Gratitude journal: The denial of ice cream

Tonight I am grateful that I did not grow up in Park Slope in 2012 where lunatic parents are attempting to ban ice cream trucks from the public parks because saying no to their children is difficult and sometimes makes their children cry.

“Along with the first truly beautiful day of the year, my son and I had our first ruined day at the playground. Two different people came into the actual playground with ice cream/Italian ice push carts. I was able to avoid it for a little while but eventually I left with a crying 4-year-old.”

No parent wants their four-year old son to cry, but if he cries when he is refused ice cream, those tears are a necessary and important part of growing up.

What I hear in this statement is a selfish woman who had her “first truly beautiful day of the year” ruined when her four-year old boy acted like a four-year old boy.

Thankfully, not every parent in Park Slope is an idiot.

One mom — who asked to remain anonymous for fear of being ostracized by other parents — said her friends want an ice-cream ban, but she disagrees.

“People just need to say no,” the mom said while with her son at Prospect Park’s aptly named Harmony Playground. “I say no to him all the time, and I feel his wrath. But he needs to hear that no.”

This mother is right, though why she is worried about being ostracized by a bunch of lunatic parents is beyond me. She should embrace the threat of being ostracized and use her free time to find more intelligent, reasonable friends.

There’s nothing worse than your kid becoming close friends with a spoiled brat.

I had very little growing up. Treats like ice cream were so rare that we learned to never even waste time asking for it. Yet I look back upon my childhood with great fondness. I was a happy child, and I learned how to be happy without the need for material possessions and ice cream.

These children in Park Slope need to learn these same lessons, and yes, learning these lessons can be difficult and even painful at times.

But what’s the alternative? Insulating your child from every possible temptation? Curbing desire by eliminating anything that your child might find desirous?

Tonight I am grateful to have grown up in a place at a time when the happiness of a child and a parent did not supersede the importance of a lesson learned.