And I don't know if I'm Ever coming home....

Today was rather traumatic.  

Those of you who know, understand that I am the type of mother who encourages...  "Yes, you can do it" to their faces, when inside my intestines have made attractive figure of eight loops around my pancreas. 

Situations like  throwing Boy at 10 into a field of muddy explorers and saying "Of course you'll enjoy it once you get muddy", and throwing Tooli into a University hallway and saying "Go, go and meet people, make friends, make the first step".  Both of which situations left me in complete turmoil (and tears), but which after having done it, both kids grew in confidence ten fold and didn't need pushed again.

This week, as we are in France, Tooli said "do you think I could go on the train to see K and L? "  

"Pft, of course you can"

Nothing much in that I hear you say,  let me remind you .... this is Tooli who can't quite manage the correct train from Edinburgh to home.  Hey ho, we thought, we'll give it a go.

On the day - we took her to the station.     Our bog standard "Je vourdrais un billet a Rouen", was met by questioning stares.  He got a map out... I took a pad out and wrote it down.  " Ah", he said "Rouen",  Oui, Oui, Rouen...."  Much laughs, my pronounciation of Rouen is obviously not the same as any French person.

We handed over the iPad which had the list of trains.  "No Good" he said, and proceeded to advise us in slowly spoken French that everything we had planned was "no good".   He made a whole new journey, told us we needed to buy a Student Card to make it cheaper.  Discovered we were from Scotland, and Shouted "Free Scotland", to which I responded  with a chours of God Save The Queen, to be met by horrified looks from them. 

He then handed Tooli a map of the underground in Paris.  By a series of hand signals and pencil marks, he indicated that she had to disembark in the South Of Paris, run to the Metro, travel to the North, find another Station, and travel on then to Rouen.

He pointed at the map, said "Learn", and then grabbed it back off her. ha ha ha ha

We said our thanks and headed for the platform. 

The way he shook his head as we walked away told us, that he was not expecting us to ever see her again.

He followed us out to the station and picked up the map again, pointed at the stations and the metros, and reversing the journey for her to come back.

He walked away, off shift, still shaking his head.

the train came, and she got on board.  Dad and Mam waving like loonies...

I mean, we might not never see her again.  Redon to Rouen via Paris  is a lot farther than Edinburgh to Ayrshire :-)