Friday, November 09, 2007

Look before you speak...

What went down at McD's today.

Friend and I having lunch near play area. Older couple walks up and says to the parents in playland. "We just found this little girl wandering around alone in the parking lot. Does she belong to one of ya'll in here?" Mom's act appauled and no one claims her.

People start whispering and finally the mother is identified by the restaurant mgr. Of course she's mortified that her daughter (who looked to be less than 2 yrs. old--no shoes and sagging diaper in tow) was able to "escape" from playland unnoticed and doddle around unsupervised in a busy parking lot in front of the drive thru lane. Yeah, scary isn't it!

Well, the mother evidently assumed that the grandmother was watching the little girl while Mom tended to her other child who was making his way through the plastic mazes/slides. Upon hearing her daughter was in the parking lot Mom briskly walks over to HER mother (who is leisurely reading a newspaper) and says, "Mom, did you not see that _____ was gone and these people found her alone in the parking lot". To which Grandma replies, "I had no idea she'd left". Mom is absolutely horrified and pissed at Grandma for not watching the infant. They promptly pack their bags and leave.

As my friend and I look on, we're having our own little conversation, about how in the world that mother could have allowed her child to slip so far out of her sight, as to end up alone in the parking lot. Then it hit's me. I hadn't seen Luke or Tristan (her son) in a long while. So, I say to her, "You know what I better go check where our boys are, because we could be sitting here talking about what a horrible mom that lady is when our two could be up to something".

I look in the mazes, slides...the video games EVERYWHERE! No Luke or Tristan. Then I hear giggling coming from the bathroom. I open the door and LOW AND BEHOLD, what do I see.........................I wish I'd had my camera. They had unrolled the entire roll of toilet paper all over the floor in the restroom. Luke had the water on and was "sprinkling" water all over the toilet paper on the floor. Tristan had wet hands with toilet paper on them and was drying them under the automatic dryer. They were both giggling like little school girls. I promptly took them both out and said, "We're going home now". I had to go back and clean up that "snow shower" of toilet paper that was now occupying the piss stained floors......It was so nasty, but I couldn't bare to just leave it the way our boys had made it.

Lesson # 298371 as a parent....Look before you speak (about someone ELSE'S kids)!

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

This is cute. I'm glad that the mother found her little girl. Thank the Lord for honest people in the world.

dana

Michelle Kemper Brownlow said...

HOLY COW!!!
This is so funny!!!

A friend and I were JUST having this conversation about watching what you are saying b/c low and behold, whatever you pass judgement about will happen to you before the day is up!!
:)

Michelle Kemper Brownlow said...

TAG - YOU'RE IT!!!!

8 RANDOM THINGS ABOUT YOU!!!

Have fun, honey!!

Tracy Rambles On And On said...

I've had that same thing happen to me. I've always prided myself on my vigilance over my children. Then one day we were shopping at an outdoor mall in a historic town, so it was basically like a street that you walk on with stores lining both sides. We stopped at an outdoor cafe to eat and the baby was getting restless so I told my mom to watch the girls and took him across the isle to see a waterfountain. The next thing I know, my middle child is gone and my mother who was "watching her" says that she's with me. We found her ten minutes later, three blocks up the street. I had never been so terrified in my life!
It happens to the best of us!

Jenster said...

Yeah. I never realized how much crow I'd be eating when I had children. Now I've learned not to say ANYTHING! LOL