Bellani New Moms Group Alumni
This is a common scene, right? We’re driving home from running some errands and decide as a treat to stop by the playground to kill some time. The four of us roll into Humboldt Park, and the kids proceed to tear it up in the way that kids do.
(As a side note, because we hadn’t exactly planned to go to the playground, and because we sometimes let the kids influence what we dress them in, Eloise was wearing an adorable but completely impractical skirt and brand new white sandals. Just the thing. We must have looked like those parents who dress their daughter in inappropriately dressy girly clothes all the time. We’re not those parents!)
There were a handful of people there, including three mothers, each with a young daughter about the same age, who seemed to be casually acquainted. One of their kids kind of wandered over to where Eloise was playing and so the three of us ended up tossing a ball back and forth. The new kid, Sadie, was adorable, and the small talk with her mother was pleasant, and I thought, “Hey, new friend?”
And then they had to leave and I found myself kind of weakly waving goodbye.
How do new parents connect with one another and schedule these “playdates” that I’ve heard so much about? I’m sure that we’re at something of a disadvantage because both Rachel and I work full time, so we’re not often a part of the weekday kid scene. (Back before I went back to work, I befriended some of the other parents in the delightful classes we took at Bellani, but since I was demoted from “stay-at-home dad” to just “dad” I haven’t had a chance to see any of them.) But even on a weekend, when I do make meaningful eye contact or pleasant chit-chat with another parent hovering by the jungle gym, I have no idea how to seal the deal.
I think it’s so awkward and difficult because it’s essentially like trying to hit on someone you just met; I wasn’t any good at that back when I was single, and I’ve been cozily partnered up for more than a decade. There’s just no way I’m going to be able to successfully pick someone up at a playground.
I often wonder how much of it is gender-related. I see little clutches of moms that seem to gather together as if by some kind of electromagnetic force. Is new parenting secretly a “no boys allowed” club? Or does a guy wandering up to a bunch of women just exacerbate the creepy pick-up vibe? “Hi there. I think our kids are about the same age… laydeez.”
(This reminds me of a YouTube video that’s a couple of years old but is still, I think, funny. There’s probably nothing in it that’s precisely inappropriate for a family-friendly blog like this, but I feel that I should warn you, as Ira Glass occasionally says, that this video does acknowledge the existence of sex.)
I am generally baffled as to how new parents find each other. Most of our pre-kid friends still don’t have kids, and although we’ve met a few new friends with children, our social circle seems pretty narrow. How do you all do it?
~Matt~
I find it relatively easy to walk away with a name and email address. I just never really have the guts or inclination or time to actually follow up and set up the play date. The warm glow of positive feeling and shared experience that I felt in the park fades quickly, and I wind up feeling like I’m emailing a stranger.
One thing that has worked in the past (and that I should do more often) is that I make my own plans to do something, and then contact the other person and say, “Hey, we’re going (for example) berry picking — we thought of you and wanted to see if you wanted to come along.” That way it doesn’t feel like you’re putting yourself quite so much out there, because the plans are concrete and already made — the company would just be a bonus.
I have to pat myself on the back for a successful “first playdate” over the Labor Day weekend. We ran into a couple of guys with twins about our twins’ age in the Ikea parking lot last month. We were loading up our car, and the other family was just arriving.
After exchanging some small talk and watching the other twins depart into Ikea, we regretted that we had not exchanged any contact information. So I found an old recepit in my car and left them our phone number, tucked under their wiper blade. After a bit of phone tag, we got together and had a really good time.
So just go for it!