This was not how I had pictured my Saturday morning.
The room around me was dark but for laser lights puncturing the black, bouncing around me on all sides. Music blasted from unseen speakers. Children darted about, including one of mine. He alternately stuck to my side and shot out himself, out of my line of vision then back into it again. We were walled in but surrounded by faces we knew, trapped but free.
It was…fun.
Birthday parties have, over the years, been some of the sources of my deepest identity crises, but these days they are more the sites of a decent time. And this one, on a grey Saturday morning amid the tourists and trappings of the city, was turning out better than I’d imagined. The Kid and I had dropped off Little Brother at a friend’s house and picked up that same friend’s brother, who came along with us. I managed to find a car park without coupling it to a nervous breakdown. We had entered the party on time. So far, so good. TK broke off from the group, wanting to check out the arcade games. We did, then I pulled him back for our first reality check/group activity: laser tag.
We listened to the instructions and the kids divided into teams. I went into the darkened room with him and the rest of them, passing on a vest of my own because I am a Dignified Adult (patent pending), and I figured I’d need to helicopter-parent TK without being encumbered by bulky outerwear. The game began.
A few minutes later it was done and we filed outside the room to check the scoreboard. No points on the board for us, but while I struggled not to hyperventilate due to sensory overload, TK grinned. The organisers suggested another round. A couple of the parents opted for vests this time. I hesitated…then grabbed one of my own. I chose to be on TK’s team.
Some of the kids saw me put on a vest and cheered, as did TK. I think it may be one of my favourite life moments.
For the next fifteen minutes, we all darted together. I shot and was shot at, by kids and other parents. People look different in the dark, when lit up only by lasers. When they’re having fun. When they’re…playing. TK and I stuck together and ventured apart. We were both in the game, on each other’s side.
This time, we got points on the board.
I had to pull TK away early, before arcade time, to get to his first tennis lesson. I expected a meltdown but didn’t get one. We got to the court and for thirty minutes, he smiled. He played, and I watched from my own spot on the sidelines.
Earlier in the week, I took LB and his friend to a school readiness program and for two hours, I hiked. I covered ground I never had before, pushed aside branches and gasped once at a snake that slithered away. I happened upon beaches that are only reachable by trail and gazed upon views you don’t see from the car.
There are some spots that can only be reached by the more arduous journey. But then…what a vista.
TK’s annual fight against school is weakening already this year. On Mondays, I pick him up early for speech therapy, and this week I crept in silently. These are the forays that you only “get” to make if you’re facing something out of the typical: a dentist appointment, a challenge, a diagnosis. There have been times when I wished I could be the parent who showed up at three o’clock every day along with all the others; the parent who dropped and ran at every party; the parent whose kid’s road didn’t have bumps in it to navigate.
But on Saturday, I played laser tag. And on Monday, I surprised my kid and was met with a grin that lit up the room just after I saw him bent over his work at the jelly bean table, his wrist working harder than the others because it was born a bit weaker, and it wasn’t about having to do anything. It was–it is becoming–about getting to.