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A Slippery Slope

I have friends who have a ten-year-old boy. This Christmas, in the midst of all my shopping, I came across an awesome sled and decided to buy it for him. I had a great sled when I was a kid, and still have lots of wonderful memories of zipping down hills on cold winter days.

I brought it by their house and he opened it in front of me. You should have seen the look on his face. I should add that his Dad had mentioned that the boy was hinting that he wanted a new sled, but that money was pretty tight this year. I felt good that I was able to make this little wish come true.

Last weekend, I dropped by to visit. The boy’s leg is in a cast up to his hip. You guessed it. Sledding.

Of course, I feel terrible. But what is bothering me the most is that his parents told me they threw away the sled because it was too dangerous and they could never live with the guilt if another kid got a hold of it and hurt himself. I told them how sorry I was, and they said, in effect, that saying I was sorry wouldn’t mend their son’s leg. And it sure wouldn’t pay the doctor bills.

Now I feel responsible for the injury, and for ruining what I thought was a good friendship. What can I do?

—Anonymous

The Gay Perspective: Continue to be a good friend, and cut these folks some slack. They are mad at you? One could say that it is their own parental negligence in letting the child to go sledding unsupervised that has allowed this incident to occur. Perhaps it is their own sense of shock that is causing this boorish behavior, but unless you are overstating their irritation, these people seem to be misplacing their annoyance. An “accident” is an “accident.” No one meant for this to happen. Accidents happen to all of us, no matter how carefully we try to live our lives. They should be reassuring you by reminding you of that fact. Or, if they thought a sled was dangerous, they shouldn’t have accepted the gift -- or they should have told their ten-year old that they were putting the gift away until he was older. Do they also intend to forbid this child from ice-skating, skiing, hiking, bike riding, swimming, and all other physical activities? This would, of course, be their parental prerogative, but it still won’t prevent a ceiling from collapsing on the kid’s head some day. Whose fault will that be?

The Omniscient One says: There’s nothing you can do. The guilt trip your friends are laying on you is unreasonable, but anger and frustration are the enemies of reason. You can’t argue with anger and frustration; you can only wait for it to fade. Once it has, it seldom pays to dredge it up again for further examination. Time will heal the kid’s broken leg, and it may heal your friendship, too.

One thing I will say: You don’t want to justify your friends’ unreasonable anger by doing something so absurd as to offer to help with the hospital bills. If you give them reason to think they’re right to blame you, their indignation may find permanent purchase. They were delighted with the sled, too, right? They allowed their kid to use it. Nobody died or lost an eye or a finger. Be supportive, be appropriately regretful, but don’t forget that these things happen.

Ruthless says: You actually like these people?

Sounds as though they are preparing their son for a lifetime of atrophied muscles and vitamin D deficiency. Not to mention a social life that, well—he’ll be lucky if it’s non-existent rather than abusive.

What’s with this sled? Obviously it’s no “Rosebud,” but was it an XTreme Sled? Did it have a motor? A built-in parachute? Was he skeleton racing?

Kids break bones doing all kinds of things. I broke my wrist getting out of bed the other day.

Write this family off as one of those couples who used to be fine, until they had a kid and went all uptight and completely lost any grasp of reality. Or any semblance of a sense of humor. Or common courtesy. Or...

Ask Anyone is local advice by and for local people. Please send your questions for our panel of experts to advice@artvoice.com.

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