How the hell did you manage to do that!” He shouts from the front door, his voice carrying down the length of the hall to the occupied bedrooms. His breath steaming in the icy morning chill air. “Sweet cheese babe, the two swing arms that are supposed to move up and down are bent entirely outwards. It’s a steel plate you’ve bent, how? Just how? Why would you – why on earth, just what were you even trying to do?” The stream of consciousness is rambling out of the man in an irritated staccato. Followed intermittently by loud sighs and and gasps of suppressed rage. “You had to unfold it to use it, didn’t you look to see how the mechanism worked when you set it up?” With a sudden whoosh the front doors shut, and loud stomps across the front porch can be heard. His voice fades into muffled exclamations of indignant confusion. It is Friday morning. The sun is shining, though mostly obscured by wispy clouds on a brisk early morning breeze. Life moves on.
Day: November 26, 2021
It’s seven o’clock on a Monday evening,
In mid November, and the day was dreary, grey and cold. The leaves have long since fallen from the trees, and everything is a mucky mixture of crushed leaves and water logged grass clippings in mud. The wind has started to pick up and what was a bland flat lit day is now quickly deteriorating into a murky black dusk. Perfect timing for it to begin to down pour now that we have to pack up all our things, muster the kids into the car, and head home after the impromtu long weekend spent at the cottage preparing for the coming of winter. It has been a bitterly cold, and long weekend spent out of doors, tackling chores that were better suited to the warmer days of late September or even early October. But alas, priorities for all involved were not exactly aligned at that point in the year. So here we are, two tired and mopey children, a cascade of rain hammering down in sheets, and the prospect of a three hour drive home, and then school early in the morning. Our youngest has napped fr the first time in two years today. Not a good sign. But she doesn’t have a temperature and isn’t coughing or sneezing, so onward we press, towards home. Fifteen minutes into the drive, she begins to vomit all down her front, and into her car seat. She manages to do this in near silence. But my wife, whom is driving, notices her rolling forwards in the glare of the rear view mirror. “She’s throwing up!”. She says, nudging my arm. I turn to look into the back seat, and there is the eldest, hands on chin, deeply engrossed in her movie. “Not her, it’s Ashley!”. Twisting to look directly behind me, I can see the dark grime on Ashley’s chin and chest from where she has thrown up her chocolate milk and what looks like a first full of Cheetos. “Oh!” I say. I frantically dig around at the kids feet to find any old containers. Finding an old cookie tin I hold it up to Ashley’s face as she bucks and heaves into a coughing fit followed by a glob of vomit. “No…. no… I don’t want it daddy….!” She screams in between heaves. “It’s ok baby, this will keep you cleaner, I can tip it out once we stop off the highway.” Variations of this follow until we pull off the rural highway, and come to a stop under a street lamp outside of a road side restaurant. Opening the door to assess the level of destruction. It’s not too bad, a bit on her chest, face and hands, and a glob on her leg and a dribble or two on the chest harness of her car seat. In a wave of miasma the smell hits me full in the face. To my dismay I then realize, our Ashley has been out of diapers for more than a year, and we no longer travel with a diaper bag, or wet wipes. Thinking quickly my wife hops out of the drivers seat, while my eldest quivers at the sight and smell of her younger sister’s stomach contents. Rooting through her luggage to hand me an old worn t-shirt. I unstrap Ashley and proceed to wipe her down, face, chest, hands and legs. I pick her up for a look over and shuffle her off to the back of the car for a change of clothes. A few heart beats later we’re strapped back in, she is sound asleep, and we are back on the road. It is still raining heavily, and the night is both dark and cold. The youngest, Ashley, will not be attending school the next day.
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