Have I ever told you that I’m a total freak?

My husband, kids and I were walking downtown Merritt yesterday and stopped at the traffic light, waiting for the pedestrian signal to change.

A fly landed on Marius’ jacket and he thought it was a bee and started freaking out. Pauline told him it was just a fly, he calmed down and she grabbed the fly with one of her ninja-like moves (at least that’s how she sees it, to me it looked more like she had some kind of a seizure and smothered the fly to death).

As she held her trophy up victoriously we all started laughing and then, out of the blue, came this angry voice: “What are you laughing at? What’s so funny?”

I turned around and saw this guy sitting on the steps of the Coldwater Hotel, obviously completely shitfaced. We turned back around and tried to ignore him, but he was pretty persistent and asked my 10 year old son if he wanted his ass kicked, because there was absolutely nothing funny around here.

He didn’t make an effort to get up from the steps (nor do I think he could) and a few seconds later the light turned, we crossed the street and were on our way.

For my husband it ended right there. The guy was drunk, was being belligerent and we moved on.

I’m still not over it.

Not that I was scared of him. I’ve seen him around town in various stages of drunkenness and he’s usually pretty harmless. If he were to come onto me I would not hesitate to take my best swing at him and I’m sure I could take him out.

But what if my kids would have been by themselves? What if it would have just been my son? He’s 10 years old and he does walk this area by himself on occasion. He’s been wanting to walk home from school by himself and I’ve been hesitant. I’m just not ready.

But if he did walk by himself, he would walk right by the Coldwater Hotel and cross the street right where we did.

What if he would have been by himself and the guy would have grabbed him, pushed him into the street?

All those thoughts were racing through my head as we continued to walk home - I was smiling on the outside, looking at my kids - and having a total breakdown on the inside.

How do we learn to let go, understand that we can’t control every situation? Actually, I want to know how I could possibly do that, I’m sure other people have it all figured out.

Not me, because I’m a freak.