The Wanderer

"He's the kind of guy who likes to roam around....."

This the song that entered my head shortly after I hung up the phone after the daycare center called me today. The center director called to let me know that during today's field trip to a pumpkin farm (sorry but the name has left me) that Jon wandered off away from the group. He was accounted for on the bus but on the walk from the bus to the designated meeting place, Jon took a detour. Jon went unaccounted for until a farm employee came over with him and asked if he was part of the group. There are two center employees being suspended because of the incident. If the employees at Jon's center had signed the new "no tolerance" policy yesterday, both employees would have been terminated today.

The director assured me everything was fine and that Jon is fine but I told her that I know for me personally that it does not help with the guilt I feel because I am not able to take off work to be a parent chaperone most of the time. Jon has no time to take off so he can't go either. She understood what I was saying and apologize profusely.

Today incident took me back to a scare that we had on Saturday. We went to the rummage sale at our church activity center. The place is huge with many rooms. The back doors were open while men loaded furniture into some trucks. I still cannot explain how but my husband, father-in-law, and I all lost sight of Jonnie. Of course, I freaked out and had my cell phone out ready to call 911. A parishoner found Jonnie in the kitchen area stuffing chips in his face. At lunch time, Jonnie asked for chips but we didn't have any. Since Jonnie couldn't have what he wanted, he didn't eat very much by his own choosing. The embarrassment of losing your child for just a few minutes and then to find your child saying "I'm hungry" and stuffing his face as if you'd been starving; I can't describe it!

I'm sitting here in my office overwhelmed by guilt and there's not a damn thing I can do about it. Quitting my job or reducing my hours is not an option because Jon and I each have to work 40 hour weeks to help make ends meet. The mortgage company already threw me a curve ball over the weekend with a letter saying that our payment is going up so what little budget I had to consider getting a different vehicle is now being applied to the mortgage. The daycare center director was not the director on duty for the field trip today and she did everything she is required to do by policy and law as far as contacting me. There is no complaint to file against them especially given that several days ago, the same thing happened to me when Jonnie wandered away from me. I would be a hipocrite.

The only thing to really do at this point is to learn from these mistakes and move on. I cannot change what happened at the rummage sale on Saturday. What I can do is to make sure when I take Jonnie out that he holds my hand even if it means not buying a shoe box of wine glasses at a junk sale. My son is far more important to me than wine glasses. I can make sure if I do go out with my son that I go with other friends or people who can help me so I can say "Hey, I'm going to go look at something" and do the same for my friends in return. I cannot change anything that happened during the field trip today. I am the breadwinner for the family and I have to work. If the schedule allows me to take a vacation day to be a chaperone, I will consider it but I also look at the fact that I pay a large sum of money every two weeks for my son to attend daycare. Why should I feel I need to use my vacation time to chaperone my son on a trip when I pay for people to do that while I work?

Life can be a double-edged sword. I need to get the sword out of my heart and move on!