Chicken Noodle in Your Ear?

I went to my PCP to get my prescriptions filled. This particular PCP also happens to be part of an urgent care facility, and accepts walk-ins as well as appointments. Therefore, each time I go, I know I will be there for a minimum of 2 hours, usually more. But I keep going back, getting a lot of reading done in the waiting room. Anyhow, after signing in, I retreated to a seat in my usual section. Within just a couple of minutes, literally, I had two kids sitting on my lap. The boy was 2 years old, and the girl was half of a set of 4 year old twin girls. The children had both their mom and their grandmother there and 2 out of 3 kids were sharing my lap. The mother was just plain mean and kept telling the kids they were stupid, that nobody wanted them, and that if they went close to the door, bad people would come and hurt them. What the heck? She even told the 2 year old that he was just a baby who wore diapers when he said "ow" after getting spanked on his bottom. Even with the two adults there, these kids ran wild, actually crawling under other people's chairs, completely unsupervised. Quite sad really. That was the beginning of 3.5 hours of my visit there. During that time, the children and I chatted about counting, manners, scary dreams, princesses, doctors, birthdays, mommies, puppies, and a number of other subjects. But it was definitely a duel learning process. To start, as the children were curious and bold, as children usually are, one of the twins asked me where my babies were. I told her I didn't have any and she couldn't grasp the concept of an adult woman who wasn't a mommy. That was not just a one-time conversation either. The child asked me every 30 minutes or so why I wasn't a mommy. Everything was Why? WHy? WHY? And all 3 children gathered around while I showed them a picture of the Ellydog on my key chain. They wanted to know what the key fob was for, what the pill holder was for, what every key went to, what my library card was (even what a library was if you can believe it. the mom said when the kids learned how to read, she would take them to the library one day, but not one of those kids had ever gone to a library!). During my conversation with one of the girls, S. told me that she got shot at the doctor. Okay, I comprehended that one shot=shots. But she also told me that the doctor put soup in her ears. By the way, it seemed clear to me that all 3 children had significant developmental delays, most noticeably speech. So I asked what kind of soup it was that the was taken out of her ear. We went over quite a few various types of soups before I understood that she meant "tubes" and it was just coming out as "soup"! Tubes, soup, not too far of a stretch, but a great brain teaser. Great kid moment. The same child also reprimanded me for not being at her birthday party that was sometime in the last month. The fact that I didn't know her then was merely a minuscule detail apparently. Another young girl, about 5, there with her mom and sister, kept asking her mom to go to the fairy. She was just being really cute and kind of singing a little song about going to the fairy. It took a good two minutes or so before the older sibling & mom realized the younger child was talking about the Ferris wheel at the fair. There is a small carny set-up in the mall parking across from the doc's office. She kind of twisted it around a bit in her head, but it was pretty close. And another good kid moment. The not-so-fun kid part was when one of the twins asked me if she could come to my home and stay with me. She was grabbing onto my shirt, sitting on my leg, with her brother on my other leg. It was so hard to not say yes. It made my heart hurt that these children desperately needed attention and love, even if it was coming from a stranger. And I almost gave the mother my contact info, but I didn't know what to say, so I didn't do it. I wanted to tell her that when things got to be too much for her, I would watch the kids. And that if she was ever on the verge of hurting any of the children, I would care for them. I wanted to tell her that her children were gifts from god, deserving of love and care and a million band-aids if that is what they wanted. I wanted to tell her all of that and a lot more, but I didn't. And sometime during the hour that I was waiting for the doctor back in the regular exam room, the kids, their mom, and their grandma all left. No more questions about my broken tummy, no more squished up smiles peering at me through the window pane, no more trailing scents of dirty diapers, no more kiddies. Back to my home and my family with my little dog and my hard-working honey. It is a lot to be grateful for, I know that in my heart of hearts.