It was my 10-year-old son’s first day of ski school on a cold, blustery
day in Minnesota. I wasn’t sure if
I was going to send him that day because they were headed to a ski hill that was about an hour
away, and we were scheduled to get a bunch of snow so I was worried about the drive home. But after finding out that a few of his buddies were going, my son decided that he really wanted to go. So, we hurriedly layered him up,
got his ski bag and lunch bag packed and we quickly headed out to catch the
bus.
We were supposed to meet the bus at a nearby mall parking
lot. I pulled into the lot and there was no sign of the bus or of any other
cars waiting for a bus. I frantically called another mom who told me that her
husband had taken their son and that she thought the bus was on the west side
of the mall. I was on the east side. It was 8:01 a.m. The bus was scheduled to
depart promptly at 8:00. I drove
like a madwoman to the other side of the mall and caught sight of a school bus
pulling a trailer behind it (presumably containing ski equipment) exiting the
mall parking lot and heading toward the freeway. “SHHHIIITTTT!!!!!” I said in
my very outside, non-mommy voice. “Mom,” my son whispered. “Did I miss the
bus?” “NO,” I retorted as I
screeched out of the parking lot, hell-bent on catching that bus.
“Mom,” said my sweet son, who could sense that I was about
to do something crazy, “It’s okay, we can just go home.” “No honey, you are going
skiing today,"I said. "You want to go with your friends, we've paid for it and you are
going.” “Are you going to drive me all the way to the ski hill,” he asked
tentatively. “Nope, you are taking the bus there,” I said trying to not let him
know that my heart was just about to jump outside of my body as I prepared
myself for the bus chase. “But, mom….” “Honey, I got this, just sit tight.” And
we were off! I raced out of the parking lot and got onto the highway on-ramp.
The bus was in sight. Trying not to kill my son and myself, I accelerated a lot
but resisted pushing the pedal completely to the metal. I maneuvered my car into the lane
directly to the left of the bus. My son sat motionless and speechless with the
oh-no-she-is-not-possibly-doing-what-I-think-she-might-be-doing look on his
face.
There was no way that I was going to drive an hour and a
half each way to get this kid to ski school today, but there was also no way
that he was not going to go. One small problem, what to do about the bus that I
needed to get my kid on but was traveling at 55 miles an hour on the
freeway? As I cozied up right along
side the bus, I had a direct view of the bus driver. I honked. I honked again. She finally glanced over and I caught her eyes. She looked
at me with a puzzled look. I pointed to my son in the back seat. She looked at
me again with the same perplexed look. I motioned for her to pull over with my right hand. She looked at me in a different way, a way that said, “Are
you out of your frick’n mind?” I nodded and mouthed the word, “Please?”
Next thing I knew, the bus was exiting the highway. I
quickly followed suit, and pulled up behind the bus where it was slowing to a
stop on the right hand shoulder of a frontage road. “Mom,” squeaked my son from the back seat, “I can’t get on
that bus. This is the most embarrassing thing ever!” “Oh, but you can, honey. I’m sure your buddies are thinking
how cool it is that the bus pulled over for you!” He slowly got out of my car. I grabbed his ski stuff from
the trunk and he and I approached the bus driver. “M’am, that was not very
safe,” she said. “I know but I can’t thank you enough for stopping.” My son slowly, gingerly got on the bus.
I saw his buddies stand up to greet him and give him high-fives.
The absolutely insane, unimaginable, outlandish things we do
for our kids. It took me several hours and countless deep breaths before I could even
tell this story to my husband who just shook his head in disbelief. It took me more that a year to write it down.
