a few days before christmas, after the convenience of holing up in our warm house had given away to large inconvenient messes in every room, i took the boys to a movie. this was the monkey’s second trip to the movies. the first one occurred when he was 18 months old, and he made it until the popcorn ran out. i was hoping that the bird would be similarly enthralled with the popcorn on his first trip to the picture show.

no such luck.

while the monkey sat gawking in a trance that only the likes of disney can induce, the bird walked up and down the steps, touched every sticky surface, ate popcorn fromthe floor, rolled around on the grungy carpet, and pretty much wrecked this self-professed germaphobe. after about 30 minutes of this, i broke the news to the monkey that it was time to go home. in my most sympathetic tone, i explained that i would bring him back within the next few days to see the whole movie, and that we would find a sitter for the bird.

this did not fly.

the monkey cried earnest tears of disappointment while i excused myself once again to fetch the bird from his newly developed plot to touch the movie screen. when i returned, the young mom who was sitting behind us with three enthralled (and slightly older) children of her own said,

“it’s okay. let him stay. i’ll watch him.”

so, for the next hour, i roamed around the theatre with the bird. the monkey sat snugly in his seat, and i became an expert at locating the top of his curly little head from every possible vantage point.

a few days later, on new year’s eve, i found myself at the (very crowded) fresh market with both kids in tow. we were standing in the never ending checkout line when the boys tired of their giant lollipops. the monkey demanded a lemonade sample, and the bird, who has clearly had too much exposure to anna dewdney’s llama llama mad at mama, began tossing things out of the cart.

once again, we were helped by a stranger, this time an elderly great-grandmother-type, who distracted the boys while i walked eight feet away to procure lemonade samples. she said,

“i have two boys too. they’re all grown up now, but i will never forget what it was like when they were little!”

i believe that it truly takes a village to raise a child. but villages cannot be very broadly defined these days. there are kidnappings and child molesters and people who follow you all over town by foot and by car (this has actually happened to my children and me). parents have to select their villages carefully. there are some strangers whose offers to help i have turned down.

but my intuition over the holidays at the movies and at the grocery store was telling me two things: “these folks are okay,” and “stay close by.” i went with it.

trusting something so subjective is scary. but sometimes, this intuition is all we’ve got.

Tags: anna dewdney, disney, fresh market, germaphobe, intuition, it takes a village, kindness of strangers, llama llama mad at mama, movie, tangled

This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 12th, 2011 at 7:45 am and is filed under choices, support systems. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.