Head Shaking Parenting

Many years ago, and for only a brief period of time, there was a segment on Saturday Night Live’s ‘Weekend Update’ news block called ‘Head Shaking News’. It featured stories of people’s behavior that were so off the wall that all the anchors could do after reading the headline was sigh and shake their heads.

I found myself sighing and shaking my head as I listened to the stories of two different parents last night. Both of them are mothers, one of them is in Tampa, Florida, and the other is right here in Portland.

In Tampa, a 26-year-old mother of two is show on a school bus surveillance camera getting on the bus with her two daughters and shouting “Where’s the girl who slapped my daughter?” A 10-year-old girl timidly raised her hand, at which point the mother turned to her 9-year-old and told her to “take care of her business”. The 9-year-old went back and started pummeling the girl. Eventually, her sister joined in the attack, while her mother watched.

(shaking my head)

Meanwhile, here in Portland – where our weather has been sunny and warm recently -- a mother left her daughter strapped in a car seat while she went shopping a Lowes; an illegal act here in Portland (leaving your child in a hot car, that is -- not shopping at Lowes). A passerby noticed the child slumped over from the heat and called the police. Paramedics were also called who determined the child’s body temperature to be 105 degrees. When the mother showed up, she was so indignant about the police intervention that she kicked the police officer while demanding to be left alone.

(shaking my head)

She wasn’t left alone, by the way. She was arrested and charged with child endangerment, resisting arrest, and assaulting a police officer.

I suspect both of these women have been disqualified from the Mother of the Year competition …