just a normal day. With poop. And sirens.

I know that some of you are very proper. And so I am going to keep this as subtle as possible.

My little Ty has recently been having some explosions in the nether regions. If you have a child, you may remember the stage with the up-the-back blowouts? Where everyone has to take a bath after? You know what I mean.

It usually turns out alright if we’re at home. Except for the time I won’t tell you about, where it ended up on the rug, and my jeans, and Ty’s hair, and Sam kept asking, “Mommy, is that Ty’s poop? Mommy, is that a big mess?” and other helpful and motivating comments.

But the worst of all happened just recently. Before I start, if you are my neighbor, you might not want to read any further. Especially if you have a precious baby who likes to use the slide.

The other day the fam and I were innocently enjoying some frolicking acting like wild banshees in the park. I had my hand tenderly on Ty’s bottom to soothe him down the slide, when I noticed some moisture. In a suspicious place. Hmmm.

I can’t explain what I did next, except that I must have missed my afternoon nap or something. Ignoring the red flags beginning to pop up, I confess that I helped him go down the slide not one but two more times. At this point the “moisture” was rather prominent, and attracting the attention of some other park-frolickers, namely, my sister, who subtly clued me in to a potential problem, using our secret code language.

“Is that poop on Ty’s pants?”

(Our secret language needs some work.)

Um, yes. Yes it is. I felt like I almost began to see some darkness creeping up the shirt. And dripping on the socks? No. Couldn’t be. So then I pulled out my diaper bag, and my diaper, and my extra change of clothes, and my hand wipes.

Except that I didn’t have any of those.

Between the two of us, we did manage to scrounge up a pair of shorts two sizes too small. And a tissue. I think we may have had a water bottle.

Luckily, our other sister lives right near the park. Perfect. I’ll just carry him out in front of me like a contaminated medicinal trash bag, she will open the door and prepare a wash stall, and things will be fine in no time.

Ding dong. It looked a little quiet inside her house, but she never goes anywhere. Except for today.

No worries. I’ll just let myself in, borrow a diaper, and no one will ever know.

Well, no one did know. At first it was just me. And poopy Ty. And then the CPI “home security operator,” who kept asking me over and over for my secret passcode. And then the most blaring, ear-piercing, alarm system I have ever heard. And then the neighbors, who were probably either heading to their bomb shelters or about to come over with baseball bats and pepper spray.

Ma’am, what is your secret word? What is your secret word?

Even if I did know the secret word, how in the world was she supposed to hear it over that beeping alarm?? I do remember feeling vaguely bad for Ty, who in addition to his worsening diaper rash was most likely beginning to suffer long-term hearing loss.

I knew I had about 25 seconds to figure out this secret word, or the house was either going to self-destruct or become overtaken by a SWAT team. (Note to self: Immediately purchase this absolutely terrifying security system.)

Somehow in the madness I came to my senses and called my sister. Who didn’t pick up. And my brother-in-law, who did, and sounded like he was having way too good of a day to be informed that the police were on the way to his house, and his neighbors probably all hated him.

That was probably the worst moment, right there, Ty crying, siren blaring, completely over-zealous operator demanding a “secret passcode,” confessing my breaking-and-entering to my brother-in-law.

The sky did start to brighten after that point. Amazingly, I entered the passcode in time, and somehow cleaned all the you-know-what up without smearing any on my sister’s rug.

It was probably only a span of seven minutes, but my the time I shirked back to the park, I was sweating in all kinds of places, my heartrate was gradually begin to subside to a less than frantic pace, and Ty seemed to stop shaking his head and smacking his ears.

Just another normal day. You know?

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