Sunday, July 15, 2007

Great stuff and OMG I need a script.....

Great stuff first. Nic went into the ocean for the first time since 2001 yesterday. It was a struggle to get him to take his shoes off, but bit by bit, his aunt, uncle and I (with the help of his cousins and little brother) got his to shuck his shoes and socks, then his shirt. Then he took me by the hand and said "Come on mom, let's go in the ocean."

My heart just soared. I have always loved the ocean and swimming in general, and it breaks my heart that I haven't been able to get Nic interested. So yesterday was, I hope, the first in a long journey to getting him lessons and swimming. It's only a first step, but I'll take it.

But the downside of this was that coming out of my brother's driveway I hit a parked pick up truck (I should preface this with my brother lives on a hellaciously narrow street and people insist on parking on it when they have perfectly usable driveways, but anyway....).

I have plenty of experience with totalling cars (I have totalled two in my driving career). Fender benders? None. I had NO script. I panicked. "What do I DO??" I asked my brother, who still marvels at my ineptitude in some situations. He advised me to calm down.

I sat in my van to get my info -- actually, I needed to collect myself to deal with the woman who ran out screaming from her house. I thought I'd die. I pulled myself together and went across to confront my destiny. My brother was back, looking at the damage. Fortunately, just a dent to their bumper, a skin to mine. But still. Dents cost.

So we exchanged info. I'll try to keep insurance out of it. If we can't, we can't and we'll deal.

But she was a lot nicer when she saw what a wreck I was, and I guess it helped that I mentioned I had two autistic kids, one who kept me distracted enough to hit the damn thing to start with (as a coda, do you think they moved the car to allow me to back out? Of course not. And their driveway remained empty...whatever).

So the upside? Hey, I could have racked up the van on the way home and I didn't. It was an inconvenience, fortunately nothing more.

Now I'll know what to do next time I hit a parked car.

But there were good things. DH is away at a meeting. I had to take the boys to church and I had lector duties. Never did it before. Guess what, the boys were fine, and I had plenty of help around me to help manage them. I never would have guessed that the help was available, but I never asked before.

And my fellow lector has a son on the spectrum. I made a new connection without realizing that it would happen, making this step.

Overall, it's been a great weekend, and Nic has been blowing me away with some of these things that he has never done before...until now. Gives me a lot of hope.

All I have to do now is figure out how to put that fender in my budget for this month....

Here's Nic.

No comments: