Boundaries
Mar. 5th, 2011 09:28 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
resonantCreepy behavior, observed and remembered.
The kidlet has a friend named Robin. They only see her at the pool, so every Saturday they spend the afternoon on inner tubes giggling about whatever it is that twelve-year-olds giggle about.
The tubing area is an oblong with a slow current in it, just about wide enough for one inner tube. Last Saturday, I looked up from my book and saw the kids in their floats at one end of the oblong, not moving, and an older man I didn't know standing in the chest-deep water talking to them.
Something about the body language of the situation troubled me, so I left my book behind and went over to talk with them. We chatted briefly about nothing much (what time we were going to leave, etc.).
What must have triggered my attention was that the guy was standing in such a way that they couldn't get around him. That was why they were floating in one place despite the current. He backed up out of earshot as soon as he saw me speak to them.
I asked, "Was he bothering you?" The kids exchanged a glance, and then the kidlet said, "Robin knows him. His wife is a friend of Robin's mother."
I made a good solid eye contact with the guy. I was quite prepared to smile back if he smiled, or to go over and make small talk if he spoke. As he did neither, I just gave him a nice long look, the kind that says, "If the police ask me to, I'll be able to give them a good description of you."
After that, I kept an eye on him -- enough to catch him looking at me several times. Keeping his eye on me.
Hours later, when we left, he was in the hot tub between us and the locker room. He said to Robin, "I'm going to tell your mother on you that you wouldn't talk to me."
On the way home, the kidlet told me that Robin doesn't like the guy because: "He keeps trying to set up dates between her and his five-year-old son." I swallowed all sorts of thoughts about how profoundly creepy this was, but I did give the kidlet the No One Is Entitled To Your Attention, And You Don't Have To Talk To Anyone You Don't Want To Talk To discussion.
Robin's mother is kind of a train wreck. For instance, I'm pretty sure she doesn't know my name, but she's kept me apprised in detail of getting and canceling various restraining orders against her ex-boyfriend, who was also her landlord.
Today, as she and I and the kids were walking to the locker room, she told me (out of nowhere; I hadn't brought it up) "Pete, the one who was talking to the girls last week? You don't need to worry about him. He and his wife are good Catholics."
As I was telling this story to the spouse tonight, it occurred to me that by saying that where Robin could hear her, the mother was basically telling her, "You don't get to opt out of spending time with someone because he makes you uncomfortable."
When I was a little girl, I had Tickling Uncles. I didn't like to be tickled, and I said, No, no no, but of course when someone tickles you, you laugh, whether you're actually enjoying yourself or not, so every time we met, there would be tickling.
My mother told me I should say, "Uncle Whoever, you're a big tease."
Did you ever think about all the ways that people tell girls that they don't get to draw boundaries?
The kidlet has a friend named Robin. They only see her at the pool, so every Saturday they spend the afternoon on inner tubes giggling about whatever it is that twelve-year-olds giggle about.
The tubing area is an oblong with a slow current in it, just about wide enough for one inner tube. Last Saturday, I looked up from my book and saw the kids in their floats at one end of the oblong, not moving, and an older man I didn't know standing in the chest-deep water talking to them.
Something about the body language of the situation troubled me, so I left my book behind and went over to talk with them. We chatted briefly about nothing much (what time we were going to leave, etc.).
What must have triggered my attention was that the guy was standing in such a way that they couldn't get around him. That was why they were floating in one place despite the current. He backed up out of earshot as soon as he saw me speak to them.
I asked, "Was he bothering you?" The kids exchanged a glance, and then the kidlet said, "Robin knows him. His wife is a friend of Robin's mother."
I made a good solid eye contact with the guy. I was quite prepared to smile back if he smiled, or to go over and make small talk if he spoke. As he did neither, I just gave him a nice long look, the kind that says, "If the police ask me to, I'll be able to give them a good description of you."
After that, I kept an eye on him -- enough to catch him looking at me several times. Keeping his eye on me.
Hours later, when we left, he was in the hot tub between us and the locker room. He said to Robin, "I'm going to tell your mother on you that you wouldn't talk to me."
On the way home, the kidlet told me that Robin doesn't like the guy because: "He keeps trying to set up dates between her and his five-year-old son." I swallowed all sorts of thoughts about how profoundly creepy this was, but I did give the kidlet the No One Is Entitled To Your Attention, And You Don't Have To Talk To Anyone You Don't Want To Talk To discussion.
Robin's mother is kind of a train wreck. For instance, I'm pretty sure she doesn't know my name, but she's kept me apprised in detail of getting and canceling various restraining orders against her ex-boyfriend, who was also her landlord.
Today, as she and I and the kids were walking to the locker room, she told me (out of nowhere; I hadn't brought it up) "Pete, the one who was talking to the girls last week? You don't need to worry about him. He and his wife are good Catholics."
As I was telling this story to the spouse tonight, it occurred to me that by saying that where Robin could hear her, the mother was basically telling her, "You don't get to opt out of spending time with someone because he makes you uncomfortable."
When I was a little girl, I had Tickling Uncles. I didn't like to be tickled, and I said, No, no no, but of course when someone tickles you, you laugh, whether you're actually enjoying yourself or not, so every time we met, there would be tickling.
My mother told me I should say, "Uncle Whoever, you're a big tease."
Did you ever think about all the ways that people tell girls that they don't get to draw boundaries?
(no subject)
Date: 3/6/11 05:02 am (UTC)