Moving on swiftly – Fort Knox
We return home en masse, mid-day and sweltering, to hear a voice on the telephone shouting ““Natalie!” Are yah there?”
The answering machine flashes.
Six messages.
“Hey Mom pick up the phone already!”
Surely not! I thought we’d “sorted” this all out! I drop six bags full of groceries on the floor and dither.
“Here, I'll do it!” she offers, which cattle prods me into action, “yes, hello, Madeline here, how can I help?”
“Where were yah? I've bin callin all morning!”
“Er food shopping.” Why did I say that?
“D'ya have Jay's address?”
“Um…..….Jay Jones, Jay Smith or Jay Higginbottom?”
“I dunno their last name.”
“Oh….er……”
“She went for a sleepover to Jay's last night. I gotta go pick er up now.”
“Ah….well……..I…”
“She's the little kid with the ratty hair, glasses and goofy teeth.” I run this description through my lexicon of Jays. “Oh…..would that be Higginbottom perhaps?”
“I dunno.”
“Let me see. I don't know the address exactly but I can give you driving directions to their home or the telephone number.”
“Number.”
I oblige.
I think I prefer my new role as Yellow Pages substitute. Who’d have thought that Anglo Americans could seek shelter in a castle? I consider myself to have escaped quite lightly.
Poor Higginbottoms.
April 9th, 2008 at 10:53 pm
Always good to know one serves some purpose……
April 10th, 2008 at 4:06 am
Natalie.
I love it! (Though you must be getting slightly frustrated…)
Heidi
April 10th, 2008 at 4:09 am
This woman slays me. Seriously. Poor Higginbottoms, indeed.
April 10th, 2008 at 5:59 am
She didn’t know how to reach her if there was an emergency???
When I was a teenager (16) I didn’t have a curfew (yes, I was that boring
), BUT, the rule was “don’t tell anyone”. How can you lie and tell someone your parents want you home at a certain time, if they know you don’t have a curfew.
The only rule was – you had to leave the name and phone # of the #1 person you were going out with incase of an emergency. She never called so there was no point in lying. But atleast they could start looking for you.
S.
April 10th, 2008 at 6:55 am
Well, for a minute there I was astounded that she wasn’t calling to ask you to go pick up her child for her! Maybe there’s hope for her yet?
April 10th, 2008 at 7:24 am
When I was a child, my mother insisted on knowing the parents and children, seeing the house, talking to the mother personally about any plans, and then having all the contact information on hand. If we were leaving the friend’s house for any reason, we had to telephone my mother and inform her where we were going and when we planned to come back.
Granted, my parents were careful, paranoid people. But this woman is TRULY amazing. Terrifying.
I will never forget telling a friend of mine when I was 10 “Oh, you are so lucky – your parents let you go anywhere and do anything.” She looked at me sadly and replied. “No, you are lucky – my parents don’t care where I am.” I never chafed at my parents’ curfew and phone-check rules again.
April 10th, 2008 at 7:55 am
I don’t think I could let my child blindly go to someone’s house…what happens if there’s an emergency? Oh Maddie…this woman is insane.
April 10th, 2008 at 1:40 pm
I second Angela’s comment – this woman is insane – and I don’t think Daughter #1′s suggestion of talking to her is likely to do any good. Well, actually it might convince her that you’re the one who’s insane I suppose and she might leave you alone . . .
I feel sorry for the kid! Maybe she knows when she’s well off – one would hope she knows her own phone number, but she didn’t call from the sleepover house asking to be picked up! Maybe she’s found a like-minded set of parents in the Higginbottoms who didn’t think to tell her to call her mother . . .
April 10th, 2008 at 2:20 pm
I third Angela’s comment! I cannot imagine not knowing where my kids where!
April 10th, 2008 at 3:38 pm
I fourth the sandbox…I mean Angela’s comment.
She didn’t know the address to where her kid was sleeping? A few coockoo’s short of a clock.
April 10th, 2008 at 4:55 pm
Unreal!…