Yesterday sucked.
Got a call from the school, they were calling all the parents to let them know that one of the first-grade girl's mother had died that day as a result of a car accident on Sunday. The girl is one of my Brownies. Apparently she was in school, and didn't know yet that her mom had died. They were waiting to tell her after school. What made this even worse for me was knowing that Kira had passed out her birthday party invitations that morning, and A. would be going home all happy and excited about a party.
It was a single-car accident, early Sunday morning, as a result of speed and poor road conditions. There was frost on the roads, and it was icy. There was an article online in the newspaper, and the pictures of the car were horrible. My Brownie co-leader's husband is a volunteer firefighter, and he was part of the rescue team. He said the pictures don't cover how bad it was. It took an hour to get her out of the car. They had to cut the dashboard in half to free her leg.
Anyway, the school was calling the parents so we would have a chance to tell our kids when they came home. The guidance counselor will be available today (and will apparently be spending most of the day in Kira's class, as that is the class that will be the most affected). When the kids came home, the very first thing out of Kira's mouth was: "Guess what? A. says she'll probably be able to come."
The kids took the news well. We moms are having a harder time with it. I've talked to a few yesterday, and we are all in shock.
I was so afraid of possible reactions from Kira. What if she refused to go to school, because A. went to school Monday morning and her mom was alive, and got home from school and her mommy was dead. Would Kira get extra clingy? How do I assure my kids that this wouldn't happen to me? How would Mark react?
Like I said, they took it well. Kira said that A. must be really, really sad. Then she asked how the car accident happened. (I didn't know then.) That was pretty much it. Kira went off to make snowflakes.
Mark spent a half-hour at MarkS's yesterday and while he was there I stopped next door at Patti's. While we were processing it with each other, our girls were running around happily shrieking. Patti and I aren't sure how today's Brownie meeting will go, whether A. will be in school today or not. It could go either way.
So then I took Mark to basketball practice. Fifteen minutes later, the phone rings. It's Amy, the team mom, and Mark has dislocated his thumb and could I pick him up.
So off to the ER we go. Mark's crying, he's hysterical at the idea that they're going to put it back in joint and it's going to hurt. He finally calms down a bit. They took a set of X-rays to be sure there was no fracture. The doctor examined it, tried to get it back in joint but it wouldn't go. Apparently it was a complex dislocation, which meant that there was possibly some cartilage that had slipped in the socket preventing the bone from going back in properly. He put two shots of a local anesthetic in and tried again, and was successful (another set of X-rays to check), although the orthopedic guy on call said that Mark needs to come in today to his office to get checked out to see if there needs to be any followup surgery(!). Meanwhile, Mark's in a hard splint up to his elbow, and his basketball season is over. If he doesn't need surgery, he'll be in the splint for 4-6 weeks, the ER doctor said.
So today I'm sending him to school, but calling the orthopedic specialist first thing this morning, and then I'll have to pull Mark out at some point to go there. There's a Brownie meeting after school today that I'll probably have to miss, and an away game that Mark is going to miss (although he still chose to wear game-day clothes to school today).
Oh, and this morning there were TWO mice trapped in the kitchen, including one in the cupboard.
sigh. mk
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