The Lost Boy at the Amusement Park
Yesterday, on the mothers-sons trip to the mini-amusement park, I was talking with three other mothers beside the bouncy castle while our 4-year-old sons jumped and played inside.
When it was time for us to get going for the group’s pre-bus popsicle, one of the little boys ran up to me with a face full of terror, sobbing.
If I had seen a photo of his terrified face, without knowing it had been taken at an amusement park, I would have thought it had been taken of a child, G-d forbid, whose home had just burnt down or who had narrowly survived a terror attack or terrible accident.
“What happened?” I asked him with real concern.
“I am lost!” he cried, looking around him in a panic.
And a few moments later, I saw his mother jogging back to the bouncy castle, her son’s sandals in hand, calling out “I’m here, Davidi, I’m here!”
“Eema,” he cried, “I thought I was lost! But you’re here now, so I’m not anymore.”
Oh those moments are so painful as a mother and the child. I remember being stuck in a school bathroom at the wrong door. This bathroom had an exit and a cleaning closet. I thought the exit was the cleaning closet door. I cried and pounded on the cleaning closet door for a long time. I cried and cried it felt like an hour. Then my teacher came in and what a relief. It was a new school for me and my first time in a school away from my mommy.
how scary!