Train Day

Ashiah has a friend named Stella who's birthday is the 13th of July while Ashiah's is on the 15th. The local steam train that comes by our road 4 times daily en-route to a quaint village named Wakefield is free for kids under 3, so there was a small window to take the girls before their birthdays. Stella's parents invited Ashiah to join them today and although I am not much up for company, I did not want to miss Ashiah's excitement of being able to ride the train that is so much a part of her life. So I joined them.

The girls had a wonderful time and we bought them toy engines that whistle, ate bad muffins and learned interesting tidbits about our area in the 1800's. There were musicians that played from car to car and Sarah (Stella's Mum) suggested they might play Happy Birthday for the girls on the fiddle which they did, and the whole car sang along. Stella was thrilled and Ashiah had a "this is so lame" look on her face. It was priceless.

Sarah is a calm, peaceful and sweet friend and her company was lovely. All went well till we reached Wakefield. As we disembarked it began to rain fairly hard and we waited for Stella's dad to pick us up. After Ashiah and I walked half way to the cafe in the rain we were then picked up but were very wet and muddy when we got to the cafe. Ashiah and I went to the bathroom to clean the water out of our shoes and when we got out there was too long a lineup to order food as our friends had ordered drinks and weren't eating and would have had to wait for us. I began to feel fairly anxious at this (silly I know) and took the kids to the play area to wait. Once there, the area was blocked by a mother and her cute baby boy who was in a high chair. My heart seemed to stop for a moment and I suddenly felt very trapped and couldn't seem to catch my breath. Will it always be this way... The girls went under the baby's chair and I sat at a nearby table with our friends. We were soon distracted by a Dalmation on the deck that Ashiah named 'Pongo' and the girls went to play with the dog and I busied myself taking pictures. I then remembered that I needed napkins at the front of the cafe to clean the mud Ashiah had left on the car seats and left the girls with the dog to play for a moment as Stella's parents were looking on. But when I returned Ashiah was nowhere to be found.



I have to say that this was the most panicked I've ever been since I've become a mother. I'm usually considered a fairly laid back mom but I became unraveled today. I began to run through the restaurant yelling her name, ran outside, knocked over 3 old women (I'm so sorry) and was now screaming Ashiah's name. What was maybe a minute and a half felt like 20 and when Sarah saw me freaking out she said that she'd seen Ashiah run up the stairs. Sure enough there she was walking down. My heart was racing so fast and I was shaking and felt like I was going to throw up. I hugged Ashiah so tight and told her to please never leave me again and promptly asked our friends to drive me home. I was an embarrassed mess.

Once home I fell into Greg's arms and cried and said that I clearly wasn't ready to be out in the world yet. I can't believe I lost it the way I did today and although I feel safe and good again at home, I wonder when I will be able to go out there and face the world in a rational, normal way again... or is this my new normal?

This aside, I am still proud that I was able to share the train experience with Ashiah and hope to be the kind of parent who won't look back one day with regrets that I missed out. I don't wanna miss a thing.

I will post more pics of Ashiah and Stella's train day here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/99049415@N00/