Chick-Fil-HEY!

I realize as I begin this post, Mad Dog read my sad post yesterday and is doing what he can to help with the boys. I couldn’t understand why he was being so attuned to my needs and swooping in to save me from chaos. I think he is afraid I might break. He doesn’t know that I am unbreakable.

How do I know this? What is my proof? Sitting with my Mom in her last days, holding her hand, helping her face death with grace and dignity are my first clues. That has been the secret gem that I have acquired from this somewhat harrowing experience. If I need to be, I am absolutely fearless. You can put anything in my way, it will not knock me down. I am unbreakable.

When I came through the door today with half-crazed boys at my feet, the look of total exasperation alerted Mad Dog that he needed to swiftly intervene (while I may be unbreakable, I do have a limit of patience that had been fully attained). He said he would take the boys to Home Depot (we had some furnace leakage and such, you know the joys of homeownership and all). I looked at him and said in all sincerity, “It’s suicide, the boys are insane, you don’t have to take them.” At least, don’t take both of them; you don’t know what you are getting yourself into.”

“No, no, I can do it,” he insisted, again believing me to be on the brink of sanity, fearing I may never return.

“Okay,” I said with resignation. His sinking ship I suppose.

This is what he is going to be up against. I had taken Full Speed for his second pre-op physical (all clear so surgery will be a go this Tuesday) and he was beyond hyper. There is a balance of being silly and being out-of-control. He clearly was out-of-control.

We went back to school to pick up T.Puzzle. I thought because of Full Speed’s extreme intensity, I needed to run it out of him, so we headed to the park. The boys played like wild animals for forty-five minutes. I was still unwilling to bring them home, they were too amped up. So, we headed to Chik-Fil-A. For those of my readers from up north, Chik-Fil-A’s are a fast food franchise specializing, in yep you guessed it, chicken. Full Speed walks directly to the order counter and says “I want a cheeseburger!”. This makes the staff chuckle (the whole point is they don’t serve beef). Oh well, whatever, I managed to direct them to a table and get them their food (which did not go smoothly). They ate quickly and loudly. Then, they were off to the play area.

The play area is small. It was not containing Full Speed’s energy very well. He was doing mock Karate moves on unsuspecting children. At one point, I sternly announced that he needed to pull it together and knock off his Karate chops and kicks. I was so severe in my delivery, the roughly ten other children surrounding us stopped in mid-play and looked at me with fear in their eyes. I can be very scary. I started to crack a smile at the thought that I scared the Chik-Fil-A play area straight. You could have heard a pin drop. Too bad I don’t scare my own children as much as I scare everyone else’s.

At another point in this adventure, T.Puzzle is daring and climbs up farther on the climbing apparatus than he ever has before. I cheer him on and he proceeds to lose it. Big time.

Of course, it’s too tiny for me to maneuver where he is and I have to practically wrench Full Speed’s (who is off to the side pretending to drive an imaginary race car) arm off to get him to focus and help me. Sometimes, if it’s not directly in front of Full Speed or if he is not directly involved, he can be kind of oblivious to the distress of others. Fortunately, he was willing to help when he realized what was happening.

Enlisting Full Speed’s help backfires tremendously. T.Puzzle is angered that Full Speed is coming near him and not me (because all he really wants is his Mommy!), so he elevates his screaming another notch (which I knew to be possible but silently prayed it would not). At this point, the entire restaurant, because the play area is surrounded by a clear wall, is staring trying to find the source of the hysteria. I finally managed to pretzel myself into a position that I’m able to grab one of T.Puzzle’s ankles. This sets him screaming to a whole other level as he is feeling frightened that he might fall. I have to do what is necessary. I grab him and pull him down in the most ungraceful way imaginable. He crashes to my level in a heap of dismay and I want to crawl to the top of this monstrosity and never, ever come down.

I’m not even going to tell you what happened when we stopped at Grandma’s for a few minutes on the way home. Our intent was to cheer up Nan, instead I think we added stress instead of relieving any. So when I finally walked in the door of my own home and Mad Dog said, “I got it,” all I could think was he may very well be the bravest soul I have ever known.