Bees & the Kidness of Strangers

Funny story.....

Last week, I was grocery shopping with the kids. It was a beautiful day. I mean gorgeous. It was about 70 degrees outside with a slight breeze and no clouds. The perfect day to be outdoors. Apparently the bees thought so too.

As we were leaving the grocery store, a bee flew up to my cart and starting buzzing around the bag that had all my bread in it. Normally, I would expect the bee the quickly decide he had no interest in my bread and fly away. Not this time. Instead, the bee actually flew into the bag and stayed there. This posed a problem since I didn't want to load the bag into the car with the bee in it, and the bag was in such a position that if I moved the bags around it, I was afraid I would disturb the bee and he would come flying out and sting me. My solution was to get the kids settled in the car, by which time the bee should have lost interest in the bag and gone about his business irritating someone else.

By the time the kids were in their seats and buckled up, I checked the bag to find that that bee was still in there. I tried a couple of things to get him to come out, including swatting a rolled up newspaper at the bag and shaking the bag a little bit. Nothing. He didn't want to come out. Finally, the bee flew out of the bag but he went right into the car. The kids freaked out since they were bucked in and couldn't escape him. I was totally helpless. I wanted to get him, but was afraid he would sting. And since my mother and her mother are deathly allergic to bee stings, its just easier for me to say I am too rather than admit I act like a three year old when a bee gets close to me. I've never been stung, and I don't want to know what it feels like to have my throat swell shut and an epi-pen jabbed into my butt. A nice motorist, seeing our distress, stopped to offer some assistance. I calmly explained that we were having trouble with a bee and that I was allergic. He looked very amused at this and got out of his car to help. With one swift move, he maneuvered the bee out of the car and slapped his hands together with the bee inside. Once the bee fell to the ground, he stepped on it for good measure. Problem solved, we have a hero. And a dead bee.

Whoops, spoke to soon. No sooner than our good Samaritan had driven off, two more bees appeared in our cart. Seriously?? This was unreal. They didn't hang around the cart too long, though; they just went straight into the car, sending the kids into another panic. This time, the kids didn't want to stay in their seats. The girls were huddled in the front holding on to each other for deal life and poor KC wasn't able to get his seat belt off. I really think that he was panicked because the girls were, and he had no idea this whole ordeal was because of the bee. But I digress. I unbuckled my son and let the kids out of the van, while trying to keep my eyes on the two new bees flying around. I could see one had flown in between the back seat and passenger's side wall. My solution was to encourage it to come out by throwing little boxes of raisins at it. Didn't work. Swatting newspapers, didn't work.

Now there are more bees in the cart. Oh jeez! The kids are screaming, running into the parking lot, people are staring, I am desperately trying to look calm and collected while not conveying my fear of a stupid bee sting. Finally I asked a store employee who was out collecting carts if he could help us. This poor 16 year old kids had no idea what the problem was and why this crazy lady with the hysterical kids couldn't handle the bees. But he went inside to get some bug spray and said he would load the bags into my car. Meanwhile, I am trying to hold onto my son so he doesn't get hit by a car, which even I admit would be worse than me getting stung by the bee or bees.

At last, a man came up to us and offered to help. I'm sure we were quite the sight, and I wouldn't blame him if he stood from a distance and chuckled a bit before coming over. But it was clear he could see our frenzy and wanted to lend a hand. Again, I calmly explained that we had been overrun by bees, the kids were panicking and I was allergic. Would he mind disposing of the remaining bees and loading my bags? My hero, my saint, my knight in shining armor did just that. He checked out the van, declared it bee free and loaded my bags. He explained that he had kids too and understood they freak out sometimes. Finally, we could be on our way.

Go ahead, get your laughs in.

When I told my husband about our trip to the store, he just shook his head. He has a crazy wife, crazy kids and shame in the neighborhood. He'll get over it. And I escaped without being stung by the bee.