So let me tell you something about Easter in the Caribbean.  This holiday isn’t just a Sunday morning egg hunt and dinner at the grandparent’s house with maybe a little trip to church on Good Friday if you’re really gung ho about the whole thing.  It’s not about religion at all from what we saw (and heard till all hours of the night).  Easter in the Caribbean is like Carnival, Part II.  Makes sense, since Carnival marks the beginning of Lent, right?  Easter here starts on Thursday.  EVERYTHING is closed half of Thursday through Tuesday-ish.  Again, it’s not because people are busy praying.  They are partying like there is no tomorrow.

Not knowing this, we toddle off to St. Kitts’ Customs on Good Friday morning, hoping to check out and leave for Anguilla.  We had a long 66 mile trip ahead of us, so we wanted to leave early.  Nope.  Customs was there, but Immigration was “closed for the holiday” according to the Customs agent.  We would have to take an (expensive) taxi to the airport and clear Immigration there.  Which meant we wouldn’t be able to leave in time to get to Anguilla before dark.  At 0730, Chris went back to the Immigration office on a hunch and they had finally arrived.  Phew.  That was a close one.  By 0810 we were on our way.

It was a hot day. We caught 5 fish and saw a whale on the way.  We had macaroni and cheese for lunch and arrived at 1750 with plenty of daylight left to anchor safely in the very pretty harbor of Road Bay, Anguilla.  A long beach stretched in an arc from one end of the harbor to the other.  A handful of beach bars and restaurants dotted the palmtree-lined sand and a small dock in the center served as a place to land the dinghy.  There were a lot of boats at anchor, but it didn’t seem busy or crowded.

We made zucchini bread for breakfast and ate it while doing schoolwork.  I headed in to check into Customs and later Chris went to the store.  Anguilla is known for its spectacular beaches, but the government charges hefty fees to visit the beach harbors by boat.  Since we were only going to be in town for a few days, we decided to stay in Road Bay and relax at the gorgeous, if not the most popular, beach there.  St. Maarten was our next stop, and we knew that would be a whirlwind week.

It might have been frowned upon in public school, but at Patronus U., the teacher this day took a little nap in the middle of math…  By 1130, the kids were done with school and I was refreshed, so we went to the beach.  Life was not feeling too tough today!  We sat ourselves in front of Roy’s Restaurant and the kids enjoyed lots of attention from passersby who admired their sand creations and Bryson’s signature “Giant Hole”.  We enjoyed the beach so much that we stayed right until dinner and ate at Roy’s.  The waitress, Joanne, from the Bronx, was funny and super helpful.  It started to pour and we realized the storm wasn’t going to end soon, so we ordered dessert!

Eventually we had to leave, so we waited for a lull and dashed down the beach in pitch darkness towards the dinghy dock.  No use.  We were all drenched to the bone long before we even got in the dinghy.  We took a wet, laughing ride back to Patronus as Chris quipped (from his favorite movie), “I don’t think the heavy stuff is gonna come down for some time yet!”

 

 

 

We woke up on Easter morning to the sight of our three little bunnies poking their heads in our cabin.  We enjoyed watching them search for candy and my eyes welled up at how excited they were to get just a few little chocolates and jelly beans.  The simplicity we were seeking this year had been found.  These children were just happy to be together, having fun searching the boat for treats.  The Easter Bunny left a little card for each of them with a few tic tac toe games and a word search.  I hope we have left the excess of our old lives behind for good.  This felt so right.

 

After chocolate chip scones for breakfast, we headed right on back to the beach in front of Roy’s.  We read, swam, and talked to locals while the kids played all day.  At 1700, we decided to head back to the boat to make dinner.  Chris, Bryson, and Reese swam back to the anchored boat and Porter and I took the dinghy.  When we got to the boat, Porter grabbed the painter (the line that ties the dinghy to the dock/boat) and hopped off onto the swim platform.  He has done this about six million times since we moved onto Patronus.  But a wave rocked the dinghy at the last second and he lost his balance.  He fell forward toward the boat and smacked his forehead on the transom.

When he stood up, there was blood EVERYWHERE.  Chris held him and I jumped out of the dinghy.  Chris ran to get towels while I tried to assess the damage.  He had a giant, gaping trough in his forehead and it was bleeding profusely.  It has taken me a long time to work up the courage to write this next part.  I have several friends who have experienced traumatic moments with their  children.  I am sure that more than a few of you will be able to empathize with us.

Time stopped.  On the outside, I was holding a towel on Porter’s head and smiling my best “It’s going to be just fine” smile at him.  I was saying all the right things to calm him down.  He saw the blood and started to panic so I explained to him that heads always bleed a lot and that I was going to take care of him.  On the inside, I was using my peripheral vision and every one of my senses to assess the situation and create a plan.

1. Where are Reese and Bryson?  There they are, still swimming to the boat.  They are almost here.  Tell them to grab shoes and get in the dinghy.  No time to dry off or get dressed.

2. We need to get to a hospital.  Does Anguilla even have a hospital?  It’s Easter and it is after 6pm.  We need to take the dinghy to the dinghy dock and find a local with a car who can drive us to a doctor.

3. What if it is more serious than the medical facilities here can handle?  We need passports, Eastern Caribbean money, insurance card, boat papers.  St. Maarten is the closest island and it’s big.  Really big.  I bet they even have a helicopter.  Tell Chris to get all that and get in the dinghy.

4. Porter needs to be comfortable and warm.  Is he going into shock?  Grab a huge towel to wrap around him.

5. We are all still in salty, sandy bathing suits.  Too bad.  I’m not wasting one extra second.  We need to get him medical attention.  Now.

We all got in the dinghy and drove painfully slowly to the dinghy dock in order to keep the bouncing to a minimum.  We carefully passed Porter up to the dock.  I carried him up the dock while Chris tied up the dinghy.  Bryson and Reese followed behind us, shellshocked.  They weren’t there when he fell and still weren’t exactly sure what had happened.

I asked the first people we saw if they could take us to a hospital.  They were extremely concerned but didn’t have a car.  They were just visiting and didn’t know if there was a hospital on the island.  We walked across the street to the convenience store.  The store owner went upstairs to get her daughter, who was a nurse.  She came down, took one look at Porter and called an ambulance, which arrived just minutes later.

During those minutes, I held Porter on my lap like a baby.  He was so afraid and didn’t want to go to a hospital.  I explained to him that the hospital was where the doctor was and that the doctor would help us make his head better.  His eyes started closing.  I thought he might be losing consciousness.  I asked him if he knew his name and he shook his head.  I asked him if he knew who I was, but he didn’t.  I asked him if he knew where we were.  He started to look worried and shook his head again.  I asked him where he lived.  He said “on a boat.”  Well, that was something.

I smiled at Porter as I spoke to him, but inside I was screaming, “PLEASE DON’T GO!!!  PLEASE DON’T DIE!  PLEASE!  PLEASE. please…”

Chris came to tell us the ambulance had arrived and I looked pleadingly at him.  I barely whispered, “he doesn’t know his name.”  We all got into the back and I laid Porter on the bed.  I leaned over him and held him.  I kept his eyes locked on mine so he would see nothing but love.  The ride to the hospital took just a few minutes.  There were no triage desks, no forms to fill out, no lines.  A doctor met us and quickly told us that he was going to be fine.  He just needed three stitches.

Breathe.

I don’t know how, but in two seconds I went from thinking I was going to lose my child to wondering if this third world doctor was going to do a good enough job with the stitches so as not to leave a scar on Porter’s forehead.  I guess I was so relieved and so ready to leave that horrific fear behind that I was willing to find ANYTHING else to concentrate on.  I also needed to make sure that I kept it together for Porter.  The relief flooded my whole body.  I felt the lump in my heart dissolve and spread through my body as it searched for a way out.  The excess adrenaline was begging for me to cry it out, but I still needed to get Porter through the rest of his ordeal.

He was panicking about getting stitches but I was able to be there fully with him.  I knew that “three stitches” meant my baby was going to be alright.  “Three stitches” is more like a good story.  I moved into my “matter-of-fact” mommy tone of voice, which usually works.  “Ok, Porter.  This is what’s going to happen.  The doctor is going to use a special thread to close up your cut because that will work better than using a Band-Aid.  After a little while, the stitches will come out and your forehead will be all better.”

I agreed with him that it was probably going to hurt and would definitely be a lot scary.  But I assured him that I was going to hold him the whole entire time and that we would give him some Tylenol to help the pain when we got back to the boat (we’ll leave the natural home remedies for non-forehead-gash moments).  I tried not to give “Dr. How Bad a Doctor is this that he got stuck working on Easter Evening?” suspicious looks as he started the first stitch.  Back at home, I had always heard the advice that you should ask for a plastic surgeon whenever stitches are needed on the face.  I laughed inside at the idea of asking the doctor for a plastic surgeon.  Between him, the nurse, and the two ambulance drivers, the entire hospital staff totaled 4.  Beggers can’t be chosers when it comes to island medical care.  (Weeks later, a friend would split open his nose on Rum Cay in the Bahamas when his snorkel mask shattered on his face.  The only available medical help was a nurse who only had one size thread.  And it wasn’t the one you usually use on noses.  He and Porter are scar buddies now.  They both look fine, so there you go.)

 

We paid the nurse $400 in cash for the ambulance and hospital visit and we were on our way.  After what seemed like twelve days since we left the boat, we were back in the ambulance, headed back home.  In fact, the whole fiasco, door to door, only took 2 hours.  Perhaps it was the speedy transportation.  The ambulance drivers really enjoyed their job and turned on all the lights and sirens as they screamed down the road at 60 miles per hour.  On the way back, too.  Chris and I looked at each other in confusion.  The emergency was over.  Did we need to run everyone off the road to get us back to the harbor?  At least Bryson and Reese enjoyed the wild ride.

Bryson and Reese were unbelievable through the whole ordeal.  They sat shivering without complaint in their wet bathing suits in the ambulance and then at the hospital.  They sat quietly and just watched Porter, sending him loving and caring thoughts.  On the way back, they whispered happy thoughts to him and cheered him up.

Back at the boat, we fed everyone and made Porter comfortable on the couch.  I busted out a little “hidden pictures” activity book and we played with that for a bit.  After dinner, we all watched Diary of a Wimpy Kid together.  We were all so grateful that our little guy was okay.  After receiving a few get well calls, Porter slept with me in our cabin so that I could listen to him breathe all night.  My fear had returned when it came time to let him go to sleep.  I will never forget the terror I felt when he started to close his eyes in the store.  May no parent ever feel that pain.

We spent the next morning taking it nice and slow.  Good think, because after all, it was “Easter Monday”, and nothing was happening because everything was closed.  Porter was happy and said he had absolutely no pain at all.  Even he couldn’t believe it.  Bryson and Reese did their schoolwork while Porter “relaxed”.  I’m sure there were more than a few “nanny nanny poo poo” looks from Porter to his siblings, but he had earned himself a pass.

The Easter weekend workboat races were supposed to be the focus of my Anguilla blog post, but they will now take a back seat.  It was amazing to watch the fleet as they took their beach start.  The boats line up along the beach, with their anchors in the sand.  One crew member stays in the water, and when the gun fires, they pull their anchors, turn the boats around, raise their sails, and take off, usually with the guy in the water splashing and screaming and trying to haul himself in.

The yelling and screaming continues as the crew attempts to get control of the gigantic sail and the skipper attempts to negotiate the boat through the packed mooring field.  Patronus was pretty much anchored on the finish line, so we were told to move to a different spot.  The only problem was that they notified us of this five seconds before the gun went off!  I ran to the bow and started to raise the anchor as Chris fired up the engine, but just as we started to motor towards the other end of the harbor, the whole fleet was upon us.  The yelling and screaming continued…

We cautiously went back to the beach and the kids played quietly so as not to get Porter’s head wet.  We had lunch again at Roy’s and had to tell Joanne the Bronx Waitress all about Porter’s escapades the day before.  After our recovery day, we all went to bed early.  I stayed up again to listen to my Porter breathing, almost convinced that he really, really, really was going to be okay.