Ella's New Friend

We went to the Nightmare called Freeport, Maine, today. I went this morning dragging two unhappy little girls with me. Our goal was to find a duffle bag for me and a suitcase for Steve at the LL Bean Outlet Store. It was more of a nightmare then I could have ever imagined. I loath shopping. All shopping. Except maybe grocery shopping-that I can tolerate. We arrived into the main outlet area and already I could feel my shoulders and jaws tense. We parked where I thought we were near the outlet shop. So we started walking, and walking, and walking, and walking...until finally we ended up on the other side of LL Bean where there are huge new buildings being built and in desperation I stopped a woman with a green shirt one. "Please," I panted, trying to rope spazzy Molly in, "Please, tell me where the outlet store is!" "Okay," she responded all calm and non-plussed, "do you know where the entrance to the highway is?" My mouth dropped-back 5 miles the way we came into town. I DIDN'T EVEN NEED TO COME INTO TOWN! So already we had walked 10 minutes from the car. I won't bore you with anymore of this nightmare but let me tell you-it didn't get any better from there.
The good news-Ella's friend's dad called and said she could come over and play this afternoon. That lightened one little girl's day so all of our days were lightened.
This is a new friend from school. And I don't think I have heard Ella laugh as much as she did in the first 15 minutes together with her buddy. I think we will be seeing more of this little girl. I hope so, as much as I hope I see more of Ella's ears.