Picture it!
It is Thanksgiving. Our house, well rather my parent's house was decorated for Fall and the holiday upon us. My rather large family was there including my youngest cousins. We were getting ready to celebrate as we often did together.
My son was 4 years old at the time and my daughter 6. I am not sure how old my female cousin, I will call her M., was but she was still young enough to be in junior high, maybe possibly still in elementary school. I don't know and at this point, it really does not matter. The point is, she had babysat for me a couple of times and adored playing with my kids.
As it was, I was helping my Mom with things and preoccupied so, having my cousin around at the time was a good thing as she could wrangle my kids and they would not be under foot. Everything was going great and dinner was smelling divine. The house looked beautiful and my Mother just as much. Dad, my brothers, male cousins, and uncles did the wise thing and stayed out of the way and chatted in the living room as football games blared from the TV.
We were just about to gather to eat when M. came into the kitchen without the kids. She calmly says to me, "Um, Cousin, I need help."
I looked at her and she motioned to the bathroom. I followed M. to the bathroom only to find my son sitting on the toilet seat with a white wash cloth to his head...except the washcloth was not white! No, in fact, it was turning bright red from the blood gushing from my son's head.
I asked her what had happen and she said that they were playing some kind of game. My son jumped on her back and she rared up only for my son to fly backwards and hit the coffee table. When she realized he was injured, she tried to fix the problem but realized it was not simple and thus needed my help.
I told her, rather calmly I might add, to go tell my Mom that she needed ice or at best another cloth right away. She did. I remained calm and my son, who was not, nor never did, wail remained calm too.
By this time, the rest of the family was starting to take note that their might be a problem. When my Dad saw what was going on, he freaked out. Seriously, freaked out! I told him and whomever else was standing there to take me and my son to the hospital. The family except for me and my son were now in full panic mode.
We arrived at the hospital with my son still bleeding profusely and had to wait and wait and wait. It was insane the time we waited but still, my son did not cry, not one time.
Finally, we saw the ER doctor and it turned out that my son needed 4 stiches in his head. The only time he cried was when they put a shot in his head to numb it. He left with candy and stickers and was happy to show off his head.
And that, is how, we spent Thanksgiving one year.
~Naila Moon
