Home Alone

I returned home from Denver last night after being there for the CASE/NAIS Conference. Without any assistance from the outside, Jack took care of the kids from Saturday morning until Wednesday morning, and as we like to say in our family ... "no bones are broken and nobody's bleeding" so everything appears to be okay.

Actually, I give Jack a lot of credit. He works 30 miles north of Raleigh, so he had two extra hours of driving each day since he had to take the kids to school. Not easy, and I do appreciate that I didn't have to even worry for a minute while I was gone.

I admit that I left him a long checklist of "Mr. Mom" duties ... complete with items like "pack lunch" and "review spelling words." But I also know that, list or not, the three of them (and even Viking), would have fared just fine.

But as my plane took off from RDU airport, I was trying to figure out why I had any nerves at all about leaving the kids for five days. Nothing bad has ever happened when I've left the kids with Jack or anyone else ... so why couldn't I just relax?

And then it hit me ...

In 2004, when LJ was 3 1/2 and Julianna was 18 months old, we moved into an apartment while our new home in Raleigh was being built. We were only in temporary housing for seven weeks, but with two little ones and crazy dog in cramped quarters, I quickly went stir-crazy.

So, every night, as soon as Jack got home from work, I would take Viking for a walk around the apartment complex. I needed any reason at all to get out for just five minutes, and exercising Viking was a perfect excuse.

One weeknight, as usual, I took Viking for a walk and left the kids playing with Jack watching them. I was gone for no more than 10 minutes. When I returned, this is what I saw:

• LJ had somehow moved Julianna's booster seat from the dining room table to the floor of the den.

• Julianna was now strapped into the booster seat.

• LJ was pointing a full spray bottle of Lysol kitchen cleaner directly at Julianna's face. He was locked and loaded.
  

• Jack was sitting on the sofa, about 10 feet away, reading the newspaper.

I look back at this now and laugh -- hysterically. All parents have had those "zone out" moments and our kids come through them just fine.

I vividly remember a "zone out" of my own just a few months after the Lysol incident. We had just moved into the new house, which had a two-story foyer with an open staircase. I was on the phone and happened to walk into the den ... where I found Julianna halfway up the staircase, clinging to the outer railings.

And there was also the time I found her, at about 10 months old, standing on the dining room table playing with the chandelier.

Or the time we couldn't find two-year-old LJ anywhere ... only to discover he had locked himself in our car in the garage.

We've all been there, and no matter how much we love our children and worry about them -- those "moments" are bound to happen. Sometimes all we can do is lock up the Lysol and hope for the best.

Oh, and fold up the treadmill too ... but that's a story for another day.





Snow on the Blue Bear in Denver