Oh, some days you just want to do a little better.
Aftyn climbed out of our car today, while I was holding sticky Bronwyn away from me and was preoccupied by a strange truck parked near the entrance of our building with a person leaning into the truck talking with the passengers. Classis drug deal pose and so it made me uncomfortable to have to walk by with my kids.
Poor Aftyn and her muddled mother.
Aftyn had somehow entangled her feet in the "straps" of an empty plastic bag, hadn't noticed because she herself was distracted by the lovely lollipop in her hand, and had been walking through the parking lot to the entrance of the building when, not surprisingly, she totally tripped because of the plastic bag and worst of all to her, broke her lollipop all over the ground. Completely distraught, she began crying while I found us standing in front of said truck, only then becoming aware of what had happened with Aftyn and the bag and really wanting the safety of the inside of our building away from the inhabitants of the truck and the man leaning into it.
I quickly managed to untangle Aftyn's boots and hugged her, but with our proximity to the truck, I just wanted out of there so I grabbed her hand and crossed our little "intersection" of roadway in front of our entrance, thankfully putting some distance between my girls and I and the dumb truck. Once I got us inside the door of our building, Aftyn took off running as she usually does for the elevator, completely unaware of the mother's complex that was rearing its ugly head inside of me. I felt SO bad that in that instance when she fell FLAT on her face on the pavement, I couldn't react with more genuine concern for her and her injuries.
Sometimes as moms, I guess we just have to give ourselves a break. We really are just doing the best we can do. I can't wait to be able to LOOK BACK at our time in this neighborhood. And laugh. And be glad we made it through safely.
2 comments:
The good thing is that Aftyn probably will not remember this little incident. Most of the things I remember from my childhood are good memories, not bad ones. There are a lot of things that mother's can't control, like that scary, drug dealing truck. All you can do is be your best. (Ha,not that I would know anything about being a parent)
I know you're right. Sometimes it's hard, with the sacrifices that we're making on behalf of our family, to not feel a little guilty. Like the fact that we don't live in a safer neighborhood and we don't have more space in our home or in our neighborhood for them to run around. But I know that it's probably true, that our girls more than likely won't really remember too much of the things I remember and will instead remember the love and memories we've shared here.
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