Monkey see, monkey poo

As we slowly tried to settle ourselves back into real life after Tomas, the toll of the moving about and the heat and the exhaustion and fatigue started to set in with everyone.  Talking to our family doctor, I heard stories of all kinds of sicknesses and under-the-weather feelings with people all over the island.  Lily and Virginie shared their pent up stress one morning on the way to school through crazily detoured Bridgetown by vomiting, one after the other all over their little bodies, clothes, and carseats.  After turning around to get them both back home and in bed or on the couch or jumping from one piece of furniture to the next, you know, to recuperate, neither one of them looked worse for the wear once we were actually home and they were naked.  (Naked being the state preferred by all household members, save me.)

I'd had a call from my landlady asking me to take some bleach from the laundry room so that she could clean the moss growing on the side of the house near the rain pipes and gutters, a task I'd insisted was so simple I could do it any time but still had not managed to do so.  No problem, I'd said, feeling instantly guilty that she was going to have to drive over to do what I'd promised to do, but hey, my kids were sick.  As Lily drove her tricycle and Virginie her big wheel around the patio, I made my move towards the laundry room which is on the outside of the main house but still in view.  The girls could see me clearly, but they insisted on tagging along.  As we made our way across the stone path, I looked up and saw a group of monkeys in the trees.  Only one adult in the pack and she was rather oblivious to the antics of her charges.  She was probably just too tired of shouting, "Sit down, Monkey!  Stop doing that, So-and-so!  Keep up, You-Know-Who!"

Now as has surely been previously noted, I am no real fan of the monkeys.  I do not want to see them harmed or injured, but I would just as soon have them on someone else's property.  The young ones are always excited by Lily and Virginie and today was no different.  They got to hopping and dancing for the girls' entertainment and the girls gave it up so easily, squealing and laughing and shouting in return.  So this made me nervous.  I had to walk under the tree they were hanging in to get to laundry room and I was holding Virginie, but Lily was walking alone.  The monks were moving in closer and closer and I just wanted to get the bleach.  At the entrance to the laundry room is an outdoor shower with an attached hose.  Against my better judgment, I reached for the hose, in my mind's eye envisioning myself spraying the monkeys and their fanning out to parts dry and safe.  Well, they did run away for a minute and then immediately returned.  From the sounds of things, I dared not look up after spraying them just in case they decided to jump on me they would not get to scratch my face and make me drop Virginie.  (I do have quite a number of escape scenarios for all kinds of potential events here, most involving monkeys, lizards, or toads.)  I heard what sounded like rocks or stone being pelted to the ground, so I told Lily to run and we hightailed it back to the house.

During our regrouping session where we all discussed what went right and what went wrong, well, really just I discussed these things out loud and the girls looked at me like I was insane, I said, I never should have sprayed them.  They thought they were under attack and retaliated.  Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a tail against one of the windows and saw that the mother had come to take a peek at us.  The girls were now beside themselves.  When Mommy Monkey left the side patio to walk to the girls window and jump up, I thought the two would swoon.  Both girls laughed and tapped on the window which excited the next generation.  One came over and made faces with the girls which caused Virginie to tire of the game and cry.  Both parties seemed to get bored looking at each other, so the monkeys walked on to parts unknown, and Lily and Virginie went to the couch to watch Discovery Kids.

Finding myself now able to go to the laundry room to get the bleach without being encumbered by a 22 pound candypie, I walked out, broom handle in hand.  And then I saw it.  The monkeys had not been throwing rocks at us.  That thud I'd heard was the sound of poo hitting the paddling pool below the Aki tree, favorite haunt of the devil monkeys.  Poo.  These people were trying to poo on us after the water attack.  Left on my own, surely I wasn't going to ask the girls to help me clean it, I was forced to don some plastic gloves, take my hose, and clean that shit off the pool before my children saw, touched, smelled, or face painted with it.  Recuperating.  Slowly.

(c)  Copyright 2010.  City Mom in the Jungle.