Some days, it's wonderful to live in the city. It's nice to know that I live a block away from the Children's Place, a pizza store, a CVS, a fire station (for the boys!), several restaurants and about 2 dozen convenience stores. If I'm out of milk, I can literally go next door and get some. If I need a dollar store, I have about 5 in short walking distance. The library is a five minute walk away, Target is a mile away, and we have 5 playgrounds in walking distance. If I hop in the car (HA...what does it feel like to hop in the car?!?), I can drive north about 10 miles to Yonkers and find any store under the sun I need.
In theory, I could be exposing my kids to the tonnnnnns of museums, art galleries, etc that this amazing city has to offer. We could be enrolled in fifty million kids classes and could be a member of 50 different play groups. Could. Are we? Do we get out to any of these fun and exciting places? No. Why? Being a mom to ONE kid in the city is a challenge, but totally doable. Being a mom to TWO brings things to a screeching halt... the MTA (our subway system) is light years beyond where it should be in regards to making things accessible for people with disabilities or strollers. Are there elevators I can take? Yes, definitely. Luckily, there is one located not too far from me.. only about a 15 minute walk away.... and there is a station at many of the major stops. So if I need to go to Times Square or 34th street, I'm good. If I need to get to 86th and central park west, where the kids' pediatrician is, I'm in trouble.
Even if there is an elevator, though, I'm kind of out of luck. You see, I have an almost 4 year old who is totally capable of walking and can walk a million miles if it's to the ice cream store, but who immediately says "Help. My little legs are too tired to walk and I need to ride in the stroller" if we have to walk to the train station. Any idea what it's like taking a double stroller on the train? It's not pretty, and during rush hour times it's impossible. People will practically fight to the death to get in a subway car during rush hour and there is no WAY people are going to make room for a double stroller. Waiting for stinky and painfully slow elevators to get you down to the station and then down to the platform is not a fun experience. Do-able, but not fun. Especially at stations like columbus circle and 34th street where I have to take three separate elevators just to get out!
So we're kind of limited as to where we can go. But there are situations that come up all the time that are quite tricky. Like today. Brielle had a 9am appt with her pediatrician today for her 2 month well visit. No, I did not choose this time. 9am (in actuality 8am, since it takes us an hour to get there) is not a time when people are going to be lining up to your door to babysit. Sure, I COULD have begged and gotten someone to come, but I decided about 2 weeks ago that I wanted to try this on my own. I was going to have to do it SOMETIME and what better place to go on an adventure like this than to the pediatrician's office, where they are used to screaming children. So once I decided that I could do this, it took a LOT of planning to figure out how. Should I take the double stroller to 59th street where there is an elevator, and then walk up to 86th? That's only a mile and change.... buuut the 59th street elevator is OUT of service, and that means I'd have to be on the train with a double stroller during rush hour and it gets REALLY crowded between 125th and 59th street. THAT option was out. Should I take the double stroller to 59th street and transfer to the 1 train uptown to 96th (elevator) and walk down to 86th? No, for the same reasons as before. Ok...so the double stroller was out. Single stroller in. Well, who gets to ride in it? Liam would love to walk, but he's at the "I'm not going to hold hands with you if I don't feel like it" and "I'm going to follow any bird I see" and "I will lay down on the sidewalk if you try to take me somewhere I don't want to go" stage. Dangerous when I'm carrying Brielle.
Do I let Eli ride his scooter to the train? No...I don't feel like dealing with a scooter on the train.
I decided Eli would have to walk and Liam would ride and I would carry Brielle. I've been talking this up to him for the past few days, promising ice cream and jellybeans and anything under the sun to get him to walk. I did everything I could last night to get ready..... packed the bag, the snacks...got bottles ready... I was not counting on Liam waking up at 5:30am this morning. I was not counting on Eli sleeping in until 7:40 when we needed to leave at 8. I was not counting on our water being brown yesterday and me having to instead bathe Brielle this morning. I was NOT NOT NOT NOT counting on it raining. Sigh.
I decided that I could DO THIS and we did. We made it work. Even in the rain. Eli whined and complained about walking and I burst out into hyper excited mom mode "ELI! LOOK AT THAT FIRE TRUCK! LOOOOK...a truck with a COW ON IT... LOOOK...a STREET SWEEPER... HEY...the next time we go to the ICE CREAM STORE, what flavor are you going to get?!" Annnnnything I could do to make him forget about the fact that we were walking. In the rain. And for the most part, it worked. Mom trickery at it's finest.
What is it like getting on a full subway carrying a baby with two small people who MUST sit down on the train in big boy seats and not in their stroller? Challenging, to say the least. But we did it. Eli had fun telling me the numbers at each of the stops (though he still reads them backwards... telling me we are at 541 street instead of 145th) and Liam was mesmerized by a guy in front of us with a crinkly bag of Doritos. The challenging part was when we had to switch trains. Normally if I am by myself and on a crowded train, I would get up the stop before and start easing my way to the door. When you're with little kids who will fall over if you try that, you have to stay in your seats. People on trains cannnnnnnnnooooot be bothered by moving out of the way of strollers. AT ALL. Even nice people. Even other moms. Strollers = looks of disdain. I had to literally yell "CAN YOU PLEASE LET US OFF?" to get people to move. I ran over a lot of feet. But we made it. We got on the new train with more seats and we got off the train. Both boys walked up the stairs while I held Liam's hand and the stroller while carrying Brielle. One out of every 200 people offer to help when they see this, and I didn't encounter any of them on my way.
We made it to the office and there was only one other person there. The boys ran off to play with the big toy in the center and look at the fish tank and Brielle slept. We made it into the check in/weigh room without incident. The lady brought the boys stickers which kept them still for about 25 seconds. Then she left and showed me how to lock the door so the boys wouldn't escape. Ten seconds after she left, Liam walked over to the door, unlocked it, and tried to escape. Every single drawer was opened and closed fifty times and it was a struggle to keep the boys off of the computer and off of the rolling stools. We finally got the OK to move into the other room, where there were more drawers and a FUN reflex hammer. Everything had to be banged. I had 10 spiderman/batman stickers applied to me. I could go on....
The appointment as a whole was a success. Brielle was an angel and was happy to sit there looking around, even though she was sans clothes and probably freezing. She cried for about 20 seconds after she got her (FIVE) shots and then stopped as soon as Dr. Grant picked her up. Dr. Grant called in an aide to escort the boys out to the waiting room while she was giving shots, so as to not traumatize them, and I was like.... A) Clingy liam is never going to leave me and B)they don't mind needles. They stayed.
Leaving was the challenge because it was POURING, but we made it home with the promise of ice cream. And hot chocolate with whipped cream and marshmallows and sprinkles. I can only smile to myself when i think of all of the overly worried people who passed us walking home... me holding an umbrella and a flimsy blanket over Brielle... Liam in his stroller using his umbrella like a captain america shield, completely getting wet, and Eli refusing to hold his umbrella at all, getting soaaaaaaked. And me, the crazy lady yelling (in the cooold rain)... "HEY! ELI! There's a big puddle!! Run up to that one!! Yaaaaay! Splash splash splash!" hahaha.
That was way longer than I intended it to be, but I wanted to write it for my future self to look back on and remember.
Two things:
ReplyDelete1. I am exhausted just from reading this post
2. You are amazing.