Some Day We'll Laugh About This...

Have kids they said. It'll be so much fun, they said.

Actually, I've always wanted to be a mom. I always wanted kids, I wanted that feeling of someone looking at me and saying "mama" and getting all that love; the tiny hands to hold, the snuggles at nap time, the tiny smiles and giggles and laughter, the memories.

It truly has been a journey full of ups and downs. But sometimes, the downs, those events that turn into the stories that you'll laugh about 'one day,' can exhaust the ever-living daylights out of you.

Saturday's event wasn't so much a "we'll laugh about this one day" as it was a "remember that time when..." event. Our 6-year-old was playing out in front of our house with her friends and was bit on the hand by a neighborhood dog. First, I want to say that this dog is well known on our street and has always been super friendly. Scarlett was trying to give him a treat and I'm not sure if he got overexcited trying to take it, or she wasn't giving it properly so her hand got in the way of the treat accidentally, or the dog misunderstood her intention, or, or, or...it could have been so many things that just had him biting too hard. The man and woman who owned the dog were so apologetic and very responsive in getting me the shot records of their dog because he did break the skin on her hand.

My husband took her to the ER so it could be properly cleaned, and they gave her some antibiotics and numbing cream, but no stitches were needed. The couple came down later that afternoon to apologize again and checked on Scarlett the next morning. We are dog people and I have had the unfortunate experience with aggressive dogs who have attacked (speaking of myself) and dogs who by accident have caused harm, and I truly believe it was the latter. Regardless, we will explain to our children (again) that we don't approach animals we don't know, we ask permission from the owners if it is okay to pet before approaching, and we read and listen to an animal's response to them being nearby, and we just won't be trying to feed any more dogs any type of treats.

Hopefully, Scarlett will have learned a lesson but this is the same child that when we moved to California and we saw a coyote on the hill behind our house, I took the moment to explain to her and my 8-year-old about coyotes and how even though they looked like smaller dogs that they were wild animals and not to go near them and her response after my "lecture" was to say, "But can I quietly walk up to a coyote to say hi?" so we'll see.

The weekend coup de grâce was on Sunday when our boys, age 15 and 8, and another boy from our street went missing for 5 hours. Apparently, they went on a walkabout without telling anyone where they were going, probably because it just started as walking the hills and trails right behind our house, which they aren't supposed to do because they are highly allergic to poison oak and get it EVERY.SINGLE.TIME. they step foot on the hill, but apparently, they are gluttons for natural consequences.

Anyway, I got a call from my friend whose son was with mine after she hadn't seen them for about 2 hours. I went up, walked a ways back calling for them but didn't see any sign of them and got no response to calling out. She joined me in looking and when it got close to it going on 3 hours since we'd seen them, I posted on our neighborhood page asking if anyone had seen the boys hoping they were just running around at one of the parks in our neighborhood.

No luck.

But, another hour of searching and we had a good chunk of the neighborhood that had eyes out looking. People were going for runs, taking their dogs for a walk, older kids were riding bikes, and just out walking around with their phones showing the picture of the boys asking if they had been seen. My heart was so incredibly thankful because even though I wasn't panicking, yet, going on 4 hours I was worried that maybe there had been an injury, or something was preventing them from getting home because we've had a lot of rain for this area and the hillsides were all muddy and the ground was so soft.

I went up to the horse stables that are up the road from our neighborhood and that can be seen from the hill behind our house hoping the boys just wanted a closer look at the animals. There were military police officers that happened to be there on a different call, talk about timing, and they were talking about seeing people on the hill in the distance calling names. I explained that was people looking for our boys, gave them the information and picture and asked for their assistance. A woman from the stables also offered to send out some staff with the MPs on their four-wheel drive gators because she agreed, the trails wouldn't do well with the police cars because of the conditions after the rain.

Nearing hour 5 of the boys not being located was when the other mom and I, with our husbands, were ready to call and make it an official missing person's report. There were a couple birthday parties going on on the other side of the neighborhood that I wanted to swing by and check first. Right when I pulled into the last party at the clubhouse, I got a call that the boys had been picked up by a volunteer from the stables out on one of the trails and they were safe and back at the stables and coming back to the house.

THANK. YOU. LORD.

The MPs out looking saw me and said he saw a group heading up the hill towards the houses and that he was going to follow me to the house to make sure it was our boys and that everyone was accounted for, or it was time to do an official report because of how long it had been since they'd been seen. I pulled up to my house to see both my boys, and their friend, safe and sound. I don't think I have ever been so relieved.

It was a high of 55 degrees yesterday and mostly cloudy all day. My 8-year-old had on only a t-shirt and jogger pants, my oldest was soaking wet, head to toe, from where he fell in a creek at the bottom of one of the steep hills. They didn't have any water, any food for over 6 hours. Apparently, they just went walking without a destination and didn't realize how far they'd traveled until they wanted to turn back to come home, then they had to walk all that way back. I told my boys to shower, because I knew they'd probably gotten into poison oak at some point along the way (which they did, and that was an ER visit and another blog post for another day), they ate, and then my 8-year-old passed out for two solid hours before he woke up to eat dinner and then go back to bed.

I am so thankful everyone was found safe. Now...one day I'm sure we will look back and say, "Remember when..." and "That walkabout Sunday..." and we'll tell the story and laugh and laugh and laugh...but today is not that day. And I've already informed my neighbors they won't see my children all week, and not to worry, because this time they're not missing.