Alex and his wife, Kathy, have an 18-month-old son who, among other his hobbies, enjoys pulling off his socks and shoes at any opportunity. (Perhaps he’s a future marathon-running superathlete. Or, you know, a normal 18-month-old.)

Recently, Kathy took her son with her on a trip to the store in their hometown of Las Vegas (temperature: a bone-chilling 64 degrees). When she came back to the car, she found this helpful bit of parenting advice waiting on her windshield.

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You know how it’s usually way easier to write off someone off as an annoying asshole than it is to feel sorry for them? But then something happens — like this whiteboard note — and suddenly, you feel like the asshole…but you still resent the person for making you feel that way. And now it’s just awkward all around, because that person doesn’t want pity from an asshole like you, anyway. Sigh.

This note makes me sad, so I will choose to deal with these uncomfortable feelings by blaming the parents, even though I know that isn’t fair either. Now I feel sorry for the parents, too. Okay, I’m going to look at more pictures from the Puppy Bowl now.

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It’s almost Valentine’s day, and yet the Christmas guilt trips keep rolling in! Savanna in Texas says her friend received this doozy of a card from her parents (the front of which said, “Joy to the World.”)

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“During the past few weeks, our  preschool-aged son has been trying to play games that are too violent for his classmates,” Juli says. “We’ve been trying to work on the problem with the teacher, but each morning’s drop-off has become a guilt and angst-filled time for me, in part because I can tell the teacher is trying to be nice but is so obviously annoyed by my child that I can’t control!”

(No need for siding with “team preschool teacher” or “team mom,” here — this kind of relationship is just emotionally fraught no matter how you slice it.)

And of course, the guilt doesn’t stop there. Jennifer in St. Cloud, Minnesota, found this note in her son’s lunchbox (along with most of a ham sandwich).

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Joel in Glendale, California was raised in a religious Christian family, and apparently someone let it slip to his grandmother (bless her heart!) that he’s — gasp!— an atheist. Aaaaand…let the backhanded compliments begin!

Dear Joel, I have heard that you say you’re an athesis [sic]. I don’t believe that because you have so many Christian qualities. You are honest, loyal, kind and giving- not to mention handsome and extremely talented. (Now —Those are gifts from God!) Please use this check to have a great New Years day Breakfast.

________________________________________________________________________________________________

Adds Joel: “I’d like to point out that she mailed me this check for $20 after I asked her not to send me money and she promised she wouldn’t. Lying isn’t very Christian, Grandma!”

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Claire and her mom found this relic of childhood while going through a filing cabinet over Christmas. “Neither of us know what prompted it,” Claire says, “though apparently I was mad enough about something to write her this note, but not mad enough to go to bed without her telling me goodnight. Boy, was I one passive-aggressive 11-year-old!”

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“My stepsister, Grace, kept ripping the tab off the cereal box every time she tried to close it,” writes Danielle in Michigan. “My mom got very frustrated and taped this note to the top of the box” — an act I’m sure only helped to strengthen to bond of the stepmom/stepdaughter relationship.

Wouldn’t you love to hear Grace’s side of the story?

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Writes our submitter in Lexington, Kentucky: “One day, I updated my Facebook status to something about how no one in my city knows how to properly use a turning lane. The next day, I got this e-mail from my mom. She often makes similar judgments about what personality traits I should have because I’m ‘such a pretty girl.’”

Annoying? Sure. But aside from the irritating Momsian/Victorian conflation of physical/moral beauty, I think I’m actually on Team Mom for this one. (Of course, had I received a similar e-mail from my own mom, I’d hardly be so clear-eyed. Such is the nature of the mother/daughter dynamic!)

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