One Too Many Social Skills

Kate and I are both pretty average when it comes to initiating conversations with strangers. And, like my inability to put drives down the middle of the fairway, or hers to parallel park with the car actually parallel to the kerb, this is one of those traits I'd hoped Austin would be spared.

It turns out I needn't have worried.

Yesterday Austin and I paid our second visit to the Rozelle Ramblers playgroup; still a room full of strange mums and kids. Where Kate would have remained by my side, Austin spends the next hour working the room, his smile and babbling ingratiating him to mothers and toddlers alike.

Other parents play with their kids in a sea of mainly self-contained huddles, but his actions leave me stranded and alone. A wallflower in a suburban playgroup.

Safety concerns and self-interest give me the occasional opportunity to venture over and be reunited with my son. Alas, he simply wanders off in search of yet more new friends.

Thanks mate. Now I'll have to talk to someone.

It's not like I wouldn't have done it eventually, but I now move over to one of the mums while contemplating how much to deduct from his inheritance. As I do I'm struck by the extent to which he has control over this situation. Aren't parents supposed to be in the driving seat? Surely not only where holidays and rainy-day drop-offs are concerned?

Of course, I should be proud and delighted. And I am, very. It would just be nice to not be the least interesting person in the room.

That said, there is a silver lining. We'll clearly have no reason to worry when it comes time to pack him off to daycare. No teary farewells with this lad. No walking out the door with a toddler hanging off your trouser leg.

Yesterday I doubt he'd have noticed if I'd popped out for brunch.