My Bedroom Smells Like Tangerines

(That title has nothing to do with this post, except that I'm writing it up in my bedroom, and N is here, dancing around and eating a tangerine that he just plucked directly from the tree right outside our back door. The tangerine tree from which all the children WHO CAME TO HIS PARTY got to eat from. Which leads me to...)

So Monday brought a few things to light. First, Baroy came back from dropping N off at school that morning with two presents from kids who couldn't make it to his party and were sorry they missed it. Both were Korean kids. This is relevant, as it turns out, because while most of the churches in our area tend to be done with Sunday services (or whatever y'all call them) by around 1 or so, as it turns out, the Korean churches go until 4. Which made it hard for the Korean kids to be at a party that goes from 2 to 5, as N's did. And since more than a third of his class is Korean (which is actually low, considering that over half the school population is Korean), it explained a lot.

That made me feel a lot less bad--for a few minutes, at least.

And then Baroy told me the other half of the story from that morning...the part where bratty little Troy came sauntering over to N and said, "So, I didn't see you at Susan's party yesterday while I was playing games and eating ice cream. Where were you?" N apparently responded by hiding behind his hands; Baroy, apparently feeling the need to fill in by becoming the emotional equivalent of a kindergartener, said, "He was having a great time in the bouncy house at his birthday party, that's where he was." (Gee...I wonder where N gets his social issues?)

Obviously, Susan has a right to have a party, and not to invite N (though I'm surprised, because I thought her mother and I were fairly friendly, and Susan happens to be one of the kids that N talks about and seems to like in his class, but that's my problem, not theirs). I'm betting that mom sent out ACTUAL INVITATIONS, too, and before I sent out N's. So of course people would have chosen that party over N's.

So I should be happy, right? The Korean kids didn't come to the party because they were in church. The rest of the kids were at a party that they had been invited to long before N's. This isn't an indictment on N; this isn't about his issues. HOOOO....ray.

Aw, who'm I kidding? That part had me in tears. Why? Because that's even WORSE, that's why! Because now, on top of having social issues of his own to overcome, apparently my poor child has a mother who can't even manage to do a BIRTHDAY PARTY right! It's not like I didn't know it was coming up, after all. It's not like I didn't know when he was BORN! I'm just a freaking loser, who couldn't get her shit together in time to make something important happen for her kid. The same freaking loser who can't manage to find the time to set up playdates for him, either. I mean, if I'd sent out invites weeks in advance, maybe a bunch of kids would have chosen Susan's party over N's party anyway. But maybe not. Maybe they'd have chosen him, at least a few of them, and I wouldn't have this feeling of having failed him hanging over me.

Thus, I'm more than a little pissed at myself. I'll get over it, but for now, I have no one to blame but myself. So I'm having at it, throwing a pity party here, in my tangerine-scented bedroom, with my 6-year-old son, who's wearing tiny boxing gloves and singing a made-up song about Spongebob. I have a feeling this party ain't gonna last long tonight.