Do Not Leave Children Unattended in Waiting Room – Episode #79

Last week, four blond, blue eyed, fare skinned people sat in the a medical clinic waiting room.  One would guess these people were related based on the physical characteristics.  I was one of them.  Heck, I thought, we could have been related except…  The other three, all children, took up all of the other chairs in the room.  The youngest, a boy, sat sideways with feet on a second chair and a ballcap on a third.  The oldest, a teen girl, sat on two chairs with a windbreaker on another and a purse on a fourth.  The middle child, a gangly boy, laid across three chairs, his boat like shoes snaked through the armrest of a fourth and his handheld video game extending under the armrest of a fifth.  It occurred to me, who raised these kids?

I heard the staff behind the window complaining loudly about these discourteous folks.  I agreed but ignored it.  Don’t meddle.  The voices I heard were clearly meant to alert the rude guests to straighten up and act properly in public.  Several times a clinician poked a head through the window and glared out.  To no avail.  I thought, they want someone to be embarrassed.

Eventually, the female of the group stood, grabbed her stuff and walked through the patient entrance.  The youngest boy hurriedly followed with his stuff and was whining about being left behind.  The gangly boy, who was left behind, sensed the absence of his family at some point and went to the window to ask where his sister and brother went.  I wondered, where are the parents?

The woman, confronted by the deserted boy, instead looked out the window at me, puzzled, and asked, “He’s not yours?”