Why it Sucks to be a Single Mom: Reason 78

Picture this, if you will: a large-ish room full of parents and children. There are tables along each wall with crafts, play-doh, etc. Enter Santa. The density in the room is not unlike that of a mosh pit. With Santa in the middle. But Santa is not moshing. That would be ridiculous.

Santa makes his way to the other end of the room where they will do pictures, candy canes and other Santa stuffs. The line is the entire length of the room. And nearly the width as well, because of the craft tables.

Got all of that?

Well, Ryder and I played with the play-doh because there was no way in hell I was going to stand in that line. I figured that we would wait til it died down. We waited and waited and waited. Then I felt as though I was going to have an anxiety melt-down if we didn't leave soon, so in the line we went.

Obviously Ryder is not going to just stand in line. But that was mostly okay because the line went by all the craft tables. So, I figured that he could craft and I would stand in line behind him.

Problem number 1: apparently if the child is not in line, neither are you, or so some parents thought. They were just pushing by me when my attention was turned.

Problem number 2: the second that Ryder moves out of arms reach and I have to go get him, I lose my spot in line. Back to the end for us.

This is Santa people. Apparently this is serious business. There are pictures and promises of toys to be had. I just wanted to leave. Ryder did not. I really wanted him to get a chance to see Santa, but couldn't figure out how to.

We ended up waiting until the very last second. Ryder was literally the last child. We got a great picture and Ryder was really excited.

I guess what really bothered me most was this particular family that was in line. One of the children was playing at the table with us and stayed until one of his parents came and got him because it was their turn. We couldn't do that. That is what sucked.