Moral dilemma

I've always made a pretty big deal out of my son's birthday. I love attempting to come up with a better idea each year ... I love the themes and the planning. And while his birthday isn't until the end of October, I usually start thinking about it in August, around the time the school year starts.

This year was different, of course ... I knew I couldn't think about October until after the trial in September. Well, Oct. 1 showed up yesterday (Hello, October), and I was all, CRAP, what should I plan for R's birthday this year?

We'd talked about a broom ball party, but that wasn't working out with "private ice" dates and times, and then it clicked. Holy crap, I had come up with the greatest idea EVER. The Dallas Sidekicks season opener is the Saturday immediately following my son's birthday. We could have a party there! I'll get a premium suite package, 15 tickets, cake, an autographed ball from the team, pre-match time in the locker room ... R would get to run on the field pre-match with the players ... his name would be on the jumbotron in LIGHTS. Oh I loved this idea. I loved it SO MUCH.

Then I realized ... it's the first weekend of the month. It's his weekend with his father. I would have to ask him to swap a Saturday with me, if he would even be willing ... and I sent an email about possibly swapping, and he was FINE with it.

And I was HIGH on this idea. I know one of the players on the team and had told him about it, and he's hoping to see R and wish him a happy birthday, and it was AWESOME. For like two hours.

Because I then realized that ... I was asking R's father to swap Saturdays so that I could have the Saturday of the season-opener, so that I could take R and his friends to the match, get the suite package, while HE would probably be scrambling for the money to buy two general admission seats ... so well, maybe I should just not swap, keep the dates, let HIM take R to the match -- father & son, on Nov. 2. It seemed like the fair thing to do.

So when that hit me and settled. I was LOW.

The timing of the opener couldn't have been better for a party idea ... but still I have empathy for this man who was throwing hand grenades at me in the courthouse a few weeks ago.

It's not about him ... it's about me, about my sense of what is "fair," what is "right." Go-karts and miniature golf ideas just aren't cutting it for me right now. This match was retail therapy in all of its glory ... money well spent, happily spent, in an attempt to delight my son and really, NO ONE else has had a Sidekicks party yet. This is totally new (especially since last season was their return to the field, after eight years off, as a member of the Central Division of the Professional Arena Soccer League). A great idea I'll have to pass on this year ...

I anticipate that I'll struggle with additional moral dilemmas such as this in the future.
Sigh.