With Hardly a Thought, We Tread on the Brink of Disaster

It was a source of grand delight to the hundreds of kids whose evening soccer practice had suddenly stopped.

A giant helicopter was hovering overhead, its spotlight trained on the field below. The amplified voice of a firefighter called out over the din, urging us to “clear the southeast corner” of the field. The entire park had taken on an eerie red glow from the flashing sirens of the half dozen fire trucks parked alongside.

It seemed so surreal. . . . One minute the coach was barking orders at kids kicking off down the field. The next minute he was chasing after his cap--blown off by a gust from the helicopter blades--as a real-life “ER” unfolded at our neighborhood park.

Quickly the news spread through the throngs assembled for the weeknight practice, whispered parent to parent, out of earshot of the wide-eyed kids fixated by the helicopter’s descent:

A little girl had lost her footing while kicking the ball and tumbled back, hitting her head on the hard, dry field. A parent helped her to her feet, but she began convulsing and crumpled to the ground again. Someone called 911 on a cellular phone and paramedics responded right away.

Now she was being wheeled out, strapped to a gurney, toward a helicopter parked near the spot where her team’s goal had stood. Her mother followed, paramedics at her side to steady her. They lifted the gurney and slid it inside, then helped the mother climb the steps. The doors closed and the helicopter lifted off.

We stood watching, so close that the whirling blades spun dirt in our faces. We could see the dazed look in the mother’s eyes and the twitch of the little girl’s legs beneath her shinguards and her bright yellow socks.

What our children saw was an adventure unfolding. All they could think of was how lucky they were to see a helicopter up close and how wonderful it was that the mundane could turn exciting in the blink of an eye.

And all we could think was how scary an innocent evening of soccer had suddenly become, and how close we always stand to the brink of disaster.

*

We often view the same scene through different lenses, grown-ups and kids. Our children tend to see the promise; we more often see the peril.

It scares me to realize how quickly things can change, how a twist of fate can steal the joy from the brightest of days.

There’s the backyard barbecue-turned-tragedy when a toddler falls into the pool and drowns. The prom night that dissolves in bloody horror when a car crash takes a host of young lives. The tumble in a game of schoolyard soccer that leaves a child maimed for life.

I’d dropped my daughter off at practice last Tuesday night like I always do, confident that I’d return to find her running laps or chasing a ball, teammates in tow. But when I came to retrieve her, my way was blocked by paramedics and fire trucks. My heart began racing as I dashed from my car the long block to the park.

Then I felt that odd mixture of horror and relief when I realized that a child was hurt . . . but it was someone else’s child, not mine.

There on the ground lay the little girl in the yellow socks, her face pasty-white, her mother kneeling over her with a cellular phone pressed to her ear.

I stood there for a moment, not wanting to gawk or intrude but unable to stop staring.

Then I set out across the field in search of my daughter, breaking into a run when I spotted her tossing the ball in the air, oblivious to drama unfolding a few hundred yards away.

*

The 6-year-old girl injured that night would be all right. She was airlifted to Childrens Hospital, where she underwent a battery of tests. Her family spent several tense hours there, but ultimately she went home OK.

I’m not sure she’ll be back on the soccer field any time soon. I can only imagine what her parents must be feeling, how that old adage about getting back up on the horse that threw you must ring hollow when they think back to the fear they felt that night.

I’m not sure what I would do, either, or what my daughter would want me to do. Would it be too scary, too traumatic for a little girl to return to the scene where she’d taken her fall? Or is that kind of worrying the purview only of adults?

Maybe she would relish a return and revel in her celebrity as the girl who got the helicopter ride. Maybe she’d be like those kids around her, who imagined wonder, not tragedy, when that helicopter touched down.

They never stopped kicking balls and chasing teammates, laughing and yelling at one another, while their parents stood frozen in fear as the drama played out.

And when the helicopter lifted off and their parents tried to coax them home, the soccer coaches barked out, “C’mon, play ball!” And laughing, they did.

* Sandy Banks’ column is published Mondays and Fridays. Her e-mail address is sandy.banks@latimes.com.

All we could think was how scary an innocent evening of soccer had suddenly become, and how close we always stand to the brink of disaster.