The Great Escape

I’ve been getting some good stuff for my pain and nausea. I think it’s a little too good.
My brain is fuzzy from the pain control and I don’t care about any of the problems outside my isolation room.
And I mean ANY.
That’s what 0.5 mg of Ativan will do to me.
I know, I know. I’m a light weight, but I am a little person.
On Weds. I was at DHMC to get perked up. They gave me meds to stop the pain and the vomiting, and effectually knocked me out so I could sleep during my treatment.
I was soooo comfortable.
So when Alissa called, my beloved friend and cousin, who was taking care of Xander while he was home with strep throat and an ear infection, I didn’t think anything was amiss.
“Hi Lis” I cooed into the phone.
“Hillary, where are you? Are you at your house?” She sounded a little panicked.
“Noooo” I said in my sign song, I-don’t-care-about-anything-now voice. “I’m at the hospital.”
Alissa started to cry. “I CAN’T FIND THE BOYS!” She cried, frantic into the phone.
“Oh, Lis, Don’t worry about it. We lose them all the time. They know their way around. They always come back.” I said, being completely USELESS in my drug haze in alleviating her fears.
“It’s okay” I said, hung up the phone, and fell back asleep.
We have a lot of space and a very close neighborhood. Not only can L and X run amok over the 100+ acres that surround my house, but they’re welcome in homes all over the neighborhood. They could have wandered over to a friend’s house, to my house, to both their grandparent’s houses.
There are a lot of options, and sometimes, they do sneak off on us on purpose. They’ll hide in trees, in the sand pit, in the middle of the circle. They think it’s hysterical.
They do know the boundaries, but our safe boundaries are bigger than most.
Alissa and I grew up like this and we survived. We think it’s an important aspect of parenting to give children some autonomy. We’re training them for the real world. They can “explore” and “go on adventures” in a safe environment, then come back to us when they’re done, dirty, and hungry.
Just like we hope they’ll do as teenagers and in college.
This won’t be happening anymore. We’re tightening the reigns. The boys took it too far.
The boys were lost!
Alissa called the family business, which got shut down for the search. Her husband raced his one-ton dump truck home at 80 miles an hour to help search.
He wasn’t concerned about being pulled over, since the local cops had all ready been called. They were at his house while he was racing home along with the rest of the workers at St.Pierre, Inc. who abandoned their post to rescue the great grand kids.
I was posted up, asleep, at the hospital, completely unaware of the chaos surrounding my family (or framily, friends that are family).
The state police and the dogs were called in too.
Poor Alissa. Our boys were found across the street at a neighbor’s house.
They had actually entered the house to play with their toys, specifically a talking parrot.
Fortunately, they decided to break into a house that belongs to our friends, friends who probably laughed when they heard about it.
Ethan, X’s other surrogate mom Jenn’s three year old son, found the boys. He heard them in the neighbor’s back yard and said he wanted to go play.
X and L were jumping on THEIR trampoline.
We have a trampoline. I guess they decided theirs was better.
Thanks Ethan and Jenn. Capt. Smith took the boys aside and gave them a talk. Jenn made Ethan listen too. I’m sure she is aware that if it was a weekend, Ethan and Colin (her 5 year old) would have escaped with the boys too.
It could happen to any of us. We love our neighborhood. We love the trees and the freedom it provides to explore. We let our kids run from house to house to house to play, but they are ALWAYS supposed to tell us in advance.
Apparently they forgot. So that just added to my eventful day. Try not to judge that we lost our kids. This is how we were raised and this is how we will raise our kids. We do keep a close eye, but these things happen.
On the bright side, we know our kids feel safe and enjoy socializing with our community. I think we’ll all look back on this someday and have a great laugh.