While visiting with an employee of my husband’s today, my son looked at her and said something I’ve never heard him say before…”Poopee-Head”.

I said, “Hey! Do NOT say that again. We don’t say that because it’s not nice. Do you understand? Do NOT say that again”.

Because, in his mind that means he has permission to proceed, he looked at me and said, “Poo…”

I glared at him and waited for the rest, but it didn’t come. My husband’s employee and I had continued our conversation, when my son got up and came over to my chair.

And, I truly believe he thought he wouldn’t get in trouble…like he had created a completely different word…when he looked at me, finished what he started, and said, “…pee-Head”.

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I am in The-Middle-of-Nowhere, Ohio this week taking classes for the family business. Truly, this is the smallest of small towns, and it’s making me realize what a city girl I really am. But at the same time, I’m finding out just how jaded that’s made me.

This afternoon, I went into a little coffee shop for a caffeine fix and while I was I paying, I looked outside to see a group of boys pull up on their bikes. They were probably about 14 or 15 years old, and there were a lot of them. They were all wearing black and had piercings in places that looked really painful. At first I was surprised to see them and all their gothness in this Po-Dunk town, but that only lasted only for a second, because the next thought that crossed my mind was that I had to walk through them when I went outside.

When I left the city yesterday, I was behind a man in a truck stopped at a traffic light when a car pulled up next to him. A young girl in the car took a full cup of soda from a fast-food restaurant and threw it at the man in the truck, then she and her friend quickly pulled away. It made me sick. Here was this poor guy, probably on his way home from work, and he AND the inside of his truck were covered with sticky soda because some stupid kids thought it would be funny. If he hadn’t been on that road, it would’ve been me.

That incident was fresh in my mind as I left the coffee shop today. I eyed that group of boys, clutched my purse a little tighter, stood a little taller, and tried to look all rough-and-tough in my girly-girl linen shirt as I walked out the door. I was prepared to get called a name, or have something thrown at me, or get followed and harassed. Instead, one of them saw me coming toward the door and he jumped off his bike to hold it open for me. I was still hesitant when I said, “Thank you”. But, when he said, “Sure thing. Have a good day”, then hopped back on his bike and started talking to his friends, I realized he was actually just a really nice kid.

Maybe living in Mayberry wouldn’t be so bad after all.

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Yesterday afternoon, we were at a picnic with some friends when my daughter got a blister on her hand. She had been playing on the monkey bars, and though she has been doomed with blistered hands from the monkey bars many times before, she keeps going back for more. Seeing as how this is completely preventable pain, I have a hard time giving her much sympathy. Especially because these are, ”OH!! TRAGEDY OF TRAGEDIES!” blisters. The kind where she cries real tears when she washes her hands and cries, “It burns! It burns us!”

I have no patience for this lack of toughness. It’s probably because I’ve seen my son go through eight surgeries in his five years, and have seen him poked and prodded with needles more times than I can count. He once had an IV in his head, and he has scars all over his hands and feet from all the other times he’s needed something dripped into his body. He doesn’t even cry anymore when he goes to the lab for blood-draws, and immunizations are a walk in the park. Once, in recovery after surgery, he actually stopped breathing. His Dad and I stood there in terror and disbelief as a nurse stood over our son yelling, “Don’t quit on me! Don’t quit on me!”

So a few years ago, when my daughter fell to the floor in a panic as I came at her with a sewing needle to remove her first splinter, I didn’t even know how to handle the situation. At first, I thought she was joking. Because, really? Could a five year old actually melt down because of a splinter? The answer is, yes. My mild-mannered, sweet, wonderful daughter TOTALLY flipped out. She was on her back, lying on the floor, kicking, screaming, crying, snotting…it was unreal to me. When I finally got her to calm down and got that splinter out, she seemed to be rational again. She said, “It wasn’t that bad. It didn’t even take you very long.” I thought we had an understanding.

Turns out, I was wrong. Way wrong. Shortly after the splinter, she needed a strep test done and freaked out so much at the sight of the throat swab that she threw up. A strep test the next year took all my strength, along with the muscles of two nurses to keep her still. All while the doctor pinched my daughter’s nose shut to force her to open her mouth. Simple procedures and things like paper-cuts send her into so much of a tizzy, that we are ever fearful that she will actually injure herself, then go into shock. I can’t imagine a broken bone or a deep cut. God help us and everyone in a ten block radius if the girl ever needs surgery. They would definitely have to use sedatives…and I’m talking about for me. “Ma’am, please put down the nitrous tank. Your daughter needs you.”

But tonight, I looked at my daughter and saw her rubbing her blistered hands without any tears in her eyes. Maybe it’s because she’s getting older, maybe it was because she was with friends, maybe it’s because I told her last night that she needs to “buck up”. No matter what kept her from coming to me and crying in pain, I was really, really proud of her and this new found backbone of hers. Another thing no one tells you about being a parent is just how gratifying such small steps can be.

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