Hoosiers

We have some lovely new neighbors that moved in down the street. Its a grandmother, her son with his wife and two children and then her daughter with her husband and child. So, one of the kids happens to be the same age as my son, meaning he waits at the bus stop with us in the morning.

For the first week, there was always somebody at the bus stop with this little boy. The mom, the dad, but mostly the aunt. Every single one of them smokes like a chimney and has this obnoxious habit of actually blowing the smoke in your face when they are talking to you.

In small chat with the aunt, as she is on her third cigarette and nearly finished with the huge liter of Mountain Dew she has been guzzling, she makes mention that her son will soon have a little baby brother or sister.

"Oh, you're pregnant?" I ask her.

"Yeah," she says as she takes a long drag from her cigarette and rubs her belly, which had been hidden by the over sized clothes she has been wearing.

"How far along are you?"

"Oh, I don't know, something like five or six months at least, I think." She takes another drag before continuing. "And I think I might be having twins, because the baby is like, kicking in two different places at the same time, so, its either a huge baby, or definitely twins."

I have nothing against smoking. Seriously, I used to smoke. This woman wasn't even trying to cut down, and by the way she was talking, I don't know that she has even seen a doctor yet. Shouldn't she know how far along she is?

I bit my tongue, but my God, I wanted to say something.

So the week passes, and lo and behold, come Monday morning, we get up to the bus stop, and this young child is sitting next to the busy road all by himself. He can't be a day over six, he is new to the neighborhood, and he was left to sit at the bus stop all alone.

Maybe I am paranoid, but you can't watch the news anymore without seeing some horrible story about children abducted from the bus stop, or being hit by a car, or God knows what other horrible thing. And they just don't care, they leave that poor baby to fend for himself.

Not good.

We now make a point of trying to get out to the bus stop before him, which is way earlier than I would care to be up there, but I can't stand the guilt of worrying what may happen to him if we weren't there.

Stupid hoosiers.