Introduction To The Competitive Sport Of Motherly Kvelling

The only other commonality is that we kvetch that getting our kids to all these activities is entirely time-consuming, and that we can’t feel our asses on the steel benches, as we shiver in cold hockey rinks every damn weekend. It’s terrible, but I don’t even know the first names of these “mommy friends.” The contact list on my phone is filled with, “Ryan’s mother,” “Adam’s mother,” or “Ben’s mother.” I appreciate these mommy friends who I can kvell with, saying to each other how much our kids have improved from the previous week, even though their team usually loses 12-0, week after week.

Also on this second level are “social” friends, who I see at charity events, parties, and with whom I may go out for a drink a couple times a year. This is, again, on a superficial level, where our only commonality is that we have kids, and we like wine.

My “social” friends will, as I will, mostly talk about what school their kids go to, how old they are, what subjects they excel at, and what they may want to be when they grow older.

Finally, there are my true friends, friends whose names I know, whose birthdays I know, who I talk to all the time. I find this interesting, but with these really close friends, that I’ve known for years, well, we barely kvell or kvetch about our children at all!

We basically ask, “all good with the kids?” before moving on to talking about anything other than our kids.

Some of my good friends should be kvelling about their kids, who have signed record deals, have written books, and can speak many languages. In fact, it’s me who has to drag kvelling out of them, when their children achieve something that is truly remarkable, that I will find out about on Facebook or Instagram.

So, while some of my friends’ kids know they want to study law, my unicycle-riding daughter has too many interests, wants to try everything, and could just as easily end up as prime minister, as she could a life-long ski bum.

I am being completely truthful when I say that I would say to a competitive kveller, “that’s great about your kid getting into the university of their choice! My daughter, Rowan? Well, she’s somewhere in Europe, selling ice cream to make enough money so she can just travel more. She’s a nomad!”

I simply don’t give a hoot about what others may think of what my daughter ends up doing with her life. I’d still kvell about her choice to be a nomad, equally as I would if she became an ambassador to the United Nations.

All that being said, I have shown a photo of Rowan practicing unicycle riding to my Uber driver, to a doorman, to my trainer, and even my gardener. Maybe I am more of a competitive Jewish mother kveller than I thought? Well, does your teenager know how to ride a unicycle?