At the beach, been here roughly 10 days so far, settled in. The kids have their friends, some old and some new. They ran in a large pack for the first few days, but by now, they have begun grouping and connecting. Spending time with one on one, and switching it up very few hours. Primarily, there are girls here. Two boys in the main pack, and they are 6 and 12, so not exactly close in age. This can be a problem for poor little Jacob, because he often is the stinky little brother that no one wants to play with. Well, in this case, stinky was accurate.
Need to make a an up-front apology to you Jacob, this blog is a bit of a laugh at your expense. Right now, you don't really care at all, because you have no idea about this. But someday, if you ever search archives and come across this, you'll find many laughs on your account. Thank you, son, for being a good sport and allowing me to share the laughter. By the way, your sweet little self is fast asleep in mid-afternoon on the couch right in front of me, which is why I am even blogging at the beach. You woke up sick, and have been sick all day so far.
Anyway, I had been hanging out down at the beach, which is maybe 40 yards from the cottage we are staying in. Kids had been in and out of the water, in and out of the cottage, it was a smooth beach day with everyone succesfully entertained most of the time. I hiked the 40 or so yards (such a burden) from the water to the cottage to get something, I don't know, probably a fresh beverage. I walked into a cottage full of girls, guess I hadn't noticed where they had been. I can't tell you who was in there, but I am aware that there was a new friend in the cottage, because I remember watching my reaction to what was about to happen. You know how you feel more comfortable yelling, or what have you, in front of friends who are around alot? But when there are newbies, you don't want to scare them off. So you filter your normal scoldings to make them sound, let's just say, NICE.
Walked in to a group of girls saying "It smells like poop in here!" First thing I do is look for Jacob, and notice he is in fact NOT in the cottage at the moment. Next thing I do is search my memory for whether or not he's 'used the washroom' yet today, as we say when we are in Canada. Mmmmmmm, don't think so. Why would I even keep track you wonder? Well, let's just say he still needs a little assistance in that department, no big deal there. I reply the gracious response about maybe the dog tooted, actually thinking maybe one of these sweet girls tooted and didn't want to admit it. However, this is pretty unnecessary in my home, in fact, these girls seem to take pride in their bodily functions. But there was a new friend here, I remember, and I don't yet know her level of confidence with public tooting.
Then I smell it too. And I have to say that there is a particular oder to a certain person's poo accidents. When I say accidents, I mean that sometimes, the process begins before, shall we say, the pants come down, leaving a little bit of evidence with a very powerful scent. I had to admit that I did smell the familiar smell. But again, Jacob was no where to be seen. So I blow it off and said "I'm sure the dog just tooted" although I wasn't too sure myself.
The my girls blatantly begin asking, well, not really asking, more stating in a accusatory tone of voice, that it smells like Jacob's poo. Since there is an undeniable smell that didn't go away with removing the dog from the cottage, I decide to make a formal investigation. The girls are all hovering around an iPad or an iPhone or a computer, or SOMETHING that you should not have anywhere near your beach vacation because it just seems WRONG. Jordan, who is now 12 (yep, that's right, a tween) was on a chair with the illegal beach device on her lap and everyone else was hovering around watching it. Jordan said the smell was somewhere around the chair. I knew that Jacob had been sitting on that chair earlier, so my thought was that maybe he accidentally began his process too late, leaving a little residue on the chair. So I had her stand, we pulled the various blankets and towels off, gave them the sniff test, and even sniffed the seat of the chair. Nothing. Huh, my best guess was insufficient.
It was funny that the smell seemed to be in the middle of the room only. It was near the chair, but not on the chair. I stood in the middle of the room, wondering. Where could it be coming from? Of course I looked at the floor in front of me, a large Asian rug. I had to lower my head to the floor for a 'tabletop' view since the design on the rug might be hiding something. Still nothing. I even looked up at the ceiling, thinking that maybe there had been an accident on the floor above me. While this may seem ridiculous, keep in mind that cottages are by nature flimsy. The ceiling is plywood, and there are plenty of leaks in the walls and ceilings. So maybe, just maybe, there was a poo accident upstairs and it was seeping. However, upon looking up - nothing. So I decided to let it go. By now, all the girls except Jordan were out of the cottage, and quite frankly, I didn't know where or how else to investigate.
Fast forward 10 minutes. Jordan is still watching some illegal beach device, Jacob is back in the cottage, and I'm buzzing around doing what mom's do chronically: pick up, wipe down some surface, prepare snack, gather laundry, whatever busy work was happening. All of a sudden, I hear "EEEEEEEEEEEWWWWWWWWWWWWW!" I'm not sure what happened exactly, but Jordan raised her foot off the floor and held it about 12 inches up, as we both gazed at a brown oval-shaped clump of something stuck to her skin. It suddendly registered that YES, it was Jacob's poo. Still not sure how it got from his rear end on to Jordan's foot, but I can only tell you that the look on my Tween's face spoke 1000 words, none of them nice or loving. You all can picture this, right? Any 12-year-old with her little brother's poo on her foot. . . this was not a pretty sight. I ran to the bathroom to get tissue while Jordan sat frozen on the chair, with Jacob asking "What? What? What?" All I knew was that I was trying to remove the poo before a tirade came flowing out of Jordan's mouth, causing permanent damage to Jacob's self esteem. I was successful only because after the poo removal, she was so motivated to get her foot into the tub to clean off . . . you know. Luckily, although I think Jabob knew he had dropped a little poo on the floor, he seemed to be unphased by all of this commotion. He went back outside.
I went into the bathroom to praise Jordan for holding it together, but the look she gave me spoke another 1000 words. Unfortunately, at this moment, instead of being able to thank her for not abusing Jacob, I BURST into laughter so violently, that I wasn't even sure if I was laughing or crying. I was hysterical! Truly. Jordan, even though I'm sure anger was boiling from her now clean foot to the tip of her head, was not even sure what to do with me. I thought for sure she would at least crack a smile at my strange behavior, but no. Not Jordan, the strong-willed child of steel. I could tell she had a grin in her, but she dared not let it out, considering the heinousness of the situation. I, on the other hand, continued to laugh-the gut wrenching, barely breathing, tears flowing-laugh. I continued to attemt to stop, to comfort Jordan, but as soon as I saw her face of disgust, I busted out laughing again. I tried to hug her to show my support, but she ended up holding me up since I was laughing so hard. Anway, I ended up apologizing for my lack of support with my chronic laughter. I am LOL-ing even as I write this. I think this memory will bring me joy for years.
I am definitly not the mother of the year, and I'm OK with that!
