hope for her children's sake she recognizes this as a destructive behavior and corrects it.

Competition is not healthy when it requires that you tear someone else
down just to feel good about yourself.

TAGS: Working Mothers