Inspired by a poll among members of the UK parenting website Mumsnet.com to identify different types of “school gate mums”, we came up with our own version of the people you meet:
OFFICE MUM dashes in with her children in the morning, irritated at the mothers who clearly have nothing better to do except stand and chat and leave their cars in coveted parking spaces for minutes on end. She is running late because she only spotted the baby’s dried-up dribble on the shoulder of her suit jacket in the hall mirror on the way out and had to dash upstairs to sponge it off. Do these stay-at-home mothers not know she is in a HURRY and still has the creche drop-off to do?
SPORTY MUMstands out in her Lycra – shorts in summer and leggings in winter. She often collects her children straight after a morning's training, typically a 10k run followed by a workout at the gym or a swim and sauna.
The sight of her lean body instantly makes other mothers regret that chocolate muffin they had with their morning coffee.
PTA MUMis to be avoided, as she is likely to be rounding up "volunteers" to sell tickets for the next parents' fundraising event or – even worse – trying to co-opt people onto the committee.
She is hard to refuse, so it is best to keep out of her way unless you are a fellow PTA member of course, in which case you can whinge together about other parents unwilling to lift a finger for things that are going to “benefit all our children”.
CELEBRITY MUMposes a bit of a dilemma to the school gate regulars. We pride ourselves in Ireland on not taking undue notice of the better-known people living in our midst, but it is hard not to stare on her occasional appearance at the school gate.
Although she avoids eye contact she might welcome a chat.
However, will other mums think you are trying to wrangle a play date for your child at her fabulous house if you go over and talk to her?
THE GRUMBLERis usually giving out about something and draws a like-minded group around her. She is not happy with her child's teacher and likes to swap accounts of her failings with other parents. Of course, she has not said anything to the teacher herself, in case complaining makes things worse for her child, but she hopes to get a deputation to go straight to the principal – safety in numbers and all that.
GLAM MUMnever goes out the door without her make-up on and makes sure she has chosen an outfit the night before, so she is not panicking about what to wear in the morning. Of course, the weather might dictate a wardrobe change for the lunchtime pick-up.
She wonders how some women can bear to be dressed in exactly the same jeans and fleece jacket day after day – she never saw motherhood as a reason to become dowdy.
LATE MUMsupposedly has the best of both worlds because she has a part-time job, but in fact she always feels guilty that she is doing neither her work nor her parenting properly.
It is hard to get away from the office and it is usually her child who is the last to be collected, his forlorn face pressed up against the classroom window.
Sometimes she will ring a friend and beg her to take him until she gets there, so she does not have to face the teacher yet again.
GAELGOIR MUMis most commonly spotted outside gaelscoileanna. She loves to be able to converse in her native language and usually makes a beeline for equally fluent parents.
That isn’t to say she doesn’t try to draw a cúpla focal out of the less able too – although she wonders why they do not make more of an effort when they are sending their children to an Irish-speaking school.
ALOOF DADis there every day, because what little work he still has he does from home while his wife is the main breadwinner, but he still feels uncomfortable among all these women. Anyway, he has no desire to join in the inane sounding chatter around him and finds the "right-on" fathers a bit much too.
"RIGHT-ON" DADis very comfortable with his stay-at-home status, talks to anybody and enjoys flirtations with some of the better-looking women.
He befriends other fathers as they appear on the scene because he knows what it’s like when you are a “newbie”.
