We stopped at one of our favorite restaurants to have a meal while we were in Maine. Sitting at one of the outside tables was a woman eating. She had an infant in a seat next to her. About 10 feet away were a young boy about 3-4 and a young girl about 2-3. They were "playing" on the edge of the parking lot by picking up the stones and tossing them in the air in the direction of everyone's vehicles. The woman occasionally glanced over at them. The baby gurgled and attempted to swat at the woman who never turned to look at the baby.
The little girl began picking up handfuls of stones and distributing them in the grass. I cringed. We have small stones around the landscaping at home and I know what a pain it can be when they stray over into the lawn and then make their way into the lawn mower where they are spit out at my unsuspecting bare legs! As the girl head back with another handful, the woman gestured for her to return them to whence they came. The little girl's expression never seemed to change, she deposited them back into the lot and at the woman's request came back to the table where she climbed up on the seat of the small picnic table and began to jump up and down. She was joined by the boy, who sat at the table and seemed to sulk a bit until he discovered that he could go around and bop the baby repeatedly on the head with one of the baby's plastic toys. The baby continued to try and get the woman's attention and continued to fail. My son returned to our table at about the time that the woman was packing up to leave. Something had transpired between her and the young boy, as he had become agitated and was less than cooperative as the woman began to pack up to leave. She put the baby on her hip and started heading toward the street as she continued to argue with the boy who was now throwing a toy in the parking lot. He sulked away from her as she told him to pick up the toy. I thought she would be heading to a vehicle parked in the lot, but instead, she headed out towards the highway where there were vehicles parked along the shoulder of the busy highway. I didn't see or hear her say anything or motion to the little girl who just filed in behind her. As they made their way along the busy highway, between the cars parked on the shoulder, I never saw her so much as glance back at this little girl. The boy, all of about 4 years old, was walking ahead of her on the shoulder. I heard a voice next to me, "I can't believe she's taking those children out on the highway like that!" When they finally made it to their vehicle, we heard a child crying in protest. I can only imagine that once out of sight the boy had suffered the wrath of the woman's displeasure with him.
All of this resulted in a discussion between my son and I about whether or not the children should have been permitted to walk along the highway like that. He had seen the way she *seemed* to treat these children with apparent indifference and that was what really bothered me the most. They were all clean, looked well fed, they did seem to listen to her when she required their attention, it was her lack of.....caring that bothered me the most, her indifference, I felt fearful as I watched that little girl walk along the highway behind her, it wouldn't take much to distract her, would it? What if she tripped? Was I over reacting? My son, in his infinite wisdom listened to me tell him about the stones and the jumping etc and he asked, "Did you ever think to offer to help her?" Actually, I had, I told him, I was going to entertain the baby a bit so she could eat, but the baby didn't seem to really concern her. I wondered though if I should have asked if I could give her a hand and I wondered what right we had to criticize when we weren't even willing to offer her a hand getting those children back to the car.