Best Laid Plans

For at least three months we’ve been planning a trip to the Nixon Museum with a favorite couple. Today was the day we were supposed to meet them there, but yesterday, Marc called and said there was a tiny problem: Carol had fallen during her usual morning walk and had broken her hip!  Oh my poor, super-active teacher friend, was laid up in the hospital with only two weeks until her classroom must be ready to go. Since we were planning to make the long drive to Yorba Linda anyway, we drove instead to Ontario to visit her after the surgery to put in three pins.

            We found her resting and looking quite lovely, and as still as I’d ever seen her. After discussing how she had somehow tripped on the tiny lip of a driveway in her neighborhood, her prognosis, and how long she would be using a walker (heaven forbid, but necessary), I asked, “How long did you lay on the driveway until you got help?”

She looked sheepish for some reason, and answered, “You’re going to be mad at me… After I found my phone, keys, and walking stick, I…”

            “Yes?” I asked. “That’s when you called 911, right?”

            “Well, I knew I was hurt, but I had a nail appointment to go to, so I hobbled home and asked Marc to take me.”

            “You walked home on a broken hip!!!?? Then you got your nails done, and finally went to the ER?” I was incredulous but not mad. Awed at her strength was more like it. When I had my hip surgery, it was all I could do, during the days just before it, to barely get around!  However, although there was no doubt it didn’t help the break to walk on it,  she was safe and sound, all stitched up, and had even started therapy. She really wants out of the hospital, and I’m sure she’ll make a break, no pun intended, from there as soon as possible. The hardest part now for her is to be calm about not being able to start her own classroom.

          Sometimes, it takes an extraordinary change in our best laid plans to slow us down enough to smell the flowers, appreciate our life, make us contemplate God’s plans for us, or all of the above.

Who’s in Control?

If I know you personally, let me assure you I am not writing about you or your child. All the children and their parents, in my sphere are not the subjects of this blog, and to be fair and honest, most of the children I see are behaving quite nicely.  I guess the kids I know are in this first paragraph!

          However, more and more, I’m seeing behavior of children and reactions from parents which causes me to wonder who truly is in control of their home.

          Here are a few examples of this lack of control issue:  Sitting in our beach chairs yesterday, we observed a dad and his boys. Obviously on their way off the beach, the dad commanded the guys to head for the car.

           “I’m going back in the water,” the littlest kid declared without a backward glance.

           “I said get to the car!” the father roared.

          At that point, the child scampered off to the surf, with his dad hollering, “Well o.k., but don’t get sandy!”  

Whew, unbelievable, because the child was then unsupervised (oh, yeah, the Red Flag warnings were up) as the others went to the car. As many are fond of saying today, “Seriously?”

On another occasion, we were down below the deck of an historic ship named The Californian, which sits in the harbor at San Diego. A dad and his two boys were there as well, surely pretending to sail the oceans, but not in a way expected of people aboard an antique and precious souvenir of days gone by. Yes, tourists are allowed to “steer” with the helm above, help turn the anchor chain, and peer into long unused bunks and galley. However, these guys were hopping around within the displays, checking out off limit cupboards and instruments. In this case, the father never said a word of reprimand to his sons!

While subbing in a church school kindergarten, I proceeded to introduce myself and help them with opening calendar activities. A darling little girl opened her mouth and yelled, “You shut up! It’s my turn to talk.” It’s all a blur after that. Although her parent wasn’t physically in the class, no one gets to that point in rudeness by five years old without a little help at home.

This kind of non or poor parenting seems be on the rise, but I do remember having a father on a field trip with our class in Sacramento MANY years ago who himself acted like a child. Rather than being in charge as he was asked, he allowed his group to disobey most rules, to arrive late for their appointment at the train museum by going to the magic shop instead, and by putting itching powder they’d been allowed to buy in a drinking fountain at the airport.

Parents can’t be their child’s buddy all the time, and believe it or not, kids want and need discipline with justice from them. So keep at it and don’t give up the goal of great kids!