Children of the Corn

Yesterday I thought we'd do something fun and different for our Saturday family outing. Something that required exercise and some time in the beautiful Autumn outdoors. So I scoured the internet until I came across the perfect thing- a corn maze. What could be cooler than the whole family wandering through a 2 1/2 mile maze of corn, complete with checkpoints, our own flag and a nifty little ticket that lets you stamp your progress as you find the stamp boxes hidden in the maze? I envisioned the girls laughing and calling out excitedly as each stamp box was found, my toddler finally free to run pell mell through the paths and my husband and I holding hands and enjoying the outdoors together.....that is not what I got.

Instead, I got Children of the Corn revisited. And let me tell you, if I had suddenly found myself being tied to a cornstalk cross and offered up to "he who walks the rows" I might have had a better time. Our beautiful autumn day turned out to be a late month scorcher. 80 degrees and sheltered by the high stalks of corn, we had no chance of a breeze. My family and I sweated through 2 1/2 miles of corn maze, dragging our flag (wave in case of emergency) behind us and taking turns dragging our toddler through the paths. And though Elisabeth actually got into the spirit of it and delightedly searched every corner for a stamp box, Abby whined because she wanted chicken nuggets and begged to wave our flag so an employee would come lead us out. My husband was just as disgruntled -if not as vocal- as we toted a howling toddler from checkpoint to checkpoint as he struggled to get down. Not to run mind you, but to disappear into the corn or to squat in the path and eat sand by the handfuls....maybe it tasted like corn? An hour later we emerged soaked and wilted, Alex red-faced and screaming, Abby still whining and Elisabeth crying because we were all too tired and hungry to pay another $20 to jump in a moonwalk for 20 minutes. Between all the whining, crying and temper tantrums I began to wonder just why we even do these outings. Then I looked at my daughters, so big already and closer to teenage than I'd like, and at my beautiful curly-haired boy who would not always cling to me so passionately, and finally at my husband who- despite me freezing him in time at 25- is beginning to show gray. And I remembered that anything worthwhile is often difficult. So I will keep dragging us all out every weekend until the kids move out or I am physically unable. We will have family time if it kills us....just maybe no more corn mazes.