Oops

I yelled at someone else's kid today. And he yelled back at me. When I got to school this afternoon to pick up the boys, there was a fire truck there, lights flashing, with the ladder way up in the air. My heart stopped. And then when I didn't see an ambulance or smoke, I realized it must be fire-prevention day. Whew. So my adrenalin was already pumping when I saw this 13-year-old push Shaggy to the ground. And the Mother Bear in me came out. I yelled at him:

Me: Hey! Don't ever push him again!

Kid: Well, what am I supposed to do!

Me: Help him up and apologize!

Kid: Well he's yelling right in my face!

Me: So come talk to me about it, don't push him down. (I was starting to calm down a bit by this time)

Kid: Whatever! (and he walked away)

And then I started feeling bad. Reeming out this kid who is a middle child, and obviously going through hormone-induced, teen-age angst. But he shouldn't have pushed a 9-year-old down. And now I'm worried that this same kid will take it out on Zoomer tonight at gym night. Last week this kid was kicked out of gym night because he thought Zoomer tripped him. So this kid got mad, threw a broom and kicked over some pylons. So his dad was called to come and get him and take him home. The more I think about it, the more I think I should call this kid up and apologize for yelling at him. I'm the adult (most of the time) and I should set the example.

*****

Update: So I called the kid and apologized. He said it was okay and thanked me. Husband asked me if he apologized as well. He didn't. I didn't expect him too, and I'm not the type of person to apologize and then say but you shouldn't have done blah blah blah... irritates the heck out of me. And then Husband laughed and said, No, you don't say that, you just call him a little twirp as you're apologizing. I didn't think that was very nice. Because in this case, I actually wasn't thinking that.