Finished up a great weekend volunteering at ScotFest here in Tulsa Oklahoma. I met some amazing people and beautiful children. Worked the children's area, lots of jumpy houses, art, and other fun activities. Not enough vollenteers though, so I pulled double shifts and got a good sunburn making sure the kids didn't kill themselves or someone else in the jumpy structures.
I've been taking care of babies since I was ten. I am the oldest out of my cousins and babysat since I was 13 years old, did some nanny gigs in-between paralegal jobs as well.
One of my duties this weekend was to make sure the kids hands were stamped and their parents paid $5.00 for a weekend access to the play area. Usually I just grabbed the child's hand to check for a stamp before they started playing. No stamp, I would send them off to their guardians and that was it.
One lady took exception and told me not to touch her child or anyone's child for that matter! All weekend I've been wrangling kids and keeping them in order, pulling them off or out of situations, making sure they waited their turn, parents stood back and took pictures. Sometimes I'd take the wee ones up the slides and go down with them, when they were to frightened to go by themselves.
I apologized to the conserned parent and said I would not touch her child again. "But we come from different cultures", I gently told her. "Where I came from there is no problem picking up a kid or telling them to behave, everyone helps out," I tried to reason with her. She said, " I didn't sound sorry." Big warning sign there!
Thank goodness I was wearing sunglasses, she might of seen I was trying not to laugh at a behavior I'd never witnessed before! That would of esculated a potentially volital situation . She did state, she did not know I was a volunteer, but I think she was fibbing. I wore a purple shirt that said volunteer on it. I kept my mouth shut though, by that time her voice was getting an edge to it. The woman had a weird effected lisp to her voice, almost valley-girlish, she was in her late 30s and her child was around 9 or 10 years old. I think she as from the East Coast, maybe the New York area, defiantly not California.
After the incident I asked all parents if I could touch their child during their playtime. Everyone said yes and were very friendly too! I can learn and adjust to changing times without conflict or resentment.
Times are changing with "stranger danger," I respect that, but usually a relative or friend is the person who is going to harm your child. I never see kids playing outside anymore, there seems to be fear everywhere. Here are some stats on child abduction The Polly Klaas Foundation.
99.8% of the children who go missing do come home.
- Nearly 90% of missing children have simply misunderstood directions or miscommunicated their plans, are lost, or have run away.
9% are kidnapped by a family member in a custody dispute.
3% are abducted by non-family members, usually during the commission of a crime such as robbery or sexual assault. The kidnapper is often someone the child knows.
Only about 100 children (a fraction of 1%) are kidnapped each year in the stereotypical stranger abductions you hear about in the news.
About half of these 100 children come home.
It was in the high 90s all weekend, I am so glad to be home! I was so busy I didn't have much time to get pictures of the handsome men in kilts or rugby players, wonderful Scottish dancers, and the Scottish games. I took a few and will post tomorrow.
