Stolen Glory

A month or so ago my daughter a few of her friends won an award...read here for more info. Anyway at the presentation a group of parents were discussing how it wasn't fair that since they won for a group they wouldn't get anything for themselves. The four students were given one award to share, well we live on a military base...one child is moving to Yellowknife, NWT; another to Greenwood, Nova Scotia; the other two are leaving the school they attend now and going to two different high schools. So basically the four of them sharing this award is not possible. They four students decided amoungst themselves to give the award to the teacher taht was with them through this whole thing, which is great but the parents wanted the kids deserved something.

My husband used to work with the man who owns the local engraving store so we went down to talk to them and asked what they could do for us. I then came home and send messages to the other parents telling them the price they would give me and what we were getting, to check with them. Then I went back to the store and ordered them and the guy called on the weekend to ask me a few more questions. Then I never heard anything else...I had my husband call the man from the store at his day job and see if he knew what was going on. The guy told my husband that they were ready and he called the number that was on the paper, my husband said we were the ones that were in charge so we should have been called. He told my husband that there was a number on the paper with the awards and he called it but he knew it wasn't me or my husband but he was at his other job so he didn't know who it was.

After work my husband and I headed down to the store to find out what was going on. Here is how the conversation went...

Christopher: "we placed an order for awards for the kids who won Leaders of Tomorrow at RAR school. We were just wondering if they were done yet or not as Bruce called on the weekend and then we never heard anything else."

Joanne: "yes they are done, but you can't have them."

Tammy: "Why is that?"

Joanne: "I am not allowed to tell you just know that it is taken care of."

Tammy: "so I am supposed to drop what I started assuming they will be there for the award presentation on Tuesday."

Joanne: "Don't worry they will be there."

That was it, no explaination, nothing just don't sweat it because it is done. I was so annoyed, not because someone had paid for them...they were only like 25$ a piece it was only like a hundred dollars or so, so that didn't bother me. What bothered me was I did all the leg work, I had done the research, I had placed the order and everything but when it was time to pick up the finished product they were gone. I couldn't even see how they turned out. I assumed that the school decided it was up to them to pay for them and picked them up so I came home and changed my status on facebook to say I was annoyed that I had started a project and someone came in and took over at the last moment. I sent all the parents a note saying that the awards were done and that I had no idea where they were as someone else took over. Well one of the parents wrote me asking what the problem was? I told her it was long and complicated..she then messaged me to tell me that it was her and her husband that took over the awards, that they thought they were doing something nice.

I was even more annoyed now. These parents have three students in this school and the youngest one is like ten, they volunteer for everything (just a note about this school, they only ask certain people to help with stuff and if those people can't make it then they ask the others, so I am not a volunteer for this school because I wasn't available to volunteer until this year so the only time they ask me is when their favourites can't make it no matter how many times I say I am available). These parents have a good standing with the school and teachers, the mother has almost 300 friends on facebook and most of them are kids from the school. Anyway that is not the important stuff...the part that annoys me was that they took over a project that I did all the work for and it will make them look even better at the school.

So my question is am I over reacting? Yes it was nice of them to pay for the awards, but couldn't they have gone in and paid for the awards and still allowed me to pick them up without all this fuss. If it was about doing something nice and paying for the awards why did they have to take over. If it were me and I wanted to do something nice that I didn't want anyone to know about I wouldn't go in and take the awards and deliver them to the school, I would have went in with some cash, paid for them and left. To me it is more about making them look good. I did not do this to look good, when it is all over I will tell my daughter that I ordered the awards and that this family paid for them because we as the parents felt they deserved them, and that is the only person out of this who's opinion matters to me is my girl. But why do people feel it is necessary to step on other people to get to the top...they were quite capable of doing the whole project themselves.