a rememory

During study hall today, one of my kids asked me what my "most embarrassing moment" was. For a moment I thought I was at an 8th grade slumber party, or the worst blind date of my life. And while I'm not sure this was my definitive Most Embarrassing Moment, it's up there. Enjoy, friends:

My 2nd grade class acquired pen pals sometime in the early months of school. These pen pals lived in a far off land called Grafton, Ohio, and one pal lived on an Alpaca farm. My 2nd grade brain couldn't wrap itself around this concept. A farm! With animals! Real live ones! So as the school year progressed, and we wrote our little letters, plans were made to take a trip to Grafton and finally visit these friends of ours.

Now these details are slightly fuzzy, but it was either late fall or early spring (I'm thinking it was spring) and the ground was wet and there was a marked chill in the air. My entire 2nd grade class, plus teacher and parent chaperons boarded a yellow bus bound for Grafton. We each had a paper sack lunch on our laps, and a hopeful smile on our face.

I'm not sure exactly how long we were at the farm, but it was long enough to need a lunch. I also don't ever really member seeing the animals, but there was a cute 2 story farm house, complete with picket fence, and a big red barn. As our visit was drawing to a close, I had an urge, as any 2nd graders is wont to do, to use the facilities. I asked a chaperon where the bathroom was, to which I was told that there was no bathroom. Again, this is a little hazy, but why in heavens name wouldn't there be a bathroom for a class of 2nd graders?? There was clearly one inside the quaint farm house, and I suppose I don't blame the owners of said house for not wanting a gaggle of 2nd graders traipsing into their house, complete with muddy shoes.

So I was escorted by a female chaperon to the place where I should pee. And this place, friends, was behind the barn. As we rounded the corner, I imagined that there was a small little toilet back there where I could pee, but all that appeared before me was endless fields. The chaperon must have sensed the fear in my eyes, and the increased urgency in my pee-pee dance, and told me I would need to squat. Squat? What is that? I had never needed to squat before in my life. Ever. We Bay Villigians don't squat. But that day, I received a crash course in squatting.

Against the red barn and in the crisp April day, I pulled down my 2nd grade size jeans, and peed. And it just so happened, since this was my first experience with squatting, that very little of my pee ended up on the already wet ground behind the barn, but rather down my legs and subsequently onto my pants. I didn't pee my pants. I peed in my pants. And there was no hiding this fact.

Mere seconds after I peed in my pants, we were set to board the bus for our return trip. I waddled out from behind the red barn in my wet pants hoping no one would hear the squeak squeak of wet denim. What I couldn't have imagined was how I was going to mask the unmistakable odor of urine. Particularly to a class of 2nd graders, who all at some point or another, probably all had wet themselves in the last year, and were thus eager to point out someone else's misfortune.

And so it was, with a heavy heart, I boarded the bus back to The Villiage with my pee pants. Yes, a few kids did ask what the smell was, and the knowing female chaperon looked at me with pitty, and told the student that it was probably just the animals they were still smelling.

But my saving grace, and the one I remember to this day, was that on that bumpy bus ride home, Becky Knaggs threw up on Julie James, and I was no longer the object of ridicule.