Two weeks back we were invited to our neighbour’s house for a house warming gathering. They had bought the house couple of months back and have settled in the place for about 4 months now. So, when they said, house warming, I was a little surprised. May be they wanted to settle down before they had friends over and this was their way of sharing their happiness with friends … even though a little late.
I had to mention that they had settled 4 months back, because they have a daughter almost a year older than Cantaloupe. Cantaloupe has always enjoyed playing with older kids. I thought the neighbors’ kid “S” would be a good playmate for her. I have had them a couple of times at my house... and I can have a decent conversation with S parents … Cantaloupe is comfortable playing with S without much parent involvement.
OK, back to the house warming story. We were invited to be there by around 11:00am. So we went there around the same time. The host couple were busy doing the “Sathyanarayan Pooja”. There were around 7-8 adults in the living room. ( we did not know any of them). We settled down in one of the corners … Cantaloupes’ little eyes started looking for S. After about 15min, she asked where S was. She had been asking about S ever since morning and we had told her that she could play with her when we went to their house. Kids were running in and out of a room and we figured S might be in the room with other kids. So we encourage Cantaloupe to go to the room by herself and play with S. Though hesitant initially, Cantaloupe couldn’t much resist the idea of playing with other kids and went to the room. BP and I were glad she was learning to make friends by herself. After about 10mins, Cantaloupe came running back to us and said “S says, she does not want to play with me”. I was very angry to hear that … how dare S not play with my daughter who is such a lovely kid. But I knew that S was a kid too …. So I encouraged Cantaloupe to go in and say she wanted to be part of the group. Cantaloupe accordingly went inside again, only to come out within 5 mins, saying “S does not want me inside”. This time, S came out of the room and announced “I don’t want to play with you Cantaloupe!!!” Cantaloupe was perhaps hurt by S’s reaction. But BP and I soon diverted her attention to some other kid, who had by then settled beside us. This kid was more friendly and Cantaloupe was busy playing with her most of the time we were at the neighbor’s place.

Yesterday, we were driving out of our garage when S and her mom were walking out of their garage. Cantaloupe promptly shouted “Hi S” from the car. S yelled back “Hi Cantaloupe” … “You want to play with me?”. Cantaloupe responded “I am going out with appa and amma… we can play once I am back”. As we drove off from our apartment complex, Cantaloupe asked “S wants to play with me today?” BP and I said together “Of course dear, she wants to… you can play once we are back” Cantaloupe asks back “She wants to play with me because she does not have any of her other friends?”

BP and I were too shocked to hear that … I managed to say “No dear, she will play with you even when other kids are around.” Cantaloupe did not ask any further questions ….