You're in the village

My brother-in-law Brennan, Captain America to you, thought I should name today's blog entry, "If it takes a village, where were you guys?" This after Toddler D decided he was going to abdicate our family and sit with a young couple with three girls under the age of four in the back pew at church yesterday.

These little girls are, I am telling you, biz-ee. They are as darling as can be and are usually found singing, dancing, fighting over pencils, whatever it takes on any given Sunday morning. My second born thinks they are tremendous fun and moved right over to where they were playing Ring Around the Rosy and nosed himself between their hands laughing uproariously. If it had been me, I would have given them surreptitious glances all hour, hoping one of them would come over and invite me. Toddler D operates with a different set of rules.

We have tried taking Toddler D to the nursery twice and got called out on the pager both times because D did not want to stay there. Since then we have arrived at church with a backpack filled to the brim with every conceivable game, toy and snack. Mostly Colin makes use of it while D tries to make friends with the people around us.

D didn't seem to be causing any more trouble with the girls than they are usually in , so I just sat there with my back turned away from the sermon waiting for him to cause an infraction I considered worthy of being pulled back into our pew.

Then it happened, he and Sister 2 started jumping up and down in the pew. Sister 2 got pulled down, but what was Young Father supposed to do with my child? I went over to get him. Unfortunately they were in the middle of the pew against the sound board. I could not get to him from either side . . . and this is where Brennan who was running the sound board comes in . . . I figured Brennan who is very tall could reach over the sound board and pluck up my child. But he wasn't there. He was off -- well, I don't know. He'd heard the sermon two times already, maybe he'd gotten the three points. Finally Young Father just grabbed D and handed him over. Pulled away from his friends D started to scream. By this time no one on that side of church was listening to the sermon anymore and, in a rare form of embarrassment for me, I just walked right out the back.

"Where were you?!" I asked Brennan when I saw him.

"I don't know," was his replay. "Maybe if you'd keep track of your child."

With relatives like that . . .