Where's George Clooney?

Last Monday I had an experience that all mothers fear...if you are the mother of someone who was dropped on their head as a small child.  My youngest shoved popcorn kernels up his nose...not one or two but THREE popcorn kernels.  I don't remember dropping him as an infant but I drink a lot so who really knows... 
I stayed calm enough to not swear while I freaked the fuck out.  Especially since this same day I was called by the daycare because my oldest son had a 102 fever, and at this same time I had just started boiling chicken and at this exact moment my phone was beeping because the battery was dying and I couldn't get in touch with my husband or my mom or my mother in law or God...
After every unsuccessful attempt at getting them out at home there was no other choice, we were heading to the ER...but not just any ER, the real glamorous one that is located right smack dab in the inner city. Although there is a dire need for hospitals to accept everyone regardless of insurance status you have to be insane to go there.  I get to go there for free thanks to my employer and when shit is free, especially a trip to the ER, that can make you reach the necessary insanity level.  This is that story...
Hudson and I arrive and pass through metal detectors behind a couple that just beat the living shit out of each other and in front of a cracked out criminal with police escorts.  We check in and stand in an area the size of a half bath with the most interesting and intriguing group of people I have ever laid eyes on...one man is holding his finger in a blood soaked rag, an elderly woman is moaning and another lady really just looks like she is waiting for Dr. Feelgood.  Other than the company it all seems pretty uneventful...
That is when we are graced by Mental Patient Marcus who approaches the check in window like he is either going to murder it or eat it.  He explains to the check in girl that he was just released by the hospital and doesn't have his medication. "I can't be released on the streets without my medication...mumble, mumble, mumble..."  Our second guest is Dad of the Year Dave who comes right up on Marcus and yells, "I need medical attention for my son!"  He then proceeds to grab his son's wrist and proclaims, "his wrist be broke!"  His son wails out since the wrist he grabbed is said broken wrist all the while Marcus is still trying to get his red or blue pills (one pill makes you smaller, one pill makes you tall).  Marcus whirls around and says to Dave, "Don't dip in my shit man."  Dave, of course, has a retort, "You best step back man...you need to take your ass to the mental joint next door."  They both are puffed up and I fear are going to start beating the shit out of each other in this 6x6 hell hole and I can't contain myself so I yell, "THAT'S ENOUGH!  There are children in here.  Both of you need to GET IT TOGETHER!"  In all honesty, I think my animal mother instinct took over and I also think it didn't make a damn difference.  These dudes could have cared less that I was going National Geographic on them or that there was children in a 6x6 room they were about to make their personal octagon.  Miraculously, Mental Patient Marcus is summoned by the pill distributor and ironically the gal behind the check in glass says that I better go to another waiting room which I reply, "Umm, you think?"
The other waiting room had a nice little play area that I wouldn't have let my child play in if it was the last playroom on earth...we were joined by a mom who said fuck every other word which if you are at the bar is fine but we happen to be in a pediatric ER waiting room so not really a good look, Dad of the Year Dave joins us where he grabs his son's broken wrist on two more occasions to show the nurse it's broken, and finally a 15 year old who had her ass cheeks hanging out of her shorts and is brought in by an ambulance with another 15 year old that put a bullet in her head...how do I know that, you ask?  Well, as I am checking my son in with the nurse the ambulance driver happens to share that information right in front of me and my THREE YEAR OLD SON!!!!  Thankfully, the popcorn kernels up his nose somehow affected his hearing because he never once asked any questions about that.
We are called back and taken to the curtain rooms of chaos.  We are surrounded by a child with a bandage wrapped all around the top of his head who keeps trying to crawl up his mother while she plays on her phone, a pregnant girl old enough to just be starting sex ed (that's 5th grade) and don't forget Dad of the Year that I hear the doctor ask when the break happened and Pops says around 5pm and the doctor seems perplexed considering the entire wrist has to be reset.  I am overtaken by this overwhelming feeling of dismay when Hudson sneezes and a popcorn kernel pops out!!!  We were starving and really hoped it would have materialized into a fluffy, butter-ific popped corn of goodness but no such luck.
It's then that my angel arrives from the darkness.  He has in his hand the magic wand of kernel rescue and with a graceful flick of the wrist releases the other two kernels that have made their home in my son's nasal cavity.  That is how I remember it anyway and is exactly what I am going to keep telling myself.  No, I did not need to apply my entire weight on my son while this satanic nose utensil gouged and dug in my sons nostril only to cause a severe nose bleed once the kernels had been rescued.  It wasn't like that at all, in fact it was a beautiful experience...like how you would imagine floating on a cloud might be.
All in all, we made it through the wilderness of inner city ER!  We aren't stabbed, or zombies, no one dipped into our shit and I still love my son.  I love him even though three days later he looked at me and slowly put a popcorn kernel up to his nostril...at which point I picked him up and dropped him on his head.