Ruminations

To err is human, to repeat is stupidity.. but I never claimed that I was as genius
Einstein supposedly said, that insanity was “doing something over and over and expecting a different result.”

I am usually not prone to repeating my mistakes.
But i am wont to bang my head against the wall, till I figure out the “secret”.
In this case, what makes for a good parent volunteer.

My experience in this department is less than stellar.
In fact a few years ago, I got such a drubbing that, well, that is today’s story..
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When we were back in Seattle, through a series of events, we ended up sending M to a very expensive private school.
Akin to the Harkers or Mittys of the world, these guys prided themselves on “individualized learning curriculum”and the school motto was “for children of higher expectations” (yeah, no kidding! 🙂

Essentially, they perform some random IQ test and determine that your child can “keep up” with the advanced curriculum.
M was just 4 years old.
So I am not sure what advanced stuff she could have learned 🙂 But we drank the koolaid and forked out $30K a year.

Now, my idea of such a school was that once you pay, they’d better take care of your kid, from “pin to plane” i.e. I should not be required to help out, volunteer aka “waste my office time” shepherding little kids.

Turns out, that it was NOT the case.

Even these private schools require volunteering.
As such I fell from grace very quickly for I could not/would not show up for any event.

But just to keep up with Joneses, I decided to take one day off, and I signed up for their annual Halloween fete, where a bunch of play areas were set up with fun games.

Since I did not know any better, I got assigned the rat-toss.
I readily agreed, as I did not have to provide anything — just stand, let the kids toss those stuffed rats into numbered vats and dole out prizes.

Simple!

When I was handed this assignment and none complained, I *should* have known that something was amiss 🙂

In any case, the day arrived and I showed up at my booth.
The kids were let inside, in batches.
Starting from the youngest bunch i.e. M’s class.
They rushed into the gym like gladiators, wildly making a bee-line for the jump house (next to me).

I expected an assault of 4yr olds. but no, NOT one came to my booth!

Now as you know, jump houses require the kids to remove their shoes.
M, who has ALWAYS had a shoe fetish (genetic??) decided that the safest thing to do was to leave her shoes with me.

Hence, she and her friend deposited their rainboots in front of my booth.
Other kids noticed this newly formed “shoe-stand” and began handing me their shoes and within minutes from a rat-toss stand, I became the local “shoe-minder-gal” — the kind you see in front of the Hindu temples!!

I thought out of courtesy these kids would come and play my game.
Nope!

They did come once in a while to hand me their head-bands, or jerseys or scarves but never to play the “rat-toss”.

I got frustrated with my diminished role, so I called out to M and implored her to play.
She rushed to me, and said in a loud whisper, “shhhhh I do NOT want them to know you are my mom —
I really wish you had picked a better stand!”

Huh?

Then I saw my other neighbor had a line 20 kids long!
He was manning the “jump and eat the donut” stand.
Every kid was given 3 chances to jump and get a bite of the hot-glazed donut.

It began to dawn on me, that this whole thing was RIGGED.
I was handed the booby-prize stand!!

No kid worth his/her salt was going to come and toss rats for random prizes.
Not when there was “eat the donut”, “jump house”, “face painting”, “temporary tattoo”,
and “cookie coloring” type activity.

So i decided to change the rules.
I said I would give out prizes just for showing up.
no tossing or for that matter no winning necessary.

Even that did not lure many for it was difficult to spread the word with the whoops of joy emanating from my neighbor’s stand.
(what was so special about donut-eating anyways? I could have done that too you know!!)

So I thought a quick demonstration might be in order.
I picked out a few rats and stood about 10 ft in front and *tried* to toss them in.
Unfortunately, I am not exactly well coordinated and I seriously think that I have a parallax problem.

Anyways, let us just say that not *one* rat fell in the vat, any vat!

I tried to not make a big deal of it.
So I quietly sidled back to my stand, but a 5th grader caught the whole action.
He laughed out loud and offered to teach me how to throw.
The baseball pitcher that he was he simply nailed every single rat into the 100 pt vat.
Luckily, his action-packed tossing, brought in a few more brats and I doled out all the prizes in 10 mins!

While the other parents were still manning the booths, I packed up and walked out whistling into the rain.

I may not have had the best booth, but at least I was done in 1hr!!

“Losers!!” I thought 🙂

Except every time the topic of volunteering came by, and I tried to put a good spin on my “effort”, M and her friend promptly disabused my rose-colored recollections with “Actually, NO ONE wanted to play in your booth”, “Remember, you had to look after the shoes!!”

That sort of humiliation makes you wonder whether honesty is really the best policy?? 🙂
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Epilogue: Which brings me to present day: Last week I finally caved in. I signed up to be the head-room-parent, the class photographer, the volunteer-parent (helper) one day a week, and created mailing list for parents etc.

Why? because another carnival is coming up and this time I am picking the “jump and eat the donut” stand — let’s see who’s laughing then! 🙂