Every week, Mallory Ortberg answers additional questions from readers, just for Slate Plus members.
Q. Angry in Seattle: My husband’s truck broke down last night, a good 20-minute drive from my MIL’s house, with my husband and our 2-year-old and 14-year-old sons in it. I was 90 minutes away. My husband texted that he called for an Uber to take the children to his mother’s (who wasn’t home), so they could wait there alone until AAA came and got him and the truck. I was horrified. Who puts children in a car with a stranger to drive out to the country, to a dark empty house?
An Uber driver is a total stranger, and this seems patently unsafe to me. I called my MIL crying, and she rushed from her errands to pick up the boys, but if I hadn’t called, he would have sent them off alone with a stranger on a dark rainy night. Who does this?
He says I’m overreacting and it would have been fine. I said he should have gone with his children and had the tow truck take the vehicle without him, or left it until morning. Am I overreacting? This feels like a huge breach of good judgment to me.
A: Your husband was faced with a series of imperfect options; I think two reasonable adults could disagree over what to do in his situation, but I don’t think you should question his overall judgment. Uber drivers, while strangers, are professionally vetted and unlikely to be child murderers. And many 14-year-olds (though not all 14-year-olds) can be trusted to look after a 2-year-old for a few hours while waiting in a relative’s house.
It’s fine for you to disagree with your husband’s choice, and to have a conversation about what you’d rather he do in a similar situation in the future, but I don’t think he was taking unnecessary risks with your children’s lives.
