I can't write this email...

Oh no. Poor Sozlet. I hope Sally gets over this `rejected love' drama soon, before this turns bad permanently.

I get what you're saying and mostly agree with what you're getting at, but the thing to remember here is that these girls are around 5 or 6 years old. They're not allowed to make their own play dates and I'm guessing they are not allowed to use the telephone like that yet.

I agree.

Mo doesn't really get to use the phone except to call home and let me know where he's landed when he's out playing with the kids who live on our street. And, while he does have our phone number memorized, he does sometimes need help with that.

Playing with kids that don't live on our block is a whole different ballgame. It takes some arranging between parents. Who is going to drop off and who is going to pick up and at what times. Most parents work so there is that to further complicate things.

Yes. Parents have busier schedules these days. (So do the kids.)

At the age of 13, they don't call it "playdates." SonofEva and his friend(s) talk on their cell phones or at school and decide they want to get together on a certain day (they know their schedules). Then they ask their parents. Then the parents call each other and work out whose house, how long, who drops off & picks up, etc. depending on the parents' schedules. (Most of us are pretty loose.)

None of SonofEva's friends live in the neighborhood like when he was younger. They're all over town now. Most of them are classmates or former classmates.

The last time I had to intervene between him and a friend was in 5th grade (more than 2 years ago.) That is not to say that it couldn't happen again. If he gets himself in another situation he can't handle, I might have to. But most of the time, I can just talk to him about it. He's pretty smart about people.

I was gonna chime in on the "why arrange playdates" question, but I see it has been answered.

Dittos to the three previous posts.

So on our way out of the pool today, ran into them... I went up to the mom, chatted, made sure we were cool, and we are. I do like the mom, kind of hope things get better between sozlet and Sally, but that's up to them. We'll see.

How would you describe the interaction between Sozlet and Sally, if any?

None. Sozlet was in another part of the pool, lollygagging with yet another friend as I was trying to get her to go. I saw Sally's mom and went over to chat with her. Sally asked where sozlet was, I pointed. She saw her but didn't go over. They went another direction after we finished talking (seemed organic, it's a big place), then I went and collected sozlet, and left.

When I chatted with the mom though we established that everyone would be at an event this evening (this community has a zillion events over the summer, part of what I like about it), so we'll see how that goes.

Just curious: Any new developments in the Sally story? Or has Sozlet just moved on to other friends?

We did indeed run into them a bunch after the email exchange. First several encounters didn't go well, then they both went to a birthday party together and played together there and that seemed to go better. Then they saw each other at the pool shortly after that, and since they'd had fun together at the party sozlet was fine with playing together at the pool, and again there were major problems. Then shortly after that we left town for a week (just got back) and so haven't seen them in a while.

It's never really been about "moving on" to other friends since she's always had other friends at the same time -- there wasn't a time when Sally was her only or her main friend. Sally was always just one of a group of kids she liked, and then the "liking" part eroded.

The common denominator to effective interaction seems to be supervision. Sally seems to do OK if there are adults (other than her mom -- depends) watching her and reining her in, and/ or if there are structured activities, but for just free play things always seem to go downhill fast.

When the kids were playing at the pool that last time I chatted with Sally's mom, and it turned out that two other kids at the pool were close neighbors (next-door and across the street) of theirs. They were all close in age, and I said something like "that must be great to have friends so closeby!" Sally's mom said well, they don't really get along. Her phrasing was something like "They're too alike, or too different, or something, but..." <mimed a sort of clashing motion>

Anyway, at this point I'm comfortable that the situation has been adequately resolved -- no playdates, and if Sally figures out how to act in such a way that, when they run into each other, sozlet WANTS to play with her, fine... but that sozlet's under no obligation to play with her when they see each other.

Sure. Thanks for the update!

I appreciate that people are interested enough that they want updates. :-)

By the way, in the interval between the "no, sorry" email and the birthday party, sozlet did well with just not playing with Sally when they ran into each other. She'd give her a chance, and then when it was clear things weren't working, she'd go find someone else to play with. One time sozlet was already playing with some kids, Sally came up, sozlet was minimally civil while continuing to play with the other kids, and after a bit Sally just kind of wandered off. I felt bad for her, but it was the next time they got together that Sally did particularly well and they had a fun time (at the b'day party).

That sounds encouraging. Perhaps Sally is learning something -- possibly in leaps and bounds.

Well, the time after that DIDN'T go well... but we'll see.

I feel sympathetic enough to Sally that I'm putting some effort into not making it a project -- sozlet has plenty of friends and has the right to NOT be friends with someone she doesn't want to be friends with.

But I do hope Sally figures things out.