I read a sentence in a blog post today that got me thinking about the belief systems we cling to ever-so tightly. The writer was asking for advice on traveling alone, to a foreign country, to pick-up her newly-adopted child. She has a young child at home and was considering leaving him behind with her husband. All of which is fine and good (and given the high cost of international adoption and overseas airfare, completely logical). But what jumped out at me was what she next wrote: "we aren't the parent's only vacation or parent's night out type."
She went on to explain that since they had only 18 years together, they wanted to spend as many moments with the kids as possible. Okay, I get it. She doesn't want to miss a single minute of her kids' lives. Good for her. But the way in which she presented it suggested that to do otherwise was wrong, perhaps even risque.
Well, apparently my parents were all about living risque and for that I am eternally grateful. They went out and we - my brother, sister and I - had a sitter. And you know what? I LOVED, LOVED, LOVED it. It was a thrill to watch my mother dress up, put on lipstick and dab a dash of perfume behind her ears. Not that every outing was a dressy affair. My mother assures me that sometimes they simply went to the mall, got an ice cream cone and walked and talked.
I thought it was wonderful that my parents had grown-up time to themselves. I don't recall ever feeling deprived or neglected. Far from it. I embraced those nights out as it meant that we three would be spending the evening with Regina, Cathy or Kevin - the awesome teenagers who lived across the street. We'd eat really cool things for supper (cereal, fried baloney, or blueberry pancakes).
For dessert, we'd have ridiculously-large portions of cake or ice cream then we'd build forts in the living room and never, ever go to bed on time. Who can argue with that? Not me.
My husband and I agree that "alone time together" is important to us as husband and wife. I firmly believe it is also important to kids - I benefited from knowing my parents truly enjoyed being together and in seeing my mother in a role beyond that of "Mom." That being said, I don't have kids ... yet. But like the woman who posted about all of this, we are soon traveling to pick up our son.
Will we hire babysitters? Yes. Absolutely.
What strikes me about all of this is that I am just now learning that there are two very distinct schools of thought on staying in versus going out. I have friends on both sides. Interestingly, it's the never-go-out parents who spend the most time explaining their decision. My friends who hire sitters rarely say a word about the choice. Which leads me to wonder, "who made the better choice?"
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