Camping: It's all fun and games until someone breaks something.
Last weekend we went to my sisters wedding.
Down a long windy road. A dirt road.
On the bank of a river.
There was camping involved. First time in many, many years.
There were a ton of kids. What would that be… what? A gaggle? A mob? A herd? Monkey was in heaven. He followed the older kids with starry eyes trying to keep up. He played in the dirt and ran in the river and tossed rocks into the water and right after the ceremony, and before the fabulous roast pig dinner he dove off a large rock.
Sideways.
And while he is a fabulously skilled rock climber, he is, unfortunately, horrible at landing.
He cried the cry of a very tired, very cranky and perhaps broken toddler. We gathered the medical professionals amongst us and poked and prodded Monkey, somewhat drunkenly as the wine and champagne had been flowing freely all day because after all, we are all camping and it is a wedding and no one was driving.
There was no swelling, no bruising, and no obvious broken anything. Upon seeing a iPad he stretches both arms out for it and settles down to flip through the apps to find something that interests him. We decide he is bruised, tired and perhaps overwhelmed and that we aren’t going to risk the drunken one hour drive down windy dirt roads to the hospital for xrays.
I do my wedding toast with him clinging to me and someone from the back of the meadow shouts “Rocking It Like a MomStar!”
He would later take back that title. I’m not sure when it would be, but there are two distinct possibilities.
Perhaps it would be two days later when I finally took Monkey to the Dr and had to explain that we hadn’t taken him to the ER when it happened because we were all drunk. I would not have showered for three days, nor combed my hair in almost that long as I stood before her trying to explain that really, I don’t drink that much, it was just my baby sisters wedding… and camping… and well… free flowing wine is hard to turn down. And yes. Usually I do shower every day. Or. Well. Every other day.
Or maybe that nice man would have taken back the MomStar title when, upon walking into the packed, yet silent waiting room, xray orders in hand, Monkey dropped a string of obscenities grinning like the worlds most charming and adorable tourettes sufferer.
As it turns out, I am not doing well at removing certain words from my vocabulary.
Just in case it should happen to you, laughing when your toddler turns to you in a quiet room, looks you in the eye and loudly states … “Oh god damnit” only encourages them to add “Shit. Shit. Shit.” and make those around you question your parenting ability.
Now, if I can teach him to say the alphabet as quickly as I’ve taught him to say “This is bullshit” then he is well on his way to an Ivy League education.
Not from me obviously. From the Ivy League School he will be accepted to. Because surely the ability to pick up phrases such as “This is bullshit” after hearing them only once is a sign of genius. Right? I’m sure it was only once. Or maybe twice.
It’s now been a week since that fun hospital visit and Monkey, who did indeed fracture his clavicle, is racing around the house as if nothing is, or ever was, wrong. The only one worried about his falling and re-injuring it seems to be … me. And in case you were concerned, yes. I have since showered.
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