Some days turn out okay

  We, like most families have our share of drama, but some days turn out better than others. Yesterday we loaded mom, dad, our two girls, and the wife and I into the van for a trip to the mountains. We wanted to ride up the Parkway a bit to see the foliage, hit a few shops, and grab some lunch along the way. The Parkway is only an hour or so from home, so it makes for a nice afternoon getaway which requires little or no planning in advance. We occupied the driver’s and navigator positions, with mom and pop in the middle row seats, and the girls in back watching a dvd courtesy of the van’s entertainment system. I will note that Dad seemed to be as enthralled with “A Bee Movie” as Mary, but that’s another story.

  The day was beautiful, traffic was very light, and the van travels well, so even though we traveled at a leisurely pace, the trip went by rather quickly. Throw in the scenery, and several bouts of light conversation, and we were on the parkway in no time. We decided to have lunch at Tuggle’s Gap, a small locale that is nothing more than a place where the Parkway intersects route 8. There is a motel, and restaurant/bar that many bikers frequent when traveling the Parkway. To no surprise, there were a dozen or so bikes outside when we arrived, all out for what may be the last good ride of the season. A lot of people may be put off by the number of motorcycles in the lot, but it is a very nice, family place, one that just happens to serve beer. And, one of the only watering holes in either direction along the Parkway for some distance, plus, the food is really good.

  Mary loves bikes, so we walked the lot admiring the gleaming chrome and steel steeds before going inside to eat. Cat is almost 16, so she knows what’s acceptable behavior in public, and Mary will be three soon, but does very well not to act up in public. There were several other families with small children(2-5 years old maybe) present, that obviously did not care, or know the proper way to behave in public. One lady nearby finally just gave up on scolding her little brat, and let him run wild amongst the patrons and staff. Our server brought placemats and crayons for the little one to color and connect the dots while waiting on the order. At one point Mary turned and said “sissy, I need to go potty please”, so Cat took her to the restroom, and upon returning, promptly sat down and continued coloring quietly. Several times she looked up and commented about the little boy running wild about the place.  She looked at me once and said “daddy, why don’t he sit down, it’s too many people in here?”. When our food came, she put her crayons aside and began eating, sissy often helps her cut something, or cools it for her, enjoying her big sister role. I noticed several times that Mary was waving and grinning at a couple sitting across from us at another table, which is not unusual as she makes friends wherever she goes.

  The other couple, an older man and woman obviously attired for motorcycling finished before we did, and walked to our table. The lady spoke to Mary first- “Hello little one, what is your name?”

“Mary; what’s you name?”

“I’m Suzanne; is that your sister?”

“Uh huh, she’s Cafrine”

“Well, it’s very nice to meet you both, you are very nice girls.”

  She asked Cat how old she and Mary were, and told her what a good job she was doing helping her sister. She then turned to me and said how well behaved they both were, especially Mary, at such a young age. She looked across the table to where the people with the running brat were sitting, and very loudly remarked “it is clear that you are both very good parents, unlike some people who have no manners, or home training.”

  Her husband added ” they are both very smart, and beautiful girls, you should be proud of them.” He couldn’t believe that Mary was already potty trained so well, and told Cat that her helping was probably why she was doing so well.

  We thanked them both, and they excused themselves to go enjoy the rest of their ride. Almost as if on cue, Mary said “Thank you, bye-bye, go ride you motorcycle now.”

  Mary loves to be out, and be seen, but not to the point of being obnoxious,  when we go out, she likes to walk, but knows she must hold someones hand when there are too many people around. It wasn’t until the lady made the comments she did that I realised just how well behaved she is in public, and I began to notice more and more unruly children. Almost every shop we went into was filled with children running about with no supervision while the parents shopped.

  The candy store was the worst place, with kids running everywhere while their parents stood in line waiting on free samples of fudge(that they did not need, if you get my point, unless it was diet fudge.) So I bought Mary a sucker and we went outside to the picnic table to wait for mom and Recie to finish shopping. As we were sitting outside, a rather portly young lad was making as much noise as humanly possible while running up and down the hill, and swinging like a monkey on the handrail. Mary looked to me and said “where is he mommy? He is going to get hurt, he needs to stop doing that. Mary can’t do that, she will fall.” This seemed to upset her some, so I just hugged her and told her that some people didn’t love their kids as much as I did, and didn’t care if they got hurt.

  Just then, the rotund one occupying the other half of our picnic table stopped shoving candy in her pie hole long enough to get offended. She let out a grunt and said “well, I never”, and began calling for little Boris.

“Come here sweety, Mommy has some candy for her baby.” When she said “candy” his eyes glazed over, and his tongue fell out, that must be what he tripped on, causing him to roll all the way to the bottom of the hill in a heap. It was funny- okay, I’m not a sadist, the hill was covered in mulch, and he was covered in enough fat that he had a soft landing at the bottom. Brunhilde seemed very concerned for Boris, and as soon as she finished the piece of candy, she carefully wrapped the remaining pieces back up and made her way to her now wailing child.

Mary looked at me grinning, nodded slightly, and said “I told you he would fall down.”

  As we headed down the mountain for home, sissy, mom, and dad, all fell asleep rather quickly, but, there in the mirror, I could see Mary in her car seat peering around a giant sucker looking at me.

“Mommy”

“What baby?”

“Hey”

“Daddy”

“What baby?”

“Hey”

“Daddy”

“What baby?”

“Mary loves you.”

“Daddy loves you baby.”

  Recie reached over, took my hand, and, with nothing more than a smile, said so many things.

It was a good day.