Breakfast Breakdown

It was probably after Miss Curly Mop had thrown the third pancake across the marble floor of the restaurant, skipping it like a stone 'til it rested against the foot of a very unimpressed waiter, and then let a mouthful of scrambled egg slide down her chin and let it stick there like a small, wobbly goatee that I wanted to cry.

When the Blonde Bombshell started sticking her fingers into the bowls of cereal on the buffet, while singing loudly about the importance of doing wees on the 'big' toilet I wanted to vomit.

But it was when I totally lost it with both of them in front of a restaurant full of people that I just wanted to die.  Let them stick hot needles in my eyes, surely it would be less painful than trying to manage two over-tired, far-from-home, cranky children in the very swanky, very expensive, very breakable Palazzo Versace on the Gold Coast.

I never wanted to come here.  Being surrounded by glass tables, crystal chandeliers, $200 bath towels and lots of breakable bling is not my idea of a relaxing holiday.  But through a series of unfortunate events here I am, sans husband, with two homesick children and three in-laws who probably wish they hadn't witnessed me have a complete melt-down only minutes after the plane landed.

By the time my parents-in-law joined me at breakfast I was literally shaking, caused by a combination of anger, sleep deprivation and caffeine.  I wanted to run screaming from the room but I was afraid I would slip on the marble floors and slide headfirst into a table of designer black lilies styled to within an inch of their genetically modified lives.

Luckily they took pity on me and took the children away, leaving me to shake and sob in solitude.  Around me, the detritus of breakfast: three uneaten pots of different flavoured yoghurts, four bowls of different cereals, nibbled upon pancakes, discarded breadsticks, scorned strawberries.

I stared hard at the table, trying to hold the tears in.

As I stood to leave a lady stopped me with a gentle hand on my arm.

'Your daughters are so beautiful,' she said.

I must have looked surprised (or dubious).

'Is this your first day?  Have you flown in from somewhere?' she wanted to know, guessing the answer.

'We came from Perth, we're a little tired,' I said. Making excuses for my (and their) behaviour.

'Well, they are just beautiful.  You should be very proud.'

And with that simple comment from a complete stranger, I was able to lift myself from my slum of self-pity, remind myself how lucky I am, and I was able to get on with my holiday.