Last summer I was home, during pandemic “stay-at-home-or-at-least-in-your-bubble” orders, with three boys. Three full of energy, want to run outside, gosh our backyard is getting boring, boys. They wanted to know “can we have a trampoline?” With what money? They insisted life would be better if we had a better wading pool, or just a real one, which I agreed with, but still was not going to happen. The play structure seemed to have outlived its usefulness, and there are only so many hours one can spend looking for bugs and other creepy-crawlies in our woodpile or in the garden. Trying to catch butterflies is no use, because they just won’t be caught, and we already raised and let go two rounds of Painted Ladies in the spring. It was July and life was getting boring.
Every week, if not twice a week, I tried to find some kind of outing to tickle our fancy. We found nature parks to walk in, while walking AROUND any people we came across. The boys rode scooters along bike paths, while I tried to chase after them. We took picnics to the front yard and waved at people taking walks in the sunshine (hey it counts as an outing). My favorite thing to do on a hot summer day is to find a little part of a creek or river and put our feet in to cool off. This summer, however, was a total bust for this type of adventure.
The first time we tried we ended up in the dog-park section of the river which did not go over well AT ALL. My eight-year old, Luca, ran back down the trail, while I yelled at my older son to PLEASE follow him. He didn’t get the hint because my memory tells me that I only found Luca when I dragged four-year-old Ezra back up the trail and pleaded with someone coming our way if they had seen a terrified child running down the trail. They kindly told me he had stopped just around the corner. Noah (dear older son) then came up behind me and said something like, “see Mom, I told you it would be fine.” THANKS.
The second time we tried was at a popular boating lake in our area. It was Fourth of July weekend, or maybe the weekend before, but either way it was HOT as HADES and we found ourselves hiking way too far, in masks, trying to find a spot we could enjoy far enough away from boats and people. It was a bust. We managed to picnic somewhat secluded from others and pile back into the car to go find some ice cream. I was already feeling 0 for 2, but this next experience tops them all.
If you have ever had any contact with a four-year-old child, you know that they do not usually want to do what you ask them to. Most of the time, I insist that my children wear sandals in the water when we wade. I never am quite sure what is at the bottom of the pond, lake, river, stream, or ocean we have chosen on any specific outing, so best to be safe. After finishing our picnic, in a less than ideal spot because TOO MANY PEOPLE and PANDEMIC, the boys decided to take a dip in the water before we left. I reminded them to wear their sandals, please, but Ezra was staunchly against it. I insisted, and the activity proceeded. After about five minutes, he came tripping out of the water complaining that there was sand in his SANDAL, plopped himself down and ripped them off. I rinsed them in the water, and turned back to him, but before I could get his protective foot gear back on, he had already run back into the water. Sighing, I decided we were only going to be there another few minutes, and I let it go. I just want to remind myself and others that it is moments exactly like these when the trouble happens. When we think, “what could happen in three minutes…”
A cry I knew to be my child’s traveled through the air to my ears, as I saw him hobbling out of the stream. Blood filled the water around my little one’s toe. It brought to mind images of shark attack shows aired during Discovery’s Shark Week, though on a smaller scale. A little piranha appeared to have attacked my kid. More likely, it was a piece of glass from the way we later assessed the cut, but either way I could tell right then that we were going to need much more than a band-aid for this one. I pulled him out of the water and immediately realized that I was going to have to do something to stem the tide of red flowing from his big toe, or we were going to drip blood in a Hansel and Gretel trail all the way up to the car. I’ve been through enough blood-borne pathogens trainings to know that this would not be appreciated by the people we would pass on our way. Plus, it’s just gross. Unfortunately, the mama who has three boys and knows the importance of carrying band-aids everywhere, did not have any in her back pockets that day. Damn me! They were in the car. At the top of the hill. Glancing around, most people around us were blissfully unaware of the panic mounting in me, or the concerned questions my other two children were throwing at me. “Mom, what are we going to do? Do we need to go to the Dr.? Oh my God, Mom, there’s so much blood!” Yes, I KNOW there is so much blood, please, don’t scare the four-year-old, I pleaded with my eyes to my fourteen-year-old.
This is when the annoying habit middle-child Luca has of never being able to decide between pants and shorts on our summer outings came in handy. Usually I am so annoyed that I have to pack him an extra pair of bottoms, the opposite of whatever he leaves the house in, just in case he changes his mind when we get out of, or back into, the car. Today, he had changed from long black jogger pants into shorts in order to wade in the water, and wow was I thankful! Holding little Ezra away from my body for a few moments, as blood dripped onto the banks of the river, and was then lapped away by the water at the shoreline, I grabbed the black pants and wrapped them around his foot. It didn’t really matter to me at the time that I might have to throw them away, it was the only option. “MOM, those are his PANTS,” my fourteen year old pointed out. I rolled my eyes.
“I KNOW that, what else am I supposed to do?” I retorted. “Do you have a better idea?” His Helpfulness quieted down after that. I grabbed the little one, holding the black pants tight against his toe, my older son grabbed all our gear, and I implored my middle kiddo to follow as quickly as he could. Up the hill we went, dodging others, all of us wearing our masks as the sun glared down on us.
By this time, though I was remaining as calm as possible since my main goal was not to scare little Ezra, all the boys knew we were heading to the emergency room to get this taken care of. Awesome. That’s just where I wanted to be in the summer of a pandemic. THE HOSPITAL. All the way to the car Ezra kept saying, "I'm going to die like Luca's gecko!" (Luca’s pet Gecko had recently died of whatever Geckos die of.) Of course Noah replied in that annoyed teen tone, that give-me-a-break tone, " You're not going to die." Luca trailed behind, his skinny legs working hard to keep up, exclaiming, "slow down guys, don't leave without me! Wait, is Ezra going to get a shot?! Is he bleeding to death!? Guys, wait!"
This was enough to push little one over the edge as he began to cry, while yelling, "I don't want a shot! I'm going to lose my blood and die!" I couldn’t even speak to tell them all to hush up. I could only pant out, “guys, we’re FINE,” as I lugged Ezra up the hill and across the parking lot to the car. We must have been a sight to behold, but not one person asked in passing if we were doing okay, or could they help. Damn pandemic.
At the hospital I was one mom with three boys. Hospital staff asked that my other two sons stay outside the emergency room door, while I brought Ezra inside. I was lucky that I had an older to sit with my younger, but I still didn’t trust them to completely behave themselves. My only contact during the pandemic, my parents, were out for the day and all I could do was leave a message for them to please come rescue the two boys from the two folding chairs they were set up in on a hot July day, with no water to aid them.
Inside the waiting room, Ezra and I sat masked waiting to be seen, getting up to check on the other boys, who looked as if they were sitting in some kind of purgatory outside the sliding doors. Once in triage, Ezra regaled the nurse with his story of how he didn’t want to wear his sandals and there was all the blood in the water. I filled in and translated when needed and when all was done she looked at me with kind, amused eyes (since I couldn’t see any other part of her face), and stated, “this isn’t your first one is it?” Chuckling I responded, “nope, oh no. He has two brothers.” At which we had a good giggle together. Oh, human contact, how I miss you.
Ezra was a trooper, he wore his little mask inside that hospital for two hours. He got the doctor’s okay to take it off to eat a popsicle at the end of the appointment for being so brave while getting his stitches. Now he seems to think all doctors will give him a popsicle. The other boys did get rescued after about an hour in the sun, and I came away feeling quite proud of myself for the measure of calm I had shown all through the ordeal.
In order to teach our kids to be brave, we have to be brave. To teach our kids to be persistent, we have to show persistence. To reveal to them that there are many ways to solve a problem, we have to exhibit the skill to problem solve, even if it means ruining a pair of pants in the process. As we make our way through this pandemic, I have repeatedly talked to my older child about patience, resilience, finding joy in the most mundane of days, and holding onto hope for the future. While I can’t talk to the littles about it in the same way, I can show them. I can give them every measure of grace in their cranky moments as I know they are wading through all this too. I can tell them truthfully, that sometimes mommy is sad, too. I can show them how to giggle at the silly, and dance to our favorite songs. Most of all, I can show them, and know in my soul, that I am capable of handling their joy, their pain, and when the moment needs it, their emergencies too. Even when I have to do it alone.
“And though she be but little, she is fierce.” ~William Shakespeare
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