Splat!

"Run for cover! The birds — they're after us!"

Screams. Chaos. Six children and four adults attempted to escape what can only be described as a carpet-bombing of bird poop. The birds had their target secured and would take no prisoners. Hair, shirts, food, eyeglasses, faces, iPhones — nothing was sacred. There was only one option: Run! Run for your life — or at least in hopes of avoiding the necessity of a nighttime shower.

Splat!

It had come to pass that we would spend nine nights in Florida because of a copy editors convention my husband wanted to attend. Our little family tagged along because I needed a little more heat in my life, a little more light. We drove the long distance because I hate anything that takes flight.

Nothing worked out as I had originally planned in my head. Not the hotel cockroaches. Not my parents tagging along. Not my kids getting sick. Not the flying feces of our feathered friends. Not my grandmother ending up in the hospital. We're just lucky, I guess.

Sitting with my dad in the infectious disease wing, draped in our hospital best, we watched my grandma wince when asked whether she was in any pain. My grandma replied, "No."

"You can't trust this woman," my dad said. "If her leg were on fire, she would say, 'I could use the light.'"

We laughed because it was true. She was always trying to take care of others — always perceiving the brighter side of the situation, even in the face of a pancreatic cancer diagnosis.

Nothing on my Florida trip turned out how I had originally planned. And isn't that just the way life goes?

The disgusting hotel room meant I stayed with and reconnected with cousins instead. My parents tagging along meant my dad was able to see his mom — to sit with her, possibly for the last time. My kids falling sick meant we stayed outside in the fresh air as much as possible. That's how we came to cheer on my cousin's kid playing baseball. That's how we came to agitate a bunch of birds who had formed a nest high on the ballpark's lights.

The birds retaliated with the full force of their previously full stomachs. The casualties were many, but no one suffered like my son, who took a deuce to the eyes and mouth.

He sobbed, alligator tears snaking through the splattering on his cheeks. Everyone ran around panicked, packing up the food, blankets and chairs and finding wipes, soap, water. And in the chaos, rocking my sobbing child, I looked up at the nest on the tall ballpark lights and laughed.

Sure, we were pooped on, but those lights meant we could see. And — adopting the bright perception of my grandma — I could use the light.

I wiped off my son's face with my shirt, stood up and stretched out my arms. "Better run, before I poop on you again. Caw! Caw!" My son stopped crying and looked at me, confused.

I flapped my wings and charged toward him. "Caw! Caw!"

He smiled and then screamed and ran. My cousin's spectating kids laughed, screamed and ran, as well, followed by some neighbor kids nearby.

I chased them, tweeting. They ran, screaming. The kids playing baseball looked over. The parents on the opposing team looked over. We laughed and ran, chased down the ice cream truck, and ran again.

It grew dark, but under the bright ballpark lights, I could see clearly. Nothing in this vacation was how I had planned. There were fevers and hospital visits and traffic and sterile gloves and tears and disappointment and poop. So much poop. And there were stories and wine and buffets and bald eagles and manatees and a bunch of adults and kids running around a park at sunset pretending to be birds pooping on one another. And most of all, there was time for family, both intimate and extended.

As I bathed my son, scrubbing the evidence from the aviary episode from his hair and body, he looked up at me and asked, "Mama, why did the birds do that?"

"We're just lucky, I guess. They say getting pooped on is good luck."

"We must be very lucky," he said.

We are.

Katiedid Langrock is author of the book "Stop Farting in the Pyramids," available at http://www.creators.com/books/stop-farting-in-the-pyramids. Like Katiedid Langrock on Facebook, at http://www.facebook.com/katiedidhumor. To find out more about her and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate webpage at www.creators.com.