To the employees and patrons of the rest stop Starbucks, I apologize. Your bathroom will never be the same. A six hour road trip with a seven month old did not go as planned and all hell broke lose at your establishment. As a loyal customer, I appreciate your willingness to spare my dignity and pretend nothing happened. However, I await my letter from corporate asking me to kindly not return ever again.
Your biggest hot chocolate fan and most embarrassed patron ever,
Deya
What prompted such a letter? A simple rest stop back in February. All was well, driving to my brother's house to meet our new niece. We stopped for some coffee and hot chocolate (seriously, order with some cinnamon dolce in it, you will thank me), and to give Will a break.
I left hubby and mom in line to order and took Will for a quick diaper change. I was so excited about the changing table and that I would not have to hide him in a Burger King booth, that perhaps my mind quit working at this point. Diaper changed, and it occurred to me I also had to go.
It was a small one room situation so I had the bright idea I could strap baby onto the table and just be quick. He immediately started reaching for me so I grabbed the first thing in my diaper bag I could reach in order to distract him. Unfortunately, this was a spoon. Second horrible idea.
All of a sudden I hear this horrible choking noise, and puke started spewing out of my baby's red face that was filled with tears. I realized he was aspirating and jumped up and grabbed him. While this was the right thing to do for Will (who was fine), when I jumped up, my cell phone went flying out of my pocket and landed on the floor in pieces. My pants were around my knees and every surface, he and I were completely covered in puke.
I was now too afraid to put him down or really notice my pants, so I did what any logical human being would do, open the door and talk to the nearest stranger. Right? The dignity of motherhood. I kindly asked this gentleman to flag down my mother who walked in hysterically laughing and almost slipped in puke. We cleaned what we could and twenty minutes later sulked back to the car.
Next time we road trip, dad is in charge of diaper changes.
