Oh, the delights of motherhood.
Like most parents, for me a trip to the playground means sitting on a bench, observing my kids from a safe distance. I have learned that venturing onto the equipment, for adults, is risky business. Not only is one’s personal safety threatened, but one’s personal dignity might go right down the… slide.
It was nearly a decade ago and I still remember it. On a bright sunny Saturday in California, my kids wanted to go to the park. I indulged them. It was an older park with metal equipment and bolts, but its location made it a popular spot. We would spend an hour or so. I brought a novel. (It was the same novel I always carried with me but never read. What mother of a two-year old reads a novel and gets away with it?)
In the middle of the sandy play area stood a very tall and narrow slide. It looked innocent enough. It was silver, and had just the right amount of slipperiness so that its riders would let out a gasp when they reached the bottom, then clap their hands and race up the ladder for another turn. That slide was the main attraction of the park.
My three boys rushed over to it immediately. Even my littlest one, Riley, wanted to try. But he was small, and the ladder itself was a bit of a challenge. From my safe, novel-reading position, I shook my head “no” to him as he began to climb. He pointed pleadingly to the ladder. I shook my head “no” again. He started to cry.
I put down my book and walked over to the slide. I might as well be fair and let the little guy try the slide, I thought. But surely he couldn’t do it without help. And his brothers were long gone on their playground adventures. “Fine,” I muttered. I followed him up the ladder, keeping myself one step behind him in case he lost his footing. When we reached the top, both of us had clearly underestimated the height of the slide. The path for your gliding bottom was narrow—it seemed much too narrow to hold him on my lap. Riley hesitated in fear. From my new vantage point, I looked around the park. Numerous parents and nannies were seated on the benches circling the play area. Many of them watched us curiously. We had entered the amphitheater.
The safest thing, I decided, was to turn my son onto his stomach, facing me, and let him down the slide feet first. So I held onto his hands and eased him down slowly and let go. Riley’s face grew smaller as he drifted down the slide, staring up at me nervously the whole way. Then his feet unexpectedly hit the ground. And his bottom hit the sand. And his face hit the slide.
Blood poured from his nostrils. I gasped in horror. “I’ll be right there! Mommy will come get you!” I shouted, feeling awful guilt. I started descending the ladder, only to feel something behind me. “Hi Mom!” It was my middle son, Kyle.
“Kyle, go down the ladder, quick! Riley is hurt!” I instructed. Kyle stood motionless. “Kyle! GO DOWN THE LADDER!” I assumed his autism made it difficult to understand the urgency of the situation. But then I turned my body as much as I could, and saw his predicament. At least five other children stood on the ladder behind him, waiting for their turn on the slide.
I had no choice. I had to go down the slide. My son needed my help. And hey, it wouldn’t be so bad. It would be over quickly. However, I couldn’t help but notice that more parents were now watching me intently.
With as much dignity as I could muster, I plopped my rear-end on the slide, and pushed myself with both hands. About half-way down I was jolted to a halt. It seems my purse, with its long strap diagonally across my body, had caught on something. A bolt. Who knows what. Now I hung from the slide, suspended by my purse. I wriggled around pathetically like a fly caught in a spider’s web, while my son wailed in the sand below. “Hey lady, MOVE, it’s our turn,” a kid on the ladder said. A few parents stood up, bewildered. Who should they rescue first? The bleeding kid in the sand, or the psycho woman dangling up above?
The strap finally succumbed to the pressure and snapped. I went sailing down the slide, landing on top of my son. The contents of my purse– including three tampons and twenty receipts from various pit-stops around town–rained all over the sand. “Mommy! Get off me!” my son sobbed.
I gathered up my crying son, his brothers, my broken purse, and what was left of my self-respect and swiftly left the park. We all survived the incident, but because of this (and a few other bad slide experiences–stories for another day) I have adopted a strict “I don’t do slides” policy, of which everyone in my family is well aware.
We don’t discuss the reasons.
I hereby challenge the other families.com bloggers to post a more embarrassing moment than this one. (Within the realms of your topics of course.) Now there’s a test.
Kristyn Crow is the author of this blog. Visit her website by clicking here.