I quickly dropped my bag and tossed the house keys on the counter as I raced to the loo. After having two kids, when nature calls…I gots to go.
No sooner had I sat down when I hear my 4 and 5-year-olds start shouting:
“Momma B come quickly! Momma B. MA B! MAAAAAA Beeeeee!”
Sweet Jesus, the whole bloody block heard these kids losing their damn minds outback.
I’m not done in the loo and now I’m irritated because I just wanted a second to myself so I could pee in privacy. So I holler back:
“Hang ON! And STOP SHOUTING!”
**Side note: If you haven’t shouted “Stop shouting” at your children, are you really parenting?
As soon as I make it outside I can immediately tell something serious is up because both dogs are jumping back and forth trying to get close to whatever my children are protecting. I race down the porch stairs and as I approach I hear a tiny high pitched squeal. Pulling the dogs away I discover what the commotion is all about.
A baby….I’m talking a baby bunny has managed to get his tiny little head stuck in some chicken wire attached to our fence (meant to keep grown rabbits outta my garden).
He looked so scared and helpless as his beady little black eyes looked at us, scared half to death trying to backup and free himself from the presence of three humans and two eager canines.
5-year-old Son: “It was Sherlock (our dog) who found him Ma B! He saved a baby bunny!”
4-year-old Daughter: “Oh isn’t he (the bunny) cute? He’s so adorable Momma B. We must help him!”
Before I go any further you should know I don’t particularly enjoy dealing with situations like this…because I’m kinda squeamish. Nevertheless, when you’re a parent and two little kids are watching you in order to learn how to handle situations like this in the future, you just gotta Alpha Up…which is what I did.
Me speaking calmly: “Stay here you two and sing to the bunny and tell it that everything will be OK. I’m gonna take the dogs inside and find some wire cutters.”
Kids: “OK.”
I dash into the basement and rummage through the mess of tools, cursing when I can’t easily locate the wire cutters. Then I remember I have a strong pair of utility cutters in the hall closet and I race back upstairs to get them.
The children were calmly and gently singing and speaking to the little bunny who had stopped squealing and trying to escape. It just lay in the grass with half of his teeny body in my neighbor’s yard and his wee little head in our garden.
I felt the rush of adrenaline as I neared the baby bunny. “You’re gonna be OK, little one. We will have you out of here in a second.”
After 5 snips with the utility cutters, I gingerly bent the chicken wire away from his itty-bitty neck just in case the bunny decided to dash forward and back again. I definitely would not have been able to handle any mess that involved bodily fluid…that’s where I draw the line.
Once freed, the bunny didn’t immediately run away. As a matter of fact, he hopped a few feet away from us up to the fenceline and tried again to squeeze through the chicken wire, obviously disoriented.
Me: “Come on kids. It looks like we are going to have to pick up the baby and return him to where we see the grown rabbits pop in-and-out of in the neighbor’s tall grass.”
And quick as a flash the kids and I raced to the front gate and were in the neighbor’s yard before you could say “Bob’s your uncle.” I scooped up the disoriented baby bunny and it immediately started squealing.
Out of the corner of my eye I caught a large rabbit bounding toward us. Once the grown rabbit spotted us it dashed to the other side of the neighbor’s yard.
I allowed both kids a quick stroke of the baby bunny’s velvety head before I whispered in its ear “Hurry home to your momma and papa little baby. I know they’re waiting for you.”
As I set the baby on the green grass, my children who were a few feet behind me started whispering encouraging things like:
“You can do it, bunny. Go find your family. We love you bunny.”
The baby bunny must have figured out where it was because he hopped straight toward the long grass a few feet away from where the grown bunny waited. The baby bunny paused for a second before disappearing into the safety of the long green grass.
As my children and I walked back to our house my wonderfully sensitive 5-year-old son looks up at me with tears spilling out of the corner of his eyes and says, “Momma B, thanks for being brave. I bet we saved another little boy’s Velveteen Rabbit. I love you.”
His words filled me up so completely that I too had tears spilling from the corner of my eyes.
It is my hope that I can always be brave for my children. That I am able to find the right tools at the right time and that I can save all the “baby bunnies” they find in the world. The reality is I won’t be able to save them from all the heartache this world holds. Nevertheless, I will find solace and comfort in knowing that I am modeling behaviors that they will someday emulate. As a parent, I always remember these wise words Winnie the Pooh so cleverly spoke:
“You are braver than you believe, stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think. But the most important thing is, even if we’re apart…I’ll always be with you.” A.A. Milne
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