umm mommy? we’re crashing!

We went into town tonight to buy a tempurpedic mattress (one of my life’s goals).   In town, there was no snow on the ground.  Here, we’ve got around 6 inches.  Will and I had driven out in it, so I knew what to expect as we drove home.  In other words, as you cross into the forest, be prepared to cross into the North Pole.

My Civic is equipped with snow tires, which makes it like the most bad ass Civic ever.  Our neighborhood road isn’t plowed, which made leaving pretty exciting.  It was definitely the deepest snow I’d ever attempted driving in, and I’m guessing I’ll only get more seasoned as we head into actual winter!  I passed a Jetta that was stranded and being pulled out of a ditch by a neighbor, and another Civic out on our main road that was in an accident.  We made it safely to town, though, and I marvelled at everything I’ve learned about snow driving in our last three years living at 7000ft.  To think the very first day we lived here I totally had a panic attack driving around with just a little ice on the roads and sobbed the entire way to our house closing!

We bought our mattress, grabbed dinner, and headed home.  Will opted to ride in “Daddy’s monster truck” (the Jeep) versus “Mommy’s race car” as is his usual way.  And we all set off for home.

You wanna know what’s not fun?  Watching in the rear view mirror as the car your child is in drives off the road.

Nic’s a good winter driver, and the Jeep does pretty well in the snow (not as well as the Civic with snow tires, but well nonetheless) so when I saw their lights cross into the wrong lane my first thought was “what are they doing?!” and then when I saw them spin around and turn into rear lights I thought “did he forget something?”  It wasn’t until I watched them cross back over the road and end up in the ditch that I realized it was time to be freaked out.  We were going all of 25 mph, so it’s not like it was a high speed crash, but when your child’s wobbly head is in any kind of car-out-of-control situation, it’s still scary.

I got a call from Nic to let me know that they were okay, and that Will wanted to talk to me.  Nic said Will was okay, but thought he might be a little S-C-A-R-E-D.  Will got on the phone and the conversation went like this:

“Mommy?”

“Yeah buddy?”

“Ummm. [pause]  Mommy?  [pause]  We’re crashing!”

“I know buddy–it’s okay.  You did crash but you’re okay now.”

“I scared.”

“It’s okay sweetie–we’ll be home soon.  Everything is okay.”

We got home and Will got out of the jeep and leapt into my arms.  “Mommy?  Daddy crashed his monster truck!”

I just keep thinking about how cool it is that he’s old enough to tell us these things now.  For him to process what happened, put a narrative on it, tell us about it and how he feels, and get the reassurance he needs.  So different from a year ago when he just couldn’t talk to us like this!