Birthday girl dancing
Muffin face with River and Landis' parents
Cheenon
Pre-party dinner of Mac and Cheese and Latkies at the Birthday girl's request.
A very happy couple
Birthday girl with GrimmyIt was a jam packed Weekend-O-Fun that trickled into mid-week. I am not even sure where to start. Let’s do this chronologically.
Saturday night was my friend Meg’s Birthday. Cheenon (everybody’s favorite band) played that night at Poe’s Pub. I live dangerously close to Poe’s so everyone packed into Chez Muffin for Meg’s Birthday Dinner pre show party or “Megapalooza” as it has been called.
The band was truly amazing and I believe Meg had a great time.
The only glitch in the evening happened after we all excitedly took our seats at Poe’s in anxious anticipation for the band to start. I looked to the left of the band and there was a couple sitting there with an INFANT. These folks were right next to the band. This is not a quiet acoustic band, y’all. Apparently the boys mentioned to the couple that the band would be loud and they said they wanted to stay because they wanted their baby to hear rock and roll. Did I mention they were also drinking and smoking? We were all beside ourselves and could not enjoy the band. My friend alerted the owner of the issue and he said it was not against the law and he couldn’t do anything. At that point my friend borrowed my cell phone to call 911. They didn’t care either. Then we called child protective services. While my friend was on hold with them I went back to the bar owner. I told him the couple was drinking and dancing with the baby and while there might not be anything he could do about it, it was making al the other patrons very uncomfortable and if I didn’t complain about it and try to stop it – I would not have been able to sleep at night. It was then that he followed me back to my seat and watched the couple. By this time they were so drunk they almost dropped the baby while dancing with him. I saw him approach them and the next thing I new they were getting a cab.
As they left the whole place erupted in applause.
As they left the whole place erupted in applause.
The rest of the night we tried to shake the experience off (knowing there was going to be a Child and Family Services investigation) and enjoyed the rest of the sets.
The band was better than ever and it was great spending time with so many of my favorite people at once.
I had to behave myself a bit because the next morning I was up early to drive to Portsmouth for my Pop’s 70th Birthday celebration. That will be the next entry. So much more to come!
2 comments:
Oh JB that just breaks my heart. It reminded me of something I was witness to back this past summer. I was at JFK getting ready to come back to VA and was in the womens bathroom. There was this lovely little girl who may have been 6 years old or so with her Mom. Something was wrong with her Mother...like she was high or on coke or something. She was thin like a rail and dark circles under her eyes and totally strung out. She was screaming at this little girl...the most abusive things. And she was crying. There were at least 10 women in line in this bathroom and we were all horrified but all of us were afraid to say something. I was right behind them in line. Well as she got up to the stall I saw her push the little girl forward and then lift her foot and kick her in the back. She went flying foward and hit the stall door. To say I saw red would be an understatement. I started screaming "call security" at the top of my lungs. In the end, the ticket agents and the police could do nothing. They had witnesses (other then me), but because the father was there and he took responsibility for the little girl (when asked if he would sign a waver), the law says they could do nothing. Now here is the kicker...on the way out he came up to me and said thank you, he told me that he knew his wife needed help, but that he didn't know where to turn to and he was afraid of her. The little girl was (as you can imagine) scream crying this entire time saying "please don't take away my Mommy." All I could do was look at him and point to his little girl and tell him that if he didn't get his child to saftey he would regret it for the rest of his life.
I scream cried all the way home. And I think about her all the time and pray that my actions (although fruitless at the time) may have caused him to think and thus make a change afterwards.
You guys did the right thing JB!
Wow. This and Jacquie's story brings an incident rushing back to me like it was yesterday. While I was in college, I worked at a Kite Store in a local touristy-type mall. One weekend, I was minding the shop, and 2 women and 2 girls (preteen, probably 11 or 12) sat on the bench in front of the store. The 2 girls, of course, were instantly attracted to the colorful kites and toys, and walked over to the store. One of the women (later found out it was one of the girl's mother) shouted at the girl to get back over to the bench and sit down (expletives deleted). Now mind you, the bench was no more that about 5 feet from the open air store front, and the woman was yelling. The girls reluctantly walked the few steps back to the bench, all the while sort of looking back at the store. I immediately got a very bad feeling as I looked at the mom. As soon as her daughter walked up to her, the woman took of her shoe and starting beating the girl in the head with it. I was momentarily shocked, but instictively reached for the phone and called security. What I remember in those first few moments was thinking that the other woman who was with her was going to intervene, but she just cooly watched. By this time, the little girl was shrieking and some shoppers started to rush over. After I hung up the phone, I walked around the counter and sort of yelled "Excuse me!" at the woman. At least she stopped hitting the girl with her shoe.... She sort of just looked at me with her eyes blazing, holding the shoe aloft. Honestly, I think she might have thrown it at me out of instinct. I said "What are you doing?" The other woman who was with her said "This is none of your business". I said "As long as you're standing in front of my store, it's my business". By this time, other shoppers starting commenting on the action, as the mother with the shoe gathered her bags, grabbed her daughter and started for the exit. I noticed Joansie, the rather large and intimidating security guard, heading in our direction. The entire time the woman were headed towards the doors, the other woman kept yelling at us "It's none of your business - these are our kids - leave us alone". I was furious, scared, sad, and hyped up all at the same time; nervous that I had crossed some legal line by stepping across the lease line to say something, but mad that not only was this woman beating this child's head with a shoe for no good reason, but that the other woman was obviously so used to the scene that she calmly sat by and then defended the abuser. Joansie followed the women out, and later took a statement from me and a few others that had witnessed the scene. I never heard anything more about it, and hope that the little girl survived to make it out of that situation.
People today are so afraid to "get envolved", but what kind of society are we becoming here??!?!
I applaud you and your friends...
Sparki
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