05 December 2008

How My Goose Is

Lucy is our mild child. Thank goodness. When I say mild, I don't mean she's sedate...or even obedient, entirely. We don't seem to have the genes for that in our family. By mild, I mean that Lucy sleeps all night. She rolls with the punches. When trouble befalls her, she just picks up and moves on.

At lunch bunch this week, Lucy and several toddlers were be-bopping down the stairs together when a slowdown of traffic occurred. I'm not sure who fell first, but suddenly several tiny people bumbled down the steps. I heard Lucy's friend, Bam-Bam cry, and then moments later, we heard a loud WHACK. Lucy had fallen head-first into the corner of a wooden column. Lucy cried for a few moments, but in pure Lucy fashion, she pretty much struggled to get free and continue playing as I attempted to press cloth onto her forehead and stop the bleeding (which, incidentally, was not as profuse as I would have expected).

Maybe because Lucy was so calm, or maybe because I'm sick of being in a waiting room with kids, I didn't really see the need to go to the doctor. As the bleeding slowed, the other mothers gathered around Lucy in a flurry of concern. "Stitches!" they proclaimed. "Band-aid glue!" they offered. Suddenly, everyone wanted to help and my son was carted away from the scene and I was on the road to the ER again.

I'm convinced that Lu is the most easy-going toddler the doctors have ever stitched up. She sat in my arms, holding bunny baby and sucking her thumb, practically unrestrained, as the doctor sewed a needle through her forehead---twice. And then she said, "Thank you, doctor!" as he left the room.