Just like that…suckered into chaperoning a litter full of highly sugared, over-excited cavemen...another glorious class trip. Second grade, the age of the never shutting yap, and stamina of a set of humming bird wings.
A mother’s involuntarily commited to being covered in fire ants, and joining a bus full of unrestrained hyperactive animals. Zookeeper for a day, sure piece of cake for most mothers, but zookeeper in a quiet theater to watch an endless play…takes miracles, duct tape, and three ibuprofen chased with Scotch.
The chaos started while waiting to board the late bus-- We were standing on the sidewalk a mere ten minutes, yet seemed like an eternity for the patience of 7 and 8 year olds, lying all over the ground, fighting, and the complaining already starts. Teachers at maximum stress levels fought for the first buses, as the principle attempted direction, and every other school official seemed clueless to which buses were for each field trip. Our bus finally approached, and they screamed even louder, cheering like a cluster of drunken men at a play-off game. Kids were throwing rocks and then punches, and I was already feeling urges to throw myself in front of the bus’s moving wheels.
The torturous bus ride left me feeling a lot of things; mostly nausea, pounding in my temples, but every bump in the road made me feel my bladder bubble through my throat. I feared it was coming, and by the gallon, one thump of anything larger than a crossing snapping-turtle, and my pants would be wet.
Surely, the teacher had sent home a lengthy list of field trip preparations but, exactly who had time to read all three pages of it before it was covered in over-flowing pasta starch? I can guarantee, it mentioned of using restrooms before arriving to school…yet, I had earlier wrestled a spraying toddler on top the toilet, wiped another screaming child, and ran by it six times to wiggle the handle, for sanity of the continuous running trickles-- but who actually had time to sit down, risk being delayed by a jelly seat mauling, on a school morning?
Instead, I searched for a focal point to distract my bladder from feeling like a kid mauling a water balloon…and anything that would help to drown out the kids screaming, so fiercely and directly into my ear, I could feel saliva dripping off my earlobe. To make matters worst, obviously when I had told my child, “Go up and brush your teeth,” this morning, he chose to go collect a pocket full of Legos instead. His teeth still looked of crumbled Colby, and his breath gave me goose bumps, which furthered my sensation to piss myself.
Each time my restless child flailed around our seat, squashing our lunches a little more, was the only time I felt bladder relief; distracted by smells and sandwich remains, squeezed through the sides of the Ziplock blowout, and my mouth watered instead of my pants. I was starving, and could have busted that soggy, mangled sandwich from its disposable bag using only my teeth.
Best of intentions to starting the day with a healthy breakfast, was home collecting flies, on my kitchen counter. Naturally, I was braiding pigtails, packing my littlest a bag for ruining Grandma’s day, and attempting to chase my hair weasel with a curling iron, instead of eating soggy cereal. Like every other morning, I wolfed down the first three bites intensely, like a hog at the trough, but never got back to the remaining sludge until after my kids were shipped to school.
This morning I had to drop Grandma the toddler bomb, walk my daughter to her pre-school class, before racing to the 2nd grade for the lecture, bags of lunches, and find the bus!
No doubt the delayed bus made our class late, and we arrived to the theater with the show already in place. So, if chasing kids into theater seating wasn’t complicated enough...now, we had to do it in the dark and silently…
“Silently!” The usher kept holding a finger to his lips… Ha! They were like herding cattle into fenced shoots for vaccinations, and with a distinctively dressed and smelling vet, holding a visible giant needle! Each time we’d close in on the silence, one would backlash and circle back around to the door… “I don’t want to go next. Where’s Hannah? I want to sit by her…”
Cranking on kid’s head tops, to realign their direction, “Shhh! Keep walking unless you want so much swelling in your vision you won’t be seeing dear Hannah again!” And don’t even make me jab my thumbnail under your rib cage to inspire you attention forward!
I was doing agility lines, like in a gymnasium fitness test, to corral their incapability to simply follow in a line. With one crawling over another, like piglets searching for the last teat at feeding time, I finally forced them into one row seating. And as I was just about to seat myself, a little girl darted into the seat I was unfolding… Really?
“Foolish child, do you really want all this voluptuous tonnage crushing down on the sparrow bones filling your leggings?” Wishing to avoid the flyswatter effect given by my back pockets, she wisely slid down a seat. There, she and the girl next to her would argue over the armrest the entire show.
“Mrs…. Tell her, I had my arm here first!”
I told them to knock it off and share several times, and each time they’d blow snot, then push each other off. Back and forth, they’d teeter-totter on the armrest, and then I’d get, tap.tap.tap.tap.tap. on my shoulder. “Tell her…”
“Coldyn’s mom…?”
I was nearly ready to whisper down, “Yes, you tell her yourself,” pointing to the girl she was fighting with… “If the little woodpecker annoying the piss out of Coldyn’s mom doesn’t stop, because you can’t share with me, she’s going to rip off your right, and my left, and place them on spare armrests at the end of the aisle, and we may have them sewn back on at the end of the show!!” Apparently, my facial expressions spoke of a similar feeling, as they decided to call a truce after my final glare!
Certainly, my phone would still sound during the play, and noises of awakening a hibernating bear voiced from of my stomach. It was a long play, and if the after questions of numerous kids weren’t torturous enough, each class was dismissed independently. And wouldn’t you know; the interrupting last arrivals would obviously, be the last departures as well. We watched the entire theater dismiss, as our group hooped and moaned, and impatiently frolicked like dogs awaiting a frisbee… Like wormy dogs, sliding around the tops of the folded stadium seating, squirming as disturbingly as being drenched in gasoline, and then threatened with a match. The man with the microphone held the match, and was going to face the wrath of Mama if he didn’t start picking up the pace with our dismissal…
I had appreciated the wait before a dental procedure and found post-surgery recovery much more enjoyable than the zoology that was ripping at my hair, tugging at my shirt, and burnt into my sole. One teacher mauled so intensely, with children at her heels, the strapping of her flip flop tore off. Certainly it was all fun and games until there's a flip flop blowout…Us chaperoning mothers were not continuing on anymore out numbered, patching up the man-down using a band aide from a mother’s purse for sticking it back together.
I considered offering up my flip flops, as the trip already seemed of walking on broken glass and hot ashes anyway, who the hell needed shoes…
The teacher again did headcounts, as did I, but not to count for missing, rather to ensure we weren’t taking any damn extras. The kids finally excused, rampaged out, the teacher skidding along in her repaired stride after...it was finally time for pouring back into the discomfort of the bus nightmare. The hot seat, the electric chair, a bed of nails, anything seemed more enjoyable than cramming back into holding cells designed for three foot tall children. Hot and humid, clammy children's hands covered with disgust of a homeless blanket.
It was a nice sunny day in the city limits, but wouldn’t it make more sense to drive back home to pouring rain and a wet playground, before starting our picnic. The bus following, apparently did not see our bright yellow mass of 18 seats turning off the exit, and kept trucking straight past…unconcerned, we hadn’t a care if that bus was driving straight in to a pit of lava or off of a bridge, we were going to eat our smashed and sun-baked lunches without them…
I have to say—the reasoning for hyper action and outraged behavior in the children, was oh, so clear once assisting in opening a few bagged lunches. 90% were the contents of a vending machine, and the other 10%, included only my wilted sandwich vegetables mayo-glued against the bag, and the orange that was used for dodge ball.
Nearly every child had some kind of boxed Lunchable. More commonly know as; enough stale items to feed an ant, plastered with a full serving of preservatives, stuffed into box packaging, and yet, hassle free because it includes even a drink. Amazed as the company has brilliantly packaged them with our greatest requirement—water! Simple water, yet a warning, nearly bold printing… Do not drink “A” until mixed with “B”…a giant packet of 36g of sugar, Red40, and artificial strawberry kool-aide flavoring. Havens no, water was for ruining the bathroom floor and slopping in holes dug into sand, not for drinking!
If that wasn’t enough, a box of nerds, or pack of skittles, becomes an adequate serving side in a child’s meal. Some kids had simply the boxed lunch, others had additional junk food items sent along, and another girl had an attempt at yogurt, but no spoon. They were effortless attempts to meals, equivalent to sending a tissue box filled with leftover trick-or-treat candy and a few smashed crackers.
All different Lunchable boxes; cold chicken nuggets, or a sub or pizza making kit… a tiny flour shell, a sauce packet the child couldn’t open, and lastly the assembling of finely shredded cheese…looking worse than a sink of whiskers after a man shaved, it left a mess just to prepare; yet small hands still had to figure out how to eat it, ...on a picnic, and without a napkin. The box had enough sauce for a large pan pizza, a sugared red beverage, along with an Oreo cookie and melted candy, but no full bib, or even a cheaply transparent napkin.
Seeming a mother no longer exerts herself with even the spreading of peanut butter, or pulling of the red bologna string, and still can not add a piece of fruit or a damn napkin to the bag… 42 kids on this field trip, and only two napkins in total…mine, and the other chaperoning mother’s! Mine ended up on the child’s lap, where the flimsy crusted pizza bomb had landed. And with no more napkins, I simply gave my spoon to the girl slurping and tapping the bottom of her yogurt, since her hands would soon be covering me.
Each child assembled directly on top of the park’s old picnic table tops, and one even slurped a wad of mayo from the wood. The child with the sub making Lunchable, smeared the enormous packet of mayo all over the roll, the table, wiping the remaining on his shirt, and then added the tiny portion of meat. A twin pack of Ho-Ho’s, and two packs of fruit snacks, made up the child’s remaining lunch…but, most likely because his teeth were rotted so severely, he couldn’t possibly eat an apple or a carrot anyhow…
Certainly, on occasion my children have enjoyed a Lunchable, but only as a snack, and after I had eaten the candy bar from it, everytime!
I opened kid’s packages, foiled tops, and wrappers, in between each bite of my already chewed-looking sandwich…yet, wouldn’t my child sitting right next, be the only one to gnaw and tug at his Go-gurt tube without wanting help, then launch the glob of sour cotton candy into my hair. Wouldn’t some napkins be nice about now…
Then, came more rain… Thank the Lord!
I was a winner either way-- The trip would end early, or I could wash my hair...
And with the miserable rain, washed away any feeling of guilt I had from neglecting all the things collecting at home on my lengthy check list (or realistically, nothing checked off list) The sky was as dark as the bags under my eyes, it would have been a perfect nap day, if that was ever possible…but, if I ever felt a nodding moment on that ride back, it wasn’t lasting long with little sewer breath, and the dragon-like child throwing steam in my ear.
The comfort returning and survival!
The comfort returning and survival!
“Mom can I go home with you instead of back to class? I promise to brush my teeth…”
No comments:
Post a Comment