call to the police

“Do you guys want to go to the park?” I ask the kids.  Despite being nearly winter, it’s shorts and t-shirt weather outside.  The sun is shining, the sky is blue, it’s a beautiful day.

“Let’s go on the country track!!”  Daniel says excitedly.   That’s code for the dusty little dirt trail that connects to a couple of bridges.

As we get closer and closer to the stepping stones water crossing, the sound of dirt bikes rings louder in our ears. “Mommy, I’m scared.”  Hannah says every time one goes ‘BBBRRRRRMMM.’  Her voice waivers and she hides behind my legs, grabbing my pants with both hands.  I should be able to take my kids to the local park without them being frightened of being run over.  Motorised vehicles are not allowed at the park.  Yes, there are trails and fields and plenty of space there, but that space is not for dirt bikes, it’s for kids running around, dog walkers, parents, bush walkers, pram pushers, people playing sports, the elderly, people in wheelchairs.  It is for all people, but not motor vehicles, which is clearly stipulated on signs around the perimeter of the park.

I can’t tell exactly where the bikes are until we pass the stepping stones and get to the field.  I hold Hannah and Daniel’s hands tightly as a man on a dirt bike tears by.  Usually I let them run off ahead, giggling through the field en route to the playground.  Near the trees on the other side of the field is a large group of men, teen, and tween boys, a 3-wheeler atv and the dirt bike that is being shared around.

As we walk towards the playground, the bike is speeding on the sidewalk, tearing past the playground, and doing circles in the field.  Kids may look like they are walking nicely next to their parents, but in seconds, they can be 20 feet away, running and giggling.  Can a dirt bike rider really predict that, especially one who is going really fast and is clearly too young to be licensed?  There is a reason dirt bikes are not allowed at the park.  What if a kid on the playground suddenly decides to chase a bird and runs out of the playground area? Can a dirt bike rider tearing by 10 feet away from the playground swerve or stop in time?

The other week we walked to the park and a police car pulled up when we were in the parking lot. I had just seen a dirt bike, so I pointed towards the field.  The cop ignored me.  He did a lap of the parking lot, whilst I flapped my arms and pointed to the field, but the cop didn’t stop to ask me anything, he just pulled back out again, making no effort to actually catch the person or people responsible for endangering children’s lives by tearing around in the park on dirt bikes.

The playground at the park. Behind is the field.

I put Daniel in the swing and call the local police station.  “Hi, I’d like to report a dirt bike at ____________,” I tell them, as I stand about 5 feet away from another mum.

“Yeah, we’ve had a lot of complaints about that.” She tells me.

“Are the police going to come?” Hannah asks me when I hand up after the brief conversation.

“I don’t know sweetie, they said they’ve had a lot of calls about it, so hopefully they will, it’s very dangerous to ride dirt bikes around a playground.”

30 seconds later, the bike speeds past the playground and ducks into the country track. The same track we were just meandering down, often stopping while the kids bent over to agitate the dirt with sticks to make “smoke.” The small dirt track that a speeding dirt bike would have trouble stopping really fast on if a kid was there.  The track where swerving is not an option due to large logs lining both sides of the path.  The short dirt path with trees all around where it would be too late to react by the time anyone realised those echoing BRRRRMMMs were actually coming from the same path they are on.

Inside, I was freaking out.  What if he had turned down that path when we were on it?

“Let’s go feed the ducks.” I tell the kids to distract myself from such thoughts.  A group of ducks is foraging on the cricket field next to the playground.

The mob of dirt bikers is staring at us as we feed the ducks.  I watch them in my peripheral vision as they push the 3-wheeler into the bushes, as if they somehow know I’ve called the police.

That’s silly, I’m just being paranoid, how could they know? 

The sound of the dirt bike is gone.  He has clearly gone down the country path to make a quick and hasty get away.

Maybe they saw a police car.

We run out of bread and go back to the playground.  Next to the woman who was near me when I made the police car is a tween in a motor bike helmet.

The rest of the group are walking up, pushing the 3-wheeler.

“Let’s get this in the back of the truck.” One of the men says to the woman.  There are about 10 of them all together.  All rough, hard looking men and boys with mullets and rat tails. All giving me the death stare.  Maybe they are actually really nice guys, but maybe they are planning to punch my lights out.  I don’t really want to find out.

I act as if I’m too stupid to put two and two together, like I don’t realise I know that they know that I called the police.  I pretend I’m so engrossed with pushing Hannah and Daniel on the swings that I don’t even notice they are there.

I look at my watch, long and obviously.  “Ok kids, time to go home and cook some dinner.”

“Please, just a little bit longer?” They beg.

I force my voice to come out as strong and unintimidated “No, it’s almost dinner time, we have to go home now.”

They hop off the swings and follow me towards the field, not our usual way home, but if we go through the parking lot, the men could watch us and see which house we go into.

The ducks are still waddling across the field, and I’m still freaking out a little inside, so even though I wouldn’t normally suggest such a thing (about ducks, not about pigeons or something), I feign excitement and say “WHO WANTS TO CHASE SOME DUCKS!!!???”

“I DO!!!” The kids say in unison and we take off running, quickly putting distance between us and the scary looking mob who knows I called the police on them.

When we get to the bottom of our street, a police car pulls into the parking lot down a hill and to the left of us.  If we go down there talk to him, the men will see us, but if we don’t, they might get away. Maybe they are still putting the 3-wheeler in the truck.  Maybe they will be caught red handed.

One thing is for sure though: I don’t want them to see us.  They don’t know we are at the top of the hill and I don’t want want them to.  Instead of turning towards the police car, we turn towards home, towards safety and anonymity.

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Copyright 2014 Sheri Thomson

Hannah the great

Time since birth: 11.5 months (she’s almost 1!!!)

Stopped at a stoplight on the way to drop Aaron off at the station, something on the vehicle in front of us caught my eye. I did a double take. The truck in front of us had testicles. That’s right, testicles. Why on earth someone would attach a pair of testicles to a vehicle is beyond me. Not only that, but why would someone design, manufacture, and sell such an item? Wouldn’t you be embarrassed to drive around with plastic testicles on your truck? When the light changed to green, the truck was off. The testicles started swaying back and forth at an alarming rate. Just like staring at a fire, I couldn’t take my eyes off them. Surely they are some sort of driving hazard as well as being super bogan-y. How could someone not look at a pair of plastic testicles vigorously swaying back and forth on a truck? Only in Penrith.

A couple of days later, stopped at the very same set of lights, but on the other side of the road, I saw something else one would only see in Penrith: there on the car in front of us was a sticker. “Vaginatarian.” Seriously, someone actually put that on their car? I bet the occupant of that car gets no dates. Maybe he gets dates, but then he brings them to his car to transport them to date spot, they see the sticker, think “wanker!” to themselves and then pretend to be sick and not go out with him.

There was so much work to be done when we moved in here. That was to be expected since we were moving in with a hoarder. Not like the I have to much trash I can’t find my pet cat kind of hoarder, but a hoarder none the less. I started with the kitchen. Looking in the cupboards, I found 2 toasters. Not to mention the one that was out and being used. I also found no less then 6 dinner sets, 2 different sandwich presses, and oh the list goes on. Grandma told me that her Mum always said “If you keep something for long enough, you’ll always find a use for it.” I guess that motto stuck with Grandma. Lucky for me, I coaxed her into getting rid of some of it. Otherwise there is no way our stuff would have fit in the cupboards at all. I found a cupboard full of platters, none of which I’d ever seen being used (and I used to live across the road from Grandma, so I was over a lot).
“Can I give this away Grandma?” I could see her mind working. “How long have you had it?”
“20 years.”
“how long since you’ve used it?”
“20 years. Ok, you can give it away.”

Next I started on the pantry. The pantry was choc-a-bloc full of stuff, most of which I thought rather questionable. I went through every single item in that pantry and checked every single expiration date. I actually found food that expired in 1992. That’s right, it was EIGHTEEN years out of date. I’m not sure which is more shocking, that there was food in there 18 years expired, or the fact the 1992 was 18 years ago. I’m getting old!

I can hear you screaming inside, “what about Hannah?!?! How is Hannah going, what is she doing?” She is GREAT! My little wonderful baby has been walking for a month now, and she is getting cheekier every single day. She has a little hand puppet with a duck on each finger that she loves to carry around and tell everyone that it is “DUCK!” We often ask her where duck is and she’ll stop what she is doing, look all around, locate it, yell “DUCK!” and then trot over and pick it up. I bought her a little (well, compared to her size, it’s big) purse to put some toys in and take with us when we go out. She loves to carry it around even when we’re at home. In fact, she doesn’t just like to walk around, she prefers to walk around while carrying something. Preferable something big and heavy like my purse or Aaron’s 1 litre water bottle full of water. Sometimes even the washing basket.

Everywhere we go, she wants all eyes on her. Hannah will squeal loudly until some random person in the supermarket looks at her, and then she will smile and bounce and giggle at them. One day a lady was talking on the phone when Hannah started her cheekiness, and the lady got so distracted by Hannah that she told the person on the other end of the phone that she would have to call them back as “this really cute baby keeps smiling and giggling at me and I just can’t think at the moment.” We went to a newcomers dinner at church the other night (we’re not really newcomers as we went to the same church for a long time last time we lived in this area, but I suppose we were away for 3 years), and once again Hannah was up the her mischief. Right when the minister was addressing everyone, telling people about the church, etc. Hannah decided that she wanted the spotlight instead. She kept walking up to people, getting them to look at her, and when they did, doing a really funny, loud, fake laugh while smiling. Of course everyone then looked at her, which only egged her on more. She is so cute though, how can you not laugh and smile when she does such things?

Now that this is the length of a novel, I’ll stop writing. But don’t worry, we have the internet now, so you will hear about the antics of Hannah every week.