(Long Island, N.Y.) I guess I am. Maybe I just have that kind of face. Recently, while waiting on line at the grocery store, a father and his son stood behind me and I heard the dad exclaim, “Great. I forgot the stuff for the salad.” I just quickly glanced his way and as soon as our eyes caught he asked “Would you mind?” and then he sped off towards the produce section telling his boy, “Stay with her, I’ll be right back.”
Although shocked that he so thoughtlessly left his young son with a total stranger, I struck up a conversation with the boy to put him at ease. He told me he was four and that he loved Thomas the Tank Engine. “So does my son,” I said, “he’s four, too!” As I loaded my groceries on the conveyer he started to back away and looked like he was ready to take off. “Stay here, sweetheart,” I said, since suddenly I was in charge of this little boy. I used the same distraction techniques I use on my own kids and gave him the important job of holding the bread for me. After we chit-chatted about trains and what he was going to be for Halloween for a few minutes he then said, “My mommy’s name is Melissa.” I couldn’t help but think: Boy would Melissa be mighty ticked if she knew her husband just left her four-year old with a complete stranger to get stuff for the salad and keep his place on line!
I’d have my husband’s head if I knew he left our kids with anyone and I’d bet his would be on the chopping block, too if his wife knew he did such a downright dumb thing. Dad soon came hurrying back with his arms full of veggies. He looked like a typical frazzled dad, wearing a suit with his tie undone clutching a grocery list. He thanked me profusely and I said no problem–but really, I wanted to grab him and say; “What’s wrong with you? Don’t you watch the news?” But instead I turned to the boy and thanked him for being a great helper. I walked away shaking my head and by the sudden concerned look on his dad’s face– I could tell that it just hit him: That probably wasn’t such a good idea.
As shocking as it is that in this day and age someone would be willing to just leave their child in the care of a stranger, it wasn’t the first time it happened to me. Once, during a day at the races, I commented to a woman that her little girl was adorable. Before I knew it, she asked me if I’d keep an eye on her while she went inside to place her bet. Offering her no more than a confused and reluctant nod, the woman wasted no time, crouched down and said to the girl, “Grandma will be right back. Stay with this lady right here and I’ll be back with some snacks.” Snacks? Stay with ‘this lady’? Was she serious? She never even asked my name.
I could just imagine the mom’s nervousness when grandma asked to take her granddaughter (about five or six years old) to the noisy, over-crowded confusion of The Belmont Stakes. Did she have any idea that grandma would just leave her granddaughter with ‘this lady’ while she placed a $20 bet on Lucky Ducky to win? And I timed her. 11 minutes. She was gone long enough for just about anything to happen. I’d never hurt a fly. Heck, I felt so bad one time when I realized I accidentally swiped a $1 lip liner–I went back to pay for it. I’m as good-hearted and honest as they come but she didn’t know that. Villains don’t hear black hats and don curly mustaches anymore. Wicked people don’t straddle broomsticks and the truly evil don’t advertise their intentions by waving pitchforks. They’re every day, normal looking people like you and me. You just never know.
But maybe it is my face because at the mall when my husband took the kids to the pet store–I escaped to do some “me” shopping and while I headed towards the cosmetic department and a little girl came running towards me out of nowhere and crying, “Ma-ma!” I looked around and realized she was all alone. She thought I was her mommy but as she got closer she looked scared and was babbling something in Spanish. I took her hand and walked with her as she was crying. She was reaching for me to pick her up–probably thinking, you’re not my mommy but you look sweet–I’ll settle for you. Luckily, we quickly ran into a young security guard and I explained the little girl was lost and her mommy probably had long brown hair like mine, because she had mistaken me for her mother. He told us to follow him and as he headed towards the security desk a man came running towards us looking relived and swooped her up in his arms. The young security guard said, “She’s yours?” to the man and he said yes and started walking away with the girl who remained silent and still weeping.
As the two walked off I turned to the security guard and balked: “That’s it?”
“Yep, that’s it ma’am. Thanks for your help. She’s alright.”
“Well, how do you know that was really her dad?”
“Dunno. He said he was.”
“Well, don’t you check? What if it wasn’t? What if that man saw she was lost and lied? She’s so young and she didn’t say a word. You can’t just let them walk off like that. Aren’t there standard procedures for something like this?”
The security guard looked perplexed by my questions but promised to catch up with them and make sure she was in good hands. So much for my stress-free shopping spree. Time was ticking and I had to get back to my own kids. Frankly, I don’t think he did follow up because he looked at me like I was crazy for questioning that man’s claim but in order to keep myself from obsessing about it, I settled my thoughts on: it was her dad and she’s safe.
You would think in light of the awful things you read about and see on the nightly news, people would just be leery of strangers and know that in a spit-second children are snatched and stolen. So next time (I hope there’s not a next time) someone instantly marks me as a kind, trustworthy lady and asks me to watch their kids for just a minute, they just might get an ear-full from this self-confessed alarmist. Do you know what horrible, unthinkable things can happen in those seemingly innocent minutes? One day, ‘this lady’ will be ‘that lady’ and you just might be longing for those few precious minutes back.
