"He chose it!"

Yesterday I had a meeting across campus, near the mailroom, so I brought along a parcel to send to my son in college.  One of the deans was visiting the meeting, and when he saw the package, he joked, "What did you bring me, Nicole?"  

"Actually!" I said, "I'm sending coffee beans to my son who is in school in the middle of nowhere."  

I'm not very good about sending packages, but I had a cup of coffee in my son's college town once, or tried to, and it was so awful, I threw it away.  (Which basically killed me, not only because I am a junkie and need my brew, but because it was served in — gasp! — a styrofoam cup.  People.  We haven't seen styrofoam up here in the Pacific Northwest since the last millennium.)  That town had a Starbucks a few years ago, briefly, but they closed.  They have two cafes, but on our visit we only found the one.  I took a picture of their signage; the sizes were in English, not Italian!  Small, medium, and large!  How cute!  Again, haven't seen that for several decades.  Coming from a place where there is a coffee shop on every corner, a city where Starbucks opened their first shop in about 1990, it was disorienting, to say the least.

But I digress.  Point being, I sympathize deeply with the coffee dilemma, and it seemed the least I could do was to send some beans.  Also, I found the whole idea a little humorous, felt like I was supplying my own child with a drug, so I chuckled and leaned over conspiratorially when I explained "...middle of nowhere."

The dean, in a jolly way, said, "Well he chose it!"

What?

Then he turned to the gal next to him.  "That's what I tell my kids.  You chose it!"

I responded poorly.  I immediately felt defensive about his choice, when of course I should not have.  The small-ish irony here is that this fellow was at the meeting to charge us with generating a strategic plan to develop ways to educate the community about disabilities — which all comes down to creating a welcoming, open, caring environment.  That one tiny comment that I could not understand made me feel confused and defensive and unwelcome.

I seldom come up with good responses to jerks until after it's too late.

I could have grabbed my phone and said, "Sorry son!  No coffee for you!  You chose it!"

Or, how about this passive-aggressive slam against my own employer, again, with phone to the head:

"Son, if you'd come to school here, you'd have had eleventy-seven coffee options within one square mile of campus.  Well, no choir tours to Barcelona or Carnegie Hall, but all the coffee you want!  So, you're just shit outta luck.  You chose it!"

Perhaps I would have been able to let this go more quickly if I hadn't just had an odd exchange with a waitress, again, about my kid.

I was sending a quick text to my son, which I totally understand is super rude.  So when I realized the waitress had appeared next to the table, I was embarrassed and apologized, "Oh, sorry!"  Then, for the benefit of both the waitress and my companion, "My son just sent a text asking whether he'd remembered all the ingredients for the soup he's making."  Because, dammit, it's pretty adorable when your grown son checks in with you from the grocery store.

The waitress gave me a stern look and asked in flip voice, "Did you tell him to Google it?"

Um.  

"Well.  He's in the store and doesn't have a smart phone...."  

"Oh."

May we order now?

I've had this type of exchange with several strangers over the years, but never twice in one week.  I don't really understand.  It seems like when we are kind to our grown children, when we extend the same kindnesses that we would offer to any adult friend, we are suspect; it's as if it is assumed that we have a dysfunctional, helicopter parent relationship with them.  Maybe.  Or, perhaps more likely, these folks are screwed up in or insecure about their own relationships so they project their crap onto the rest of us.  ("See how hip and sassy I am?  You chose it!  Google it!")  Whatever.

Maybe I am naive, but it seems to me that the best way to teach a child to treat others with respect is to be respectful of them.  Sassy condescension never sits well with me, so I choose not to inflict it on my offspring.  

Now.  I'm not saying that children, grown or small, shouldn't have to deal with the consequences of their decisions.  But coffee?  Please.  And I highly doubt that a text that reads "cheddar cheese and dill" is undermining my son's ability to grow into a self-sufficient, responsible adult.  He's making his own meals, for crying out loud!  The bottom line is that my relationship with my son is my own damn business and has nothing to do with you and your children.

Parenting is hard, so let's all just back the hell off and cut each other some slack, shall we?