Just Another Day At The Farm

The last time I was brought to tears while out shopping with Camryn was 2005. An elderly un"gentleman" in Publix let me know how annoying my daughter's screams were, special needs or not. I was still a lightweight at the time and broke down crying as the cashier proceeded to scan my items. Dry spell ended today, but ya gotta have rain sometime right? Any good farmer will tell you that!

It started clouding up about four o'clock this afternoon during an impromptu, should have known wayyyy better, trip to Target. Camryn had been at camp all day and Mason and I spent the day shopping for school clothes and presents for Natalie's birthday next week. Nat is spending a few days with my mother-in-law so it's just the two girls. Brad called to say he'd be late and since I had already achieved super cool mom status for all the cute clothes I bought Mason, I thought why not go for Mom of the month and suggest pizza for dinner? Target has a great fresh pizza so I told Mace after we picked up Cam we would stop off and get one on the way home. Sounds innocent enough right?

We got Cam and she was......Cam. I have gotten smart(er) over the years and had a bag of M&M's  and a bottle of water waiting for her in the car. She can be pretty hard to deal with after camp if there is no snack waiting. She ate  all but one M&M, a blue one,which she decided to suck on until the shell became soft and then took it out of her mouth, smashed it up in her hand and then proceeded to rub the melted chocolate all over my right arm laying helplessly there on the console. Yep, love those car rides. When we pulled in the parking lot I told Mace we would only be in there for minute as we had been out all day and I wanted to get home. I put Cam in the cart and bravely entered through the automatic doors. I needed laundry detergent and that happens to be located dangerously close to the dog bone aisle and well, you all know what that means. Cam started to stand up in the cart screaming "I wanna give Ry-Ry a treat!!" and I thought "Oh hell, this is going down hill much faster than expected. I handed her a bag of bones and hurried off to the grocery section. Well the pizzas are right next to the Lunchables and it has been my practice for quite some time now to always buy the kids a Lunchable while shopping in Target to keep them quiet. So naturally Camryn saw them and began to shout out "Do you want a lunchable sweetie!!!!!" I grabbed her one, tore off the wrapper and knew I had to move fast. Mace picked out a pizza, I threw some water in the cart and was almost out of the store when I had the brilliant idea of "just checking out" the clearance toy section to see if there was anything Natalie may like. Am I ever going to learn???? Doesn't seem likely. We start winding up and down the aisles and Camryn started to stand in the cart again. She really is way too big to be in the cart but I like her confined when we shop. I tell her to sit but I may as well have been talking to the cart because she is still towering above me lunging for things on the shelves. I got her on her bottom again by handing her a singing Cookie Monster toy. Knowing we needed to leave immediately I wheeled us up to the register and of course the lines were all at least three deep. And there must have been a contest to see who could buy the most "little" things. I swear the lady in front of us had to have had about thirty small items and the lady next to her maybe forty. Camryn was getting very restless and I was trying to prevent a meltdown. But that would be like trying to put a cork in Mt. St. Helens. Camryn was pushing Cookie Monsters hand over and over and over making it sing "Old Macdonald" repeatedly. Mason asked if I was buying it and I said I didn't care how much money it was there was no way that thing was entering our home. Well Cams had a different idea, a very different idea. She wanted that Cookie Monster and not only did she want it, she wanted it right then,as in scanned by the cashier at that very moment which was impossible because the cashier was only on item number fifteen out of thirty belonging to the lady in front of us. But Cams was like "whateva!!" She stood up in the cart again and started fussing " Do you want the lady to pay for it honey?" It was getting sooo ugly. I lifted her out of the cart and she clamored past the lady in front of us and shoved Cookie Monster in the cashiers face. And may I might add, our cashier had a severe personality deficit. I grabbed Camryn by the arm and said the six little words that piss her off more than anything..."You have to wait your turn." Well, Camryn Faith Walker does not wait her turn. Or wait her turn quietly I should say. She started crying and shouting out "Pay for it honey!!! Do you want to pay for it sweetie!!!" The stares started and I held my head high as I have learned to do. But my God, it seemed like the items the woman  bought in front of us had multiplied on the conveyor belt. I knew it was going to be a few minutes before it was our turn. Cookie Monster kept singing "Old McDonald" and Camryn kept shouting out that she wanted to pay for it and I pulled every trick I could think of out of my sleeves. I may as well have been wearing a tank top as nothing was working. I felt like the crowd was growing and Camryn's screams seemed to get louder. I would have tried to console her and talk her down but you see, that my friends is like the old pouring gasoline on a fire thing. It only makes it worse, so I just stood there praying our turn would come soon. And it did, but that didn't quiet Camryn. She shoved the Cookie Monster in the cashiers face again shouting "Pay for it honey!!" "I wanna hold him!" Well, remember how I had said I wasn't buying it? Oh I was buying it and you would think that would have solved the problem but Camryn wanted to hold it and apparently it's value is somewhere right up there with the Hope diamond because the damn thing was held into the box with about a million plastic twisty ties wrapped around about twenty times each! And I was still trying to load my items from the cart. By this time I had given up trying to calm Camryn and thought "F*** it!" I just stood there as my daughter thrashed and screamed and cried and shouted and the whole store stared. I paid for my things, grabbed Camryn by the arm and looked everybody in the eye as we walked past. And I probably should have just left it like that, but that would have been way too dignified. Instead, I stopped the cart, announced that "She's autistic for all of you who are staring!" pulled my shades down and cried all the way to the car. Mason didn't know. Cam's didn't know.And Cookie Monster didn't give a rat's a**. He was still singing about Old McDonald. I got everything loaded in the car, composed myself and drove home.

As soon as we opened the door Camryn took Cookie Monster into her bedroom, tossed him in a bucket, told him good night and left the room. What the ????? Uuuugghhhh I wanted to scream!! I texted Brad that I was certain I would be on the news at some point in the near future.

So Cookie Monster is still in the bucket and Old McDonald is nowhere to be found. But let me tell you something. Old McDonald may have had a farm and on that farm he may have had a pig and a cow with an oink oink here and a moo moo there but let me tell you what Old McDonald didn't have. He did not have an autistic child because if he did the song we all know and love would instead go as follows :
 "Old McDonald had a funny farm, Crazy,Loony man. With a scream scream here and a poopy pullup there, here a pinch, there a bite, waking up all hours of the night, Old McDonald had a funny farm, Crazy,Loony man.
Sing that Cookie!!!