Owlhaven 's The Grocery Store Gauntlet reminded me of a situation that I ran into because I am single and didn't think before I spoke.



I lived on a street where the kids played on the street and everyone's yards during the summer. Neighborhood kids were constantly coming in and out of my house. It was really nice weather (cooling off) and there was a beautiful sunset. I went outside to relax and doing nothing other then watch my child play.


I put my brain in neural and was in the moment. A neighbor who had just moved onto the block. She came over to talk. So here how the conversation went...


Neighbor: Hi, my name is Sarah. I moved into the blue house.


Me: Nice to met you. Is that your boy?


Neighbor: Oh yes. I finally finished unpacking. My husband, Jack... (sigh) He just was..... you know work took up so much of his time. And I got to unpack.


Neighbor: Are you married?


Me: Nope, not even once.


Neighbor: Is that your daughter? (pointing my darling daugher Natasha)


Me: Yeap...


(I was totally relaxed at this point. I didn't realize that I just told her I was an unmarried mother. And looking back at this conversation later, the neighbor started getting judgemental toward me after this answer. I was a woman of loose morals)


Neighbor: Is the daddy (pointing to my daughter) still around?


Me: Hmmmmmm....... I don't know. I don't know his name.


loooooooooooong pause


I turned to look at the woman and finally realized what I had told her. I had never been married and I don't know my child's father's name. She wasn't not thinking nice thoughts about me.


And she actually physically moved away from me.


I am single, so the only father my daughter has is her birth father. I had a conversation with my daughter on her birth parents earlier this week.


And we had to talk .... about me not being married and therefore she didn't have a adopted daddy. She wanted to know why I couldn't go out and find her a daddy. Then we talked about how she did had a daddy.... her birth daddy. And we talked about how sad it was we didn't have her daddy's name.


I looked in my neighbor's judging eyes and decided to just relax and enjoy the sunset. I saw no reason to mention Natasha was adopted. I didn't feel the need to defend my reputation.