Summer Olympics Dallas 2024 or Zombie Apocalypse?

My sweet precious absolutely beautiful girl, Vivie, is freakishly strong. No, I mean it. Girl is crazy-hoist-herself-to-the-top-of -the-fridge-and-climb-up-the-rain-gutter strong. She is (and I refer to her this way with all the affection a mother has for a child who is so desperately wanted and loved) my Little Dung Beetle. Did you know that dung beetles are among the strongest of creatures on the planet with the ability to pull over 1000 times their own body weight? Okay, so I don't call Vivie my Little Dung Beetle for obvious reasons, but I am floored by her strength and agility.

She has the makings of a real gymnast. At the ripe old age of 3, she already has that muscular triangular build that is so Mary Lou Retton-esque. So in an effort to give Vivie the foundation to become a gold medal gymnast should she so desire later on, George and I had decided to enroll her in a gymnastics class this summer but then her friend, Reed, who is very much her male counterpart to her wild child ways, invited her to attend his gymnastics class for Bring a Friend Day. Well, I was pretty excited at the prospect of getting a sneak preview of my girl in action and of course, I was certain that the instructors would take one look at my little powerhouse and offer her a scholarship to their program because surely, she is Olympic bound.

So the morning of our big day (I'll admit I may have had just a small sip of the Stage Mom Tea), I dug out a hand-me-down blue sparkly and velvet leotard, dressed Vivie, and pulled her hair up cheerleader style. Again, I admit to having sampled the Stage Mom Tea. We made our way to the gym where I filled out the necessary "We Are Not Responsible If Your Olympic Bound Child Breaks Every Talented Bone in Her Body During Our Session" paperwork and proceeded to wait for Reed's arrival and let's be honest...for someone to acknowledge how Vivie is built just like a miniature Olympian, a Mini-Nadia, if you will. Reed arrived but not the acknowledgement that my girl was indeed ready to take the gold.

In my efforts to prepare Vivie for class, I left out one detail, however minor. I failed to mention to her what exactly we were doing. I had simply told her that she and Reed would get to play together. Again, I am not sure how I managed to drop the ball on this one, but alas, I did. Class was getting ready to start, so all the kids (and there were a bunch because after all,  it was Bring A Friend Day) lined up at the door that leads to the gymnasium and all the parents, myself included, headed upstairs to the observation room. Oh yeah, seeing as how I only told Vivie that she would be playing with Reed, I also didn't mention that  I would be upstairs. Vivie, who was completely enthralled with Reed and feeding off the excitement of all of the other kiddos, was completely unaware that I had left her immediate vicinity. The gymnasium door swung open and the kids burst into the wide open space filled with trampolines, rings, parallel bars and all that jazz. There was a fury of excitement and laughter as the two college age male instructors shouted, "RUN!" From the observation room, I saw a sea of children take off running for the other side of the room at which point, I expected to see Vivie right in the middle of the group if not towards the front (she is Olympic bound, you know). When Vivie heard, "RUN," she looked over her shoulder to see that not only was I not there, but none of the mommies were there. I can only imagine that she was wondering what kind of monster must have snatched up all the mommies, caused those two big guys to yell, "RUN," and scared all of her newfound friends to take off screaming. Well, Vivie started to wail and darted after the kids, trying to catch up with the other survivors. When she reached the group, they turned to run back from whence they came, leaving her in their dust. She then ran back to the starting point, tears streaming down her face, as she continued to wail, " I want my mommy! Where is my mommy?"  She spent the next 35 minutes curled up in my lap refusing to participate until the last 10 minutes of class. Not exactly the first impression I hoped she would make. Those last 10 minutes were all I needed to see to know that we will indeed be back and hopefully next time, she will enjoy the whole session. If the road to the Olympics is paved with blood, sweat, and tears, Vivie may have just taken her first steps, however timid, onto that road.

Shop Til You Drop

My mother, albeit loving and nurturing, is a real Suck-It-Up-Buttercup kind of mom. Just as there is no crying in baseball, there is no whining in her presence. She was raised with the understanding that for almost any injury she had, her daddy had had worse in his eye on any given day. So Mom is not a complainer by nature and she raised my brother and me with the understanding that whatever our wounds may be, my Papaw most certainly had worse in his eye, a thought that always left me wondering what exactly had been happening to this man's eyes. I feel I should tell you that he did indeed have both of his eyes and they were fully functioning.

While our boo boos and owies were usually minor, there were those few times when Mom's reassuring sentiments of  "you're fine" or "shake it off" missed the mark. As mothers, haven't we all been there? I know I have. There was that time my oldest son, Jacob, was practicing handstands in his bedroom and landed on his foot wrong. He was trying not to cry when he crawled on his hands and knees down the stairs. I looked at his foot...no swelling, nothing protruding from the skin..."You're fine. Prop it up with some ice on it. No biggie." A couple of hours later when he was still complaining (very unusual for Jacob), we took him to the doctor. Turned out he'd broken not one, not two, but three bones in his foot. Yep....and the Mother of the Year Award goes to yours truly. I really should have known it was something worse than what had been in my Papaw's eye because prior to that mishap, the last time Jacob had shed any tears with an injury was when he broke his collar bone earlier that same school year. All that and the kid still earned the Presidential Award in Physical Fitness.

At least when I missed the mark with Jacob's broken foot, I had the luxury of doing it without an audience. Mom had not been so fortunate. I was about 15 and she and I were shopping at our local Target. This was before Target had eaten all of its Wheaties and grown into the super store we all know and love. I tell you this at the risk of showing my age because you need to know that the checkout lanes were the old school style with the steel railings separating each lane. Mom and I were just wrapping up our shopping excursion when I said to her, "I don't feel well. Can I have your keys and wait for you in the car?" To which she replied, "You're alright. We're almost done." So there we were waiting in line as all of our items were making their way down the conveyor belt. Time was slowing down and my head was starting to spin. I moved to the other side of the railing from Mom so I could support myself on it as my stomach was starting to flip flop and I was getting tunnel vision. Then suddenly, everything was quiet and black. I had passed out right there in the checkout lane at Target. Luckily, I had been leaning on that shiny cold steel railing so when I dropped, I didn't hit the floor. Instead, my body draped over the railing, my long hair and longer arms dangling to the floor. I must have been like that for a minute or what seemed an eternity to my mother who was embarrassed and concerned all at once. I'm not sure if Mom noticed me right away or if the cashier or the people in line behind us brought me to her attention as she was busy paying for our items. I wish I could have seen the expression on the cashier's face. She wasn't much older than myself and when I awoke to the sensation of Mom trying to pull me up by my hair using one hand, her other hand still clutching her wallet, I could hear the worried cashier ask Mom if I was okay. Mom was laughing as is apparently her custom when someone falls, faints, or otherwise makes a scene. I  then heard Mom say "Allison, get up. Get up. She's alright. She does this all the time. Get up, Allison!" 

For the record, I didn't do that all the time. I came to fairly quickly and we managed to make it home intact minus just a smidgen of my dignity. Apparently, I had the flu and that, my friends, was worse than anything my Papaw had ever had in his eye.