Wonderful Wednesday?

Today has been a interesting, busy and exhausting day. We finally have been relieved of the 100 degree weather, thank God! It was a beautiful morning out, which worked out perfectly since Grandpa had promised the kids that he'd take them fishing on Wednesday.

When my parents arrived this morning, they had the kids practice casting with thier poles, and did pretty good considering their ages and the fact they've never done it before. We stressed the importance of casting over their shoulders, and not over their heads. They seemed to have the basic knack of it. And so, with the day upon us, we went in search for bait.

We found some at the gas station in Boiling Springs. We were anticipating just fishing there at the Children's lake, but after prepping the lines, I went and read some posted signs, and live bait was not allowed. Hmmm... so we decided to take our adventure down to Pinchot Lake since we had only live bait.

When we arrived at the docks, the kids were so excited. The ducks were too. They came right up to us, begging for food. It made the kids rather nervous, but we ignored them and after a bit they went and sat down and left us alone. Mom started to help Nathaniel while Dad helped Ariel and I took some good pics.

Nathaniel was extremely lucky and caught a little fish on his first cast! He was so proud of himself! Ariel was instantly jealous, of course, and so was getting frustrated after losing several bites on her line. She finally got fed up with it after about 10 minutes, and walked off to do it herself. She wasn't standing too far from me when she went to cast off. I knew as soon as she lifted her arm back that it was gonna go wrong. Sure enough, she had it behind her head instead of her shoulder, and I couldn't talk fast enough to get her to stop mid-way. It swung back in her face and she slapped at her face as I started yelling at her to hold still and don't touch anything.

As soon as I got to her and looked, it seemed as though it was stuck in her eye. She was nervous and scared and whimpering and I was trying to get her to stay calm. But when I couldn't get the hook off her the first try, she started panicing and screaming.

I yelled for my mom to come and help, and she did. We weren't sure which way the hook went-- if there was a barb at the end or not. We didn't want to tear anything any worse than it already was. We yelled for my dad to hustle over, and if you know my dad, you know he doesn't hustle. Hasn't since I've known him. By the time he got over, my mom had manuevered it out of her face. There wasn't a lot of blood, but I could feel myself going faint. I asked for the keys to the van so I could get some napkins and stuff to clean her up a little bit.

As I walked as fast as I could to the van in a daze of black and white spots, a man in blue asked if there was anything wrong or something he could do. I vaguely and hurriedly told him that everything was fine-- we got the hook out of her eye, and I was getting some napkins to clean it up. He must have thought I was a little bit out of it.

I made it to the van- barely- and sat down on the side floor. I took a couple sips of water and tried to breathe slowly to get my heartbeat under control. It's not like it's the first time for this for me. But within seconds, I knew it wasn't going to be enough, and so I rested my head on the back of the front seat.

Instantly I started dreaming that I was being chased by some crazy people and my only choice was to let them hurt me, or to take my chances of escape by jumping into a gully of sharp rocks. So, I leapt, full force. As I screamed in trepidation, I woke myself up and found that I was face down in the gravel parking lot. My chin hurt. My head hurt. I was still seeing spots and blurriness.

I pulled myself into the van and laid down. I could hardly move. In a couple of minutes, I heard some rushed footsteps approaching. It was my mom, coming to look for me, as apparently I was gone for awhile. I told her what happened. So embarrasing. Good grief. Soon the kids and my dad came to the van too. The first aid guys were following them and then they informed me how they treated Ariel's eye-- an iodine cleanser and then an antibiotic cream. I called the doctor anyway, just to be sure that we did everything for her, and they said so long as it didn't turn red or puffy, that she'd be fine. And so she seems to be, but I am definately feeling the effects of the fall. My mother-in-law calls me one big bruise. Blah