A Facebook Post

    Facebook post from the morning of May 11, 2019 – 10:59 AM.  The following, unscheduled, Grandmother event occurred 12 hours earlier on the evening of May 10th.  An evening that will live on, in the infamy of Rai family lore.  
 
“Don’t you just hate it when your 7 year old granddaughter gets mad at you at 10:00 PM when you take the iPad away and tell her to go to bed and then she disappears and you go to find her and she is nowhere to be found and you panic and you look everywhere even in the shed and around the house and yell until you are hoarse and then you think maybe she tried to walk home so you try to call your daughter but it goes straight to voice mail so you jump in the car and drive over to her Mom’s so she can lose her shit so you aren’t losing your shit all alone and then you decide you need help so you call 911 on the ride back to the house and give them all the details and tell them to hurry and you arrive back at home and yell for her one more time right in the 911 operator’s ear and you hear this sweet little voice answer “what Grandma” and you yell in the operator’s ear one more time “Were you hiding from me?” and your sweet granddaughter says yes and you tell the nice operator that you found your granddaughter and you are going to kill her… ya, weekends with Rai took a dark turn…Happy Mother’s Day to all the Mothers and Grandmothers out there and try not to stroke out.”
 
   I have shared lots of stuff about little Rai on Facebook, using the social format as a journal of sorts. I have saved the posts thinking that I would one day write a book about our time together and perhaps inject some Grandmother wisdom amongst the various snippets of our shared experiences.  
   Many of the posts have been cute, endearing, idyllic – moments to be cherished while other posts have described times of a less than perfect environment.  Those posts have recounted everything from the incredible uprisings of a child entering the fabled terrible twos to the devastating destruction of a curious four-year old with paint and lipstick.  
   Over her seven years of existence, weekends with Rai have been filled with humor, fun, excitement, challenges and love.  Many weekends are exhausting but this past weekend was the first to bring me to a state of complete and utter panic.  Like I said, weekends with Rai took a dark turn but it was a learning experience as well.

    I wasn’t sure if Rai understood the severity of the situation – if she truly realized the chaos she had created.  Oh, she hung her head in shame when confronted with the fact that she must have heard me yelling her name… but her saying she didn’t remember hearing anything wasn’t going to cut it for this old grandma.  
    Shaking her head meekly yes, when I asked her if she understood that hiding from Grandma was wrong, didn’t give me a lot of confidence that she truly “got” it.   So, the next morning I called the Police and asked if an Officer could come visit with Rai for a little “one on one” education concerning the laws against scaring your Grandma.  
    

   The Officer was professional and courteous but firm in his discussion of the facts of the case.  Rai listened and this time seemed to absorb the importance of not repeating the offense.  I also appreciated the fact that the Officer didn’t blame me for getting all panic stricken – he gently explained that a missing child is the scariest experience a parent or grandparent can ever know.  He asked Rai about the times she had been scared and helped her recall what that had felt like.   He helped her understand how scared I had felt when I couldn’t find her.  
    I shared with the Officer that I saw people walking on the sidewalk as I drove to my daughter’s house. I told him that I was scared that maybe someone had taken her.  He understood how I could have thought that.  The Officer then warned Rai of the dangers from strangers and that sadly there are people who live in our town who hurt kids.  
    He warned her of the dangers of hiding during a house fire.  He instructed her that if there was ever a fire she was to get out of the house, even if she had to break a window.  She said she would.  Rai was receiving a lot of information from a tall, imposing, gun toting, law official and she seemed to be “getting” it.  
    Raising kids and grandkids, for that matter, is hard.  Helping to raise Rai has been an adventure.  I do want to gather those Facebook posts and write the story of “Weekends With Rai”.  I told one friend I should call it “WTF is she up to now.”  I don’t have to decide the title yet – we can wait to see what future weekends bring!  The Rai Adventure Continues…