And Then There Was Elmo

The week before Lilly started preschool, all my doubts and anxieties about sending my little monkey off three mornings a week to play and learn without me came to a head. I was dreading the separation and I wasn’t sure how she would handle it either. All I knew was that I wanted to make the most of our last few weekdays together.

We enjoyed several days of playdates and classes with our usual friends, but no week with Lilly is complete without a trip to the zoo. I was running out of free time between orientations and other obligations; we were left with only one option: a late afternoon jaunt through the zoo on Thursday.

I got Lilly down for a relatively early nap so she was up by 3:30. She had a quick snack; I packed a couple drinks and we were out the door by 3:45 with plenty of time to spare. A few minutes into our drive, the traffic on the interstate slowed to a stop just past the exit to the malls. Huh, that’s odd, I thought. I’ve lived in Louisville for 5 years. I commuted daily for most of that time and I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve hit traffic here that involved a full stop. I was not pleased but I was sure it would move along soon enough.

Forty-five minutes later, I was still sitting next to the mall. By this point, Lilly was only beginning to stop roaring like the tiger she wanted to see long enough to realize we weren’t at the zoo yet. Then the chanting began: “Zoo, Mommy! Go to the zoo!” I explained that I was trying to but I couldn’t go anywhere until the other cars moved. Why I bothered to explain this to a 2-year-old, I have no idea. As expected, Lilly’s response was: “Zoo, Mommy! Go to zoo! Tiger like this – ROOOAAR!”

I watched the clock. 4:15. 4:30. 4:45. The zoo closes its doors at 5. So at 4:52, when we had moved a grand total of about 200 yards since we first hit traffic, I decided that no matter how she took it, I had to break the news. It did not go well.

Over the next 20 minutes traffic finally started moving; Lilly was crying longingly for a carousel ride; and I begged the universe to make this a day when the zoo would have after-hours for members. It was not. The universe is a real bitch sometimes. So after finding the zoo, in fact, closed and realizing that I was likely to hit the same traffic if I just turned around and returned home the same way, I calmed Lilly down by promising her a playground and decided to take a different interstate, around downtown, to avoid the traffic.

Did you catch that brilliant idea? Avoid traffic by driving past downtown at rush hour. See any flaws in this plan?! So, yes, we hit traffic again. And Lilly began screaming again. And now for the first time on this nightmarish afternoon, I really began to lose it. Screw the interstate, I thought. I can do this faster on sidestreets. So into downtown I went, getting stuck at every light at every intersection. I racked my brain trying to come up with anything worth doing with a toddler during rush hour in downtown Louisville. Of course, since it was now almost 6:00, we’d also need dinner but preferably not one that required strapping Lilly into yet another chair. Then it hit me. Slugger Field! Please let there be a game tonight. Please let there be a game tonight.

I drove a few more blocks, saw baseball fans headed toward Slugger Field, pulled over and parked. Sure, it was an hour before the game was going to start and Lilly would probably not make it through more than an inning or two but I did not care one bit. Tickets are cheap, food is abundant and there is both a playground and a carousel at Slugger Field.

Within the first hour, Lilly had her first ballpark hotdog, played on the playground and took a ride on the carousel.  Things were looking way up.We found an unclaimed row of seats in the shade where we could take it all in and maybe get through an inning or two. Lilly was having a blast, dancing to the music being pumped into the stadium, playing with the flip-up seats. I sat back and relaxed for the first time in hours, listening only vaguely to the pre-game announcements, until it hit me what they were saying — “Ladies and Gentlemen . . . first pitch . . . Elmo!”

I jumped up. Are you kidding me? Lilly, look, it’s Elmo!!

Lilly started jumping up and down. “Elmo!!!” So what if she was actually pointing at the guys in red shirts cleaning up the field? Elmo was on the mound. Lilly was happy. And all was right with the universe again.

The And Then There Was Elmo by MushBrain, unless otherwise expressly stated, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License. Terms and conditions beyond the scope of this license may be available at mushbrain.net.