This past weekend was a little too eventful for our liking. We were in Toronto for my cousin Shan's wedding (which was an absolutely fun affair at The Liberty Grand downtown). Having had a festive evening, we arrived home to free our babysitter. K-man had slept soundly from 7pm but at 2am decided to awake for his own party. Having managed to get him to sleep by 3:30am or 4am, we were woken again as usual around 7am.
Unfortunately, K-man was very late in the game when it came to rolling over. Had he started rolling at a younger age, perhaps I would have heeded the warnings. But given that he only just recently started flipping himself over (and usually on the changing table he lies there staring at the ceiling). But this particular morning, he decided he was going to try taking on gravity. I had just turned to reach for his pants when I heard a crash and little K-man had fallen face down on the hard wooden floor.
My first instinct was to pick him up (lucky for us, he started crying almost instantly after a very brief shock). I held him close and took stock of his little bleeding mouth. The first time ever that I had ever seen him in such distress. I was so upset myself but I calmed myself and handing him over to his father, went running past my mother to get an ice pack and a cloth. Everyone in the house went into a panic as he screamed and cried in unconsolable sobs. The ice pack was too big. He didn't want anyone poking at his mouth. So I let him cry and just held him while my husband got our stuff together and we rushed to the emergency room at the RHH.
My heart felt broken that I had been witness to little K-man's fall and our normally happy little brown cherub was so unhappy and upset. I finally managed to get him to sleep a little as the triage nurse checked his vitals and established that from his initial cry that he had not hit himself badly enough to warrant a concussion. We were at the hospital for about 3 hours and by the time we saw the doctor, the bleeding had subsided and he could see clearly there was a cut on the gumline above K-man's two front baby teeth. His nose and other facial features were all fine. Our little trooper was in good condition towards recovery with no medical attention needed.
Let it be known: the Ontario based hospital would not see him until I paid up a $630 fee upfront. Any additional hospital fees would be added at the end. Of course I practically threw my credit card at the poor admin who normally would simply take your OHIP card and not ask for such funds. IF you're a parent out there, definitely invest in travel insurance. Lucky for us, we're fully covered for emergency care on our US health plan.
As all of this was happening, hurricane Irene had been downgraded to a tropical storm by the time it reached Boston and New England. I had been keeping an eye on the news and knew of the flooding in Vermont and some of New York. I received a text from my neighbor showing a tree that had fallen in our back yard and how if our car had been there - would have demolished it. I searched the news for any travel advisories for people returning to Boston via New York. None. Nevertheless, my gut instinct was to cancel our return on Monday to Tuesday.
By Tuesday morning, Kiran was well recovered and back to his bouncy smiley self. His gums showed a little bruising but were otherwise fine. He didn't show any sensitivity when being fed as he had done the day before. I searched the news and found nothing saying anything about travelling back to Boston. We also received several emails from friends telling us how fine the weather was after the storm.
So we packed up our bags and left fair Toronto around noon on Monday expecting to reach Boston at the latest by midnight.
Unfortunately for us, we ran into traffic on the 401 heading to Gananoque. We thought nothing of it, after all - we had planned to take an extra few hours on the road. But then we crossed the border with no trouble and entered Syracuse. We were soon notified by a state trooper that the I-90 going East was closed and traffic was being re-routed via Hwy 5. Looking at the time, it would only take us an 1hour before we would get back on the road. No worries, or so we thought! We got on 5 and headed towards Albany. As night fell, we felt that perhaps it would be better to head back towards the I-90 and see if it was open around Utica. 8PM brought us to Utica and the I-90 was still closed. We were told that it would open up again around Amsterdam. Taking the detour route we fell in line with all of the other traffic that was heading there. Soon we were stopped for about an hour on a country road with a LONG line of cars ahead and an equally long line of cars behind. It was about midnight before we reached Amsterdam.
By now, we had been driving 12 hours. Kiran had woken and eaten and slept and been changed countless times. We had hoped by travelling more in the evening we would take advantage of his sleeping state - but now we ran the danger of OUR increasingly exhausted sleepy state. We stopped at every rest station between Albany and Boston. At one point the husband even missed the exit and ended up driving another 28 miles to the next one. We were EXHAUSTED. This would be the longest night in the history of our marriage. (Even beats the time we couldn't find a hotel room due to the celtic festival in Loriant and ended up sleeping at a cross roads in the countryside surrounded by bunnies). By 4am we had reached Framingham. Only 1 hour away from home. But we both passed out and slept. K-man was safe and warm in his car seat and actually stayed asleep even after the car had stopped. I had a blanket wrapped around my feet and one of K-man's blankets around my shoulders. Steph had opted to sleep in the front seat - which was probably a good idea for a less cramped experience. I woke up at 5:30am and woke him up as well and while Kiran slept we got home. We were both still so tired and exhausted. Tuesday was a write off.
But the benefit of coming home, was that K-man's Nanny arrived on time at 9am and let us both get some much needed rest.
So having survived the last weekend. I was happy for the ultra-short work week. This weekend, we're hoping for an uneventful boring weekend at best.
The worst you can wish a person: "May you live in interesting times.." - Terry Pratchett