The Neighborly Thing

We've had our share of pretty good neighbors over the years, particularly now when our across the street neighbors are rescuing us (okay, me) on a regular basis by closing the garage door when we've gone off and left it open, to letting the dog in and out, and much, much more.  (I'll let you in on more later, say, around Thanksgiving.)

But, probably the neighbors who put up with us most lived next door when we lived in Willow Creek in Oklahoma City.  We've had nodding-acquaintance-neighbors, hold-a-garage-sale-together-neighbors, even share-the-lawn-mower-neighbors, but Robert and Linda were key-swapping neighbors and beyond.

When Jake was a teen-ager and came home to what he thought might have been a break-in he went to their house and Robert went back over and went through the house with him. When a guy has dodged the empty Christmas boxes, and Easter baskets, and wrapping paper flying out of your closets at him without calling that Hoarder's Hotline, you know he's a real friend.  When Robert was out of town and water started spewing all over the kitchen floor at their house Dennis returned the favor by dashing madly (yeah, this was a long time ago) through their house looking under all the sinks to find the shut-off valve. It was in a closet, I think.  I didn't hear if he got hit in the head with anything falling on him when he opened the door.

They were in our Sunday School class and when Robert received a pair of old bowling balls (they were wrapped beautifully, the package the biggest, the heaviest, who could resist it?) in a gift swap at our class Christmas party he used them as Yuletide decorations on his lawn, then spent the next month turning them into lamps which he presented to me for my birthday. Such a sacrificial giver!

Oddly enough, our dish patterns and even some of our linen patterns were the same, so it was like having access to twice as much party ware when we needed extra. Linda's beautiful crystal serving platters held chocolate-covered strawberries and little cheesecakes on our dining room table when we had Jake and Robyn's engagement party at our house.  And the Tool Time wedding shower (HooYa!) for Jake was held at Robert and Linda's.

After Robert and Linda started working in the Youth Department at church they often had crowds at their house which spilled over into the shared yard between us and sometimes we would come home to find mysterious pans of lasagna in our oven, or big pots of chili simmering on the stove when Linda's kitchen was full and the kids were coming over.  Most of the time we resisted sampling. Really, we did. Mostly.

I promise I didn't send her over on purpose but after they moved in we didn't spend nearly as much on dog food.  Come to find out our dog, Roxie, was making regular forays to their house for her daily treat.  Linda bought dog biscuits for her even though they didn't have a dog. Jake's puppy even made his home on their porch a few times.  He seemed to think that Robert's shoes were a tree trunk.  Or a fire hydrant. Or something.

Of course we didn't take advantage of having their key or anything. Well, maybe except for the time we had a gas leak at our house and the gas company shut off the gas for almost a week and we had no hot water, so they did wind up feeding us several times and we trekked across the yards, dragging our towels and shampoo like kids in a college dorm, and took our showers at Robert and Linda's.  And, oh yeah, when we finally were moving away from our beloved neighborhood, I let myself in and went to sleep on their couch while the movers were hauling things to the truck. Robert had already left for work and Linda was still in bed but she didn't bat an eyelash when she came out and found me there, just headed to the kitchen to fix us some breakfast.

When Jake was moving into an apartment at college and someone told me boxes from liquor stores were the best for moving  I collected a lot (I went to the stores and asked!  I didn't save them up from our personal usage. I did not!) and was storing them in our garage.  I decided I'd better let Linda in on what was going on since they were fellow church members and Linda is a well-respected Bible teacher.  I didn't want her to see the garage door up and think "Aha!  The lushes next door have finally let out their little secret!"

"Oh, don't worry about it," she said. "I know looks are deceiving. When we first moved here I was looking for a present for Cassidy and went into Christy's Toy Box (note from Pat: an infamous "Adult" store in Oklahoma) to see if they had anything. Well, it said 'TOY Box'!  Then I had to stay in there for an hour because I was afraid someone would drive by and see me coming out."

It's no wonder that we got along so great.  Not that I ever do anything as embarrassing as that.  Usually. Well, okay, there is a little store here in Broken Arrow called "Sassy's" (the same people that own Christy's may own it)  They don't have manicures for little girls there even if you are only looking for a gift certificate for your granddaughter. I'm going to have to find a neighbor here who will come rescue me from there.

Filed Away

We have one big four-drawer lateral file cabinet, and two big regular four-drawer file cabinets in our garage, and a two-drawer lateral file in the study, not to speak of the file drawer in the desk. And we are running out of space. The other day I found that last year's tax records, unbalanced from on top of one of the cabinets, had dropped into the cat litter box that is in the garage and the cat had expressed his opinion of them right then and there.

When I told Dennis of this situation, (after I threw away the two front pages of the tax file which were just instructions anyway) he said "We need another file cabinet."  No-o-o-o-o!  He skirts the edges of the TV show "Hoarders, Buried Alive" by keeping all his papers hidden away in drawers and, for the most part, he knows how to find whatever he is looking for if you give him enough time. But if the garage is too full of file cabinets to get a car in, doesn't that count for the Hoaders thing?

I know you have to keep tax records for seven years in case of an audit, but----I am not making this up!----he has forty-five years of them! He has every tax return we have ever filed and the records to back them up.  He knows he doesn't need them; he just wants them. In case.

He has files on every house we have ever owned (seven), files about every car we have ever owned (twenty-two), every insurance claim we have ever made on houses and cars. There are files on all of our medical records going back to the blood tests for our marriage license, every picture of every ball team the boys were ever on even if our boys were out sick the day of the picture, everybody's birth certificates, and on and on and on.  There are files about every car accident, files that belonged to his mom who died seventeen years ago, and files related to all his businesses.  (He has owned three over the years). And now he has files for Medicare. That can fill a file cabinet all of it's own.

Sometimes these files come in handy. If you have a question about, say, what kind of tires did we purchase for Jake's 1985 Cougar, he can tell you.  Or who played third base on the Flyers when they went to that tournament in Midwest City?  Important stuff like that. You never know what you might need.  Okay, sometimes they have been useful.

 When Josh and Jerilyn were booking their honeymoon it included a cruise that went into Canada.  At the time you could use birth certificates in lieu of passports to enter Canada. No problem, dig into the file cabinet for Josh's birth certificate. An odd thing happened, though.  The legal copy of the birth certificate was not to be found.  We did send off to Sacramento to get one but the departure date was getting close and it still had not arrived.  Back to the file cabinets.  There were several Xerox copies of the certificate but no original. There was, however, a corporate seal from one of the old businesses. This is a device that looks kind of like a big hole-punch but it embosses the name of a company on official documents.  You've seen them on legal things.....like birth certificates.

Josh and Jerilyn left on their honeymoon with their birth certificates in hand.  Josh, though, did not know that his birth certificate was embossed "Agape Industries" instead of "State of California".  We held our breath. It looked like the real thing.  It felt like the real thing. You would have to hold it up to the light to tell the difference.  No one was going to suspect a clean-cut young, honeymooning, pre-med student of forging documents. They went into Canada. They returned from Canada. They had a lovely trip. It was not until after they were home a few days that we let them in on the secret. We were glad Josh didn't have possession of any scalpels or things like that yet.

I might give in on Dennis getting another file cabinet soon.  But I already told him, when he dies, the next vehicle after the hearse is going to be one of those big commercial paper shredding trucks.

Daughters-in-Love

We have two daughters-in-law whom we love dearly. (Most of the time. No, really, we do. All the time. Okay, we have our moments) I would say we got lucky but since we started praying for them the day each of our sons was born, I'm sure it was not luck that brought this about. Had Dennis and I been choosing them ourselves I don't think we could have done better, although our sons did not give us that option. (Not that I didn't make strong suggestions.)

They are both beautiful young women but here is the difference between them: Shoes. One wears them, the other doesn't. I suspect that Jerilyn goes to bed with her really good tennis shoes on because I have almost never seen her without them, except when she is wearing really good dress shoes.

Robyn, on the other hand, is hard pressed to keep her shoes on in a blizzard.  She will compromise by wearing flip-flops when shoes are absolutely required.  A few years ago for Christmas she asked for, and got, a pair of flip-flops with interchangeable straps that could be swapped out for different looks, dressing them up or down. There are pearls on one of the sets of straps for the dressing up part.

 Jerilyn likes antique furniture and classical music.  Robyn, country music and the kind of furniture that will accommodate the Great Dane at her house. Cloth napkins for Jerilyn, paper towels for Robyn. Robyn makes lists and schedules. Jerilyn will follow lists and schedules but she doesn't want to make them.

Robyn survived teaching in an inner-city school where she was called on to break up fights daily and bore the bruises to prove it.  Jerilyn will do anything to avoid confrontation.  Jerilyn survived having to drive herself to the ER, carrying her toddler, during a gall bladder attack when Josh was on call and couldn't leave. (I don't think she even called him.)  Robyn was lucky enough to get the husband who will wait on her when she's sick and now her daughters will too. Even her mother-in-law will do what she can. (I did. Really, when the kids were little, I took them.  Don't you remember?)

And here is what's the same:  They are both godly young women who put the Lord first in their lives, then their families. They make my sons happy. And, oh, yeah. Between them they have given me four beautiful, brilliant, stupendous grandkids.  What more could I ask for? (Insert Mother-In-Law joke here)

Okay, I could ask for a pair of slippers.  I don't do barefoot, but slippers whenever I'm in the house (and sometimes out) instead of shoes seem perfect to me.  Midway between the two, I'd say.
                        
                            

Dear Little Girl

 When I met each of our daughters-in-law, and knew that they would be in our family, I said "I've been praying for you all your life, I just didn't know you name till now."  I found this the other day.  It is from the late seventies.  I was mushier then.

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Dear Little Girl,

I prayed for you today, and yesterday, and I will pray for you again tomorrow.

I do not know you. Perhaps you are three or four or perhaps you are a tiny baby, just reaching for your daddy's outstretched finger.  Maybe you are not yet even born.  But, though I do not know you, I know Someone who does. His Word says "Before I formed you in the womb I knew you." And He is my link to you.

Did your mother reach you just before you ran into the street chasing that ball, oblivious to the pick-up truck full of teen-agers that was roaring around the corner?  I was praying for you.

Did the big dog that frightened you so badly last week seem a little less scary today?  I was praying for you.

Are you beginning to understand, just a little, when your teacher tells you of a wonderful Man who loves little children so much that He told His helpers not to send them away, even though He was very busy?  I am praying for you.

Do you wonder that I, a stranger, am praying for you?  I am praying for you because in my house there lives a little boy.  He is straight and strong and tall for his age.  Some days he feels God is calling him to be a baseball player, some days a fireman.  He loves Jesus very much and speaks of Him and to Him as naturally as he speaks with me.

Our Heavenly Father, in His wisdom and love, wanted to give us here on earth a tiny taste of what His love is like and so He planned for families. He planned for a man and woman to love each other and to have children that will symbolize the Family of God.

God's Word tells us that He sees us before we are born and schedules each day of our lives before we begin to breathe. That is why I believe, dear Little Girl, that God's plan for you already includes my Little Boy, and that His plan for him already includes you. And so I pray for you each day.

I pray that you will come to know Jesus early and well. I pray that you will learn to love and be loved freely. I pray that your life will be filled with laughter and joy and that you will be able to share that happiness with the Little Boy I know and the little girls and boys that God sees fit to send the two of you someday.

I pray that in God's perfect timing you will come into the life of my son and that he will recognize you and you him.

And so, dear Little Girl, I am praying for you today and I will pray for you tomorrow and all the tomorrows of your life.

Cat-Tales

There were cat prints all over the windshield of my van this morning.  Paw prints going up on the driver's side, slide marks going down on the passenger side. Apparently Morning, our tuxedo cat, was climbing up on the roof of the van and slaloming down for his evening entertainment, what time he wasn't sleeping in the back seat on Dennis's sweater and weaving his fur into it.

He had been consigned to the garage for the night because he was galloping up and down the hall, pounding on closet doors and jumping up, down, and across the bed at two in the morning while we were trying to sleep, meowing to try to get our attention. He got mine. I threw him into the garage as soon as I could catch him.  ( Oh, don't go all PETA on me! I leave the car window down so he can sleep in there when he's finished skiing on the windshield.)

Carl Sandburg, who wrote "The fog comes in on little cat feet...", obviously never owned a cat. Sandburg was going for softness and silence.  When a cat barrels down the hall it sounds like nine horses in the fifth at Kentucky Downs.  It is magnified at night.  A cat's life is twenty hours sleeping, one hour eating and grooming himself, and three hours wreaking havoc.

Before we became Politically Correct we let a cat we owned have kittens.  It's possible there is nothing in this world cuter than a teeny kitten. They literally bounce into the air when they are jumping around chasing wadded up pieces of paper or strings or each other. They can fit into anything, like in Dennis's dress shoes. They are quickly litter-trained, but before that they may make an occasional mistake, like in Dennis's dress shoes. That made for some unpleasant rides to work in the winter with the heater going!

I swear I wasn't really retaliating for the shoe incident when I almost killed those kittens.  It was simple human error!  This was before self-cleaning ovens.  I read that you could clean an oven by stuffing all the vent holes with dish towels and leaving a bowl of ammonia inside the oven for several hours. There was no mention of the fact that if you don't get the vents completely closed off and you leave the house shut up with kittens inside all day with ammonia in the oven that the kittens might be overcome! We did get home from work in time to rescue them but it was kind of a close call.

Now, I certainly don't believe in reincarnation but cats do have nine lives, they say, and they live a long time (unless overcome by ammonia) like into the teens, so while I don't have any basis for this, I'm wondering if the latest cats we have had may somehow be getting back at us for that unfortunate ammonia thing.

The grand kids gave Dennis two kittens, brothers, for his birthday a few years ago.  They were darling to begin with and just wanted to cuddle, but they swiftly turned into the cats from hell.  Midnight (Dennis named them. Don't blame me.) liked to be up high, the better to look down on you and plot his next move. He would manage to leap from the floor to the chair to the top of the bookcases and walk back and forth till he had displaced every decorative object up there, then he would sprawl out and take his nap, frequent naps being required of cats but only in the daytime.  The bookcases form an L on the wall at the corner and there is about a twelve inch square opening between them. Soon after we got the kittens Midnight completed his high jump and tumbled right down between the bookcases six feet to the floor. I considered leaving him there but the howling was rising to a crescendo that was going to disturb the neighbors. And the grandkids might have noticed.

I made a desperate phone call and Robyn came to our rescue. While I was preparing to remove all seventy-two linear feet of books prior to pulling out the bookcases Robyn attached some scarves to a basket handle, climbed onto a chair and lowered the basket with a cat treat for bait in it down the hole and gently pulled up the cat.  I knew that girl was smart!

Dennis wanted to put them in the garage at night so we could get some sleep but I was more tender-hearted.  We compromised by getting a sweet little cat bed and shutting them in the laundry room/pantry. They thanked us by climbing the pantry shelves and knocking down as many cereal boxes as they could and drop-kicking several glass bowls that were on the very top shelf.

From that experience I learned to tightly cover anything left in the pantry overnight, especially the cat food, but when I was gone for a week baby-sitting our Edmond grand kids, Dennis didn't think about the cover.  In the morning when he went in to retrieve the kittens they had knocked over not only the whole container of cat food but also their water dish making a slushy mess.  Dennis, who really wasn't the one who had put the ammonia in the oven, slipped, slid and fell, breaking his leg in three places and, home alone, had to crawl through the house to even reach a telephone to call for help. This, dear readers, is why he walks with a limp to this day.

I may be doing penance for the ammonia thing but I'm not too soft-hearted to put him in the garage any more.

Fast Friends

     A lady I met in the line at Wal-Mart drives 27 miles to work each day, coming from Sapulpa to Broken Arrow. And she bought macaroni and cheese on sale for thirty-nine cents because Wal-Mart will price-match. And soda. Her teen-ager drinks a lot of soda, but she doesn't drink it at all. There was more, but you get the gist. I never saw her before and probably won't ever see her again. We had a nice chat, though.
     And last week my husband was sitting in the car with Gus, our dog, while I ran into a convenience store. Just as I came out a lady came up to the car to see Gus (Who wouldn't? He just happens to be the cutest Yorkie in three states). She thought he was cute but apparently she thought hers was cuter because before I knew it she was sticking her cell phone into the car to show us a picture of her dog, which was the the screen saver, and all the saved ones in the album. But they wouldn't let her take her little Gretel into the Aquarium and on and on. We would have been home half an hour sooner if Gus had just kept his head inside the window in the first place.
     Almost every time I go into the post office or a store I learn all the details of the check-out guys' failed prom date, the sad saga of a lady who had lost all her trees to a tornado and was replacing her shade plants with sun plants, several stories of operations, failed and successful, the pros and cons of making your own baby food and quite a few recipes (mostly for Mexican dishes, this is Oklahoma, after all). You don't want to know what I've learned in doctors' offices.
     It's kind of like Speed Dating for grown-ups; a couple of minutes of pleasant conversation but you don't make a date, in fact you never see them again. I, of course, would never talk to strangers myself. Well, okay, but only when I have something really interesting to say. Or ask. Like whenever I see a guy buying a  bouquet of flowers I give him a thumbs up. I'd like to know what he did that he's apologizing for but I haven't gotten up the nerve to ask...yet. And maybe I talk to babies sitting in the grocery cart while their moms are unloading things onto the checkout belt. (Oh, don't tell me you never do that! I see you every time.) And I have to whisper a little encouragement to the same moms who are trying to deal with temper tantrums being thrown in public by their two year olds and still hanging in there. It's a Grandma Rule.
     Once, when I opened my wallet and found I was short two dollars to pay the bill, the lady behind me insisted on paying it for me even though I was sure I could go out to the car and scrounge up that much in change from under the seats. That's one I've tried to pass on and it's pretty fun.
     I hope I'm not stepping on anybody's toes here, but when our kids lived in a state farther north and east, people didn't speak to you if they didn't know you. I thought I was in a foreign country!  I couldn't even get a smile out of the person handing me my food at the drive-through. And when we were leaving the hospital with our new-born grandbaby and several other people were in the elevator with us, not a soul spoke! Can you imagine being right next to a baby you know was just born and not talking baby talk or finding out how long the labor was? It must be something to do with the cold weather back there.
     One time when I was in a serving line at a buffet---an out of town wedding, I think---a total stranger, I'd never seen her before in my life, was chatting with me as we waited to be served.  "I try not to take too much at these affairs," she said. "But, you know me, I always do."
It's been about five years since I met that lady, and while I restrained myself from saying "Uh, no ma'am, I don't know you." I've thought about her a lot and I realized that, yeah, maybe I do know her. I think she's Me.

After the Fall

It was raining cats and dogs this morning. Literally. When I got out of the car to carry Gus, the Wonder-Yorkie, into the groomer's I slipped on the wet sidewalk and plopped myself down.  I tried my best to hold onto Gus, especially since he sometimes bolts if he gets loose outside, but he fell like rain the last few inches. Or maybe like a huge chunk of hail (he was okay). I grabbed his fur and lay there, holding onto him and wondering how in the world I was going to get up.

Being an Old, (okay, and yes, very out of shape, thank you for bringing that up) Wife, if I get down on the floor, or in this case the sidewalk, I can't get up without holding onto someone or something.  Dennis was in the car but I had fallen right in front of the hood, too close for him to see me laying there flailing about like some lobster in a trap and the windows were rolled up and with the pounding rain I was pretty sure if I yelled loud enough for him to hear me the tornado sirens across the street would go off. There were brick pillars on either side of me, about four feet away and I thought of crawling to one, but I had to hold onto Gus. The one-handed  crawling thing wasn't working so well.

Then, here came a car with people in it hurrying to my rescue.  I use the term hurrying loosely because the car hurried but when it stopped I saw that the couple in it were even older than I am and the lady was the only one who was able to get out to try to help.  At this point Dennis finally noticed that I had gotten out one side of the car and he had never seen me emerge onto the other side and he came out to try to help too. Again, the term hurrying is not really relevant.  He did take the dog, though, the lady guided me to the point I could kneel up and all's well that ends well.

It was Deja vu all over again, so to speak, but first you must know about my winter coat.  I used to have to walk almost 2/10 of a mile across a huge parking lot to work. (Okay, I'm a wimp, but YOU try walking that far in -54 degree wind-chill!), so when I saw the wonderfully padded  full-length coat in a catalogue, I ordered it.  The fact that it was purple should be secondary except for the fact that when I wear it with the hood up all my kids say I look like Barney. Whatever! It is extremely warm. And, as it happens, the padding comes in pretty handy too.

I think it was Josh's senior year in high school that I had a winter of winding up on the pavement every week or so. I swear I don't drink, but I'm sure that's what it looked like when I suddenly went down on my backside, not just sitting there but sprawled out flat on my back, while walking across a parking lot. It was too bad that it was the church parking lot. I was wearing the Barney coat.  Fortunately I was not hurt because of the padding; unfortunately, the padding made it even harder to haul myself upright. Josh and Jake picked me up and no one from church was rude enough to mention it.

A few weeks later when we were visiting Oklahoma Baptist University to preview it before Josh's application was turned in, there I went, splat onto the parking lot.  OBU is an alcohol-free campus.  There were looks sent my way. They may have noticed the purple coat.  Think Guinness Book of World Records-winning biggest grape Popsicle. Or Barney. I think Josh wavered between picking me up and pretending not to know me. Since he would eventually have to ride home with me, though, he decided to be a gentleman and help me up.  We waited awhile before turning in his paperwork.

Christmas Eve, that same year, Josh was working at Chic-Fil-A in Penn Square Mall. Jake, Dennis and I went to pick him up from work and since parking places were non-existent, Dennis pulled over to the curb and I was going to go in to get Josh.  He parked very close to the curb.  I opened the car door and rolled out like a lapsed AA member and fell once again, this time between the curb and the car. I was stuck.  The doors on the street side were blocked by traffic, or so Jake and Dennis said later, and there I lay. No flailing, It was too tight a fit, with the purple coat and all.  It did not help that the car was bouncing up and down with somebody laughing hysterically inside.  I have to admit I was laughing that hard too so there was really no way in the world I could free myself.  I guess I'd still be there if a man from across the mall had not seen me laying there and, full of the Christmas spirit, come across to pull me out.  He did not seem to think it was funny and he certainly gave Jake and Dennis a dirty look for letting Barney lay there, humiliated, and having to be rescued by a stranger.  I tried to stifle my laughter and look pitiful.  They deserved his attitude!

I hope this morning was not the start of another season like that one. I guess I'd better get out the purple coat.

Postcards to My Mom

I didn't have time to "blog" much yesterday (okay, I did but I don't like what I wrote so I'm still working on it) but I spent all evening re-reading some postcards my mom sent me last year that she had saved for more than thirty years.  I had written them to her, trying to have something in her mailbox each day for about a year. My dad died that year and she had said "The loneliest thing is an empty mailbox."

I am going into a busy season, with yard clean-up, company coming from New Hampshire (anyone who wants to come help me clean house is welcome. I love my sister-in-law but she is always so clean!) and we will be spending a week baby--no make that kid-sitting in Edmond.  Anyway, for the next few weeks I will let you in on life at the Carey's when the little boys who eventually made me into a grandma were busy making my life...umm, interesting.  These would have been written around 1978-79. Jake was about three, Josh around five. You will see why I now have grey hair.

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Dear Mom,

I didn't get up before Jake to have my Quiet Time and I was so thankful he stayed in the kitchen and didn't bother me.  Well, I just came in and found that he has put six 13 cent stamps {equivalent to 49 in 2016] all over a bill Dennis had left for me to mail, covering up most of the address.  The he said "See what I did for you?  Say 'Thank you'."

Every time I tell him not to do something he says "My dad said I could!"  Outrageous things like stick a soda bottle down his throat or eat dog food.  He's not too smart about it though.  Sometimes he says it in front of Dennis. He acts like he feels fine (from a cold) today, too fine.  He's wild.
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Dear Mom,

Jake is really keeping me entertained today.  This morning it was raining quite hard and he said there is a "heavenly hose up there doing that."  Later I called him for something and he said "You can call me Son."

Now he is eating lunch: Popcorn. And he's eating it with a spoon.  He also wanted soda with "too much ice in it."  I wanted him to eat a little more than popcorn so I fixed him a hot dog.  He said he is going to save that for me.
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I know I don't have to say this, (but that's never stopped me before) but hug your kids really tight today.  It is absolutely amazing how fast they will be gone.  Which reminds me of one of my embarrassing moments that you all seem to sadistically enjoy:

While sitting with Jerilyn, waiting for Josh's plane to come in once, she was joined by a friend, the wife of Josh's college professor who was on the same flight. I felt the need to impress her, of course.  The subject of disciplining children came up and I, being the older, wiser, more experienced parent of children who had grown into fabulously successful adults, made the final pronouncement on the subject.  "The most important thing," I intoned, sagely, "is that you have to pick your no's."

I'm not sure how impressed the professor's wife was, but Jerilyn has never forgotten it.

"Loafing Around the House"

This is dedicated to all the full-time moms who work at home and all the working moms who do all this and work away from home also. And the dads who do it all, too.  It was written when my children were three and six.


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I received a letter from a school friend recently bringing me up to date on her family and describing her exciting new career.  "How about you?" the letter ended, "Still loafing at home?"

I wanted to answer her letter right away so it wouldn't get lost amid the accumulation of crayon drawings, school schedules, shopping lists, coupons and catalogues for school fund-raisers on my desk, but the phone interrupted.  It was Josh's room-mother asking me to drive first-graders to the petting barn at the Fair.  "I hate to ask you to drive again so soon," she said, "but since you don't work..."

By  the time I got back to my letter three days later, I had cooked nine meals, plus six snacks, made nine beds, washed, dried, folded and put away eight loads of laundry, vacuumed seven rooms of carpet, trimmed twenty tiny fingernails and twenty toenails, scrubbed two sand-filled heads of hair, driven five fighting kids to the Fair, driven the soccer car-pool, gone to Bible Study Fellowship and taught another Bible study at church.  (Studying for both hidden away in the living room an hour before sunrise.)

I had mopped up five spills of Kool-Aid, two bathroom floors and two bloody noses, scrubbed four toilet bowls, four sinks, one shower and one tub.  I cut bubble gum out of the dog's tail, cents-off coupons from the newspaper and five minutes off the time it took to get supper fixed, eaten and over in time for the soccer game.

I barbecued, tenderized and assembled.  I defrosted, de-boned, and delivered.  I planned fourteen dinner menus and wrote out that grocery list, called twelve ladies in the prayer chain and removed a jar full of twenty-seven roly-polies from the kitchen to the patio.

I hemmed six pair of size-eight jeans and let the hem down on six pair of size-four jeans.  I spent $40 at the grocery store just going to pick up a gallon of milk.  I read aloud eight "I Can Read" books from the library, watched three hours of Sesame Street and rocked two sleepy boys at bedtime three times each.

I poured six glasses of milk, eight glasses of Kool-Aid and one--only one--glass of Kool-Aid and milk, mixed, that Josh swore he would drink.

And finally, I poured myself into the easy chair and searched for something other than a crayon to write the letter with.  "Dear Glenda,"  I began.  "Your new job sounds very exciting.  Yes, I'm still loafing at home..."

"A Helper I Will Be..."

We were walking to the elevator at the doctor's office building the other day and I had to back up a few steps to fix the picture that was hanging crooked on the wall.  Dennis couldn't stand it. "Will you stop!" he said. He always thinks I'm doing too much for other people. Please! What I can't stand is pictures that are crooked.  I had already taken care of the ones inside the doctor's office.  I'm sure people appreciate it if I adjust things for them. It's not like I carry around a carpenter's level. Okay, I used to have a small one in my purse. But I never used it when anyone could see me. And it disappeared one day. I don't know what happened to it.

I only flip sofa cushions in some one else's house if they really need it.  I'm helpful that way. I sold furniture for a long time and I know the best way to keep your sofa looking like new is to rotate the cushions and some people don't know that.  I don't actually do it if they are in the room.  And, of course, if the reason they haven't changed them is that there is a big ol' stain on one side, like at my house, I quickly turn them back the way they were. Or if I hear them coming back. I think people are grateful for the help.

Also, public places like the library should be everybody's business.  I usually pull a few weeds on my way up to the door to drop off my books.They have a lovely flower bed next to the sidewalk and just a few weeds would multiply like rabbits if we all didn't help out. Of course, I never know what to do with the weeds after I pull them, so I just lay them on the sidewalk. Maybe the people who work there will notice and be more vigilant about the weeds themselves next time.

 There aren't that many people who are helpful like I am in today's impersonal society. Like, I always reach up and tuck in the tag if it is sticking out from the back of someone's blouse. I wouldn't want to go around all day with my tag sticking out. Sometimes it even tells the size and I SURE wouldn't want that sticking out.  And what would I have done if that lady hadn't told me that my skirt was tucked into my pantyhose that time?

Of course, some people just are not taught to be grateful when they are children, I guess.  There was that one time when this man didn't seem to be very appreciative of any help.  He was standing in the line at the bank and you could tell he was probably on his way to an interview or an important meeting or something because he was all dressed up with a blue blazer and nice pants.  I'm sure he even had a tie on although there was just the back view.  Wouldn't you want to know before your interview if there was a long blond hair on the shoulder of your nice navy coat?  Someone needed to get if off before he embarrassed himself at his meeting. But, no-o-o.  You never heard such yelling and carrying on. Who could have known that hair was attached to his neck?

By the way, you don't need to mention this to Dennis. He doesn't need to know every time I help somebody.

One of Those Days

It should have been a clue when I was getting dressed this morning and it was really hard to get my pants on and I knew for once I really haven't gained that much weight but then when I went to put my phone in my pocket and the pocket was facing the wrong way and I realized I had put them on backwards. But I didn't have that much time to keep changing clothes because I had spent the last half hour searching for my glass of Diet Coke (okay, you have your coffee in the morning, I have my own way to get caffeine) and finally gave up and decided to get my Diet Coke at QT on the way out and then everything was on RUSH.  I should have just taken some Tylenol and gone back to bed at that point.

I got Dennis to work and he wasn't all that late and then ran into the store for groceries and Miranda's birthday present and then to the church gym to ride the bike but there was someone there letting her four grandkids play on the exercise equipment right under the sign that said "No one under eighteen years of age allowed on exercise equipment."  I didn't even get up to 5K so I could brag to Dennis when I gave up and quit because I had to keep stopping to avoid the little girl who kept running in front of my pedals.  I decided to just go home, take some Tylenol and go back to  bed.

So I headed on home and when I pulled onto our street and saw everybody's trash still out (no good stuff, though) I remembered I hadn't put out the trash, but  thought "I got lucky.  I can get the trash out before the trucks get here." and I ran in and dumped the contents of the stinky kitty litter box into the trash bag so I could  get it to the street before the trucks and then wash out the litter box. And I made it! Things were looking up. Except for that part where I got my jacket stuck between the trash can and the new trash bag when I was trying to fit it around that stubborn rim. And I really should have checked to be sure there was more kitty litter before I dumped  the box and there was nothing to refill it with. And the cat was looking at the box meaningfully.

So instead of going back to bed with someTylenol I had to run up to Sam's (they have the 42 pound kitty litter there) Well, they had toilet paper on sale too so I got that but when I got back home the garage door opener wouldn't work no matter how much I pushed the button until I realized I was pushing the button to open the back car door  instead of the button on the garage door opener.  And, guess what! I got the "Ultra-Strong" toilet paper instead of the "Ultra-Soft" and I will have to use up 64 rolls before I replace it. As soon as I finished complaining to you I was definitely going to take some Tylenol and go back to bed!

Except then I realized I got the groceries and forgot to get Miranda's birthday present. Her birthday is tomorrow. Instead of getting that Tylenol and going back to bed I had to leave early to pick up Dennis and go get her present. So, I got Zoo Doctor Barbie, gas, and Dennis from work. Finally, things went smoothly. Well, except for that almost hitting the gas pump thing and trying to get between the car and the pump to reach the handle and cleaning the whole side of the car with my backside. I think I'll just get out of these dirty jeans and into my pajamas so I can take a couple of Tylenol and go to bed.
                                                                 

P.S.  Thought you'd want to know:  When I got ready to go to bed tonight I found my glass of  Diet Coke in the medicine cabinet. Next to the Tylenol.

To Fly or Not to Fly

Long, long ago when you went to an airport, to fly or to meet someone, it was an event. Unless you are of a certain age, you will never believe this, but people actually wore nice clothes. I mean, Stewardesses (there was none of this "Flight Attendant" nonsense) wore hats! And suits! So, of course, you had to dress accordingly.  No one was going to make you take your shoes off or look at you naked in an x-ray machine, anyway.

When Wilbur and Orville invited us to come on down.....oh, wait, it was a few years after that.  When Dennis and I were first dating we used to go to the airport for a fun evening. You could dress up and stand around at the gates and kiss each other and everybody who saw you just thought you were saying a fond good-by. For two hours. And it was cheap, too. Good for lots of laughs.  Dennis pushed me in a luggage cart, we watched crazy people who were watching us and we never left St. Louis once.

There was a time.....and here is where you will really have to stretch your imagination but it is true....when smoking was allowed on airplanes and even tacitly encouraged. Not only were there no Smoking and Non-Smoking sections, (as if the smoke from the one section would not drift into the other any more than you can pee in one part of the pool and...well, you know what I mean) they actually even put little packs of cigarettes, like those little boxes of crayons you get with a kid's menu at Chili's, on the dinner tray. I am not making this up!

 he first time I flew I was fourteen years old and I was by myself.  I dressed up, of course, with make-up and high heels. I would have worn a hat if I had had one, and looked very mature, practically as old as the stewardesses. Imagine my excitement when--get this--the dinner tray arrived. You were served a meal on airplanes back then! Boy it has really been a long time.--and there, next to the tiny plate, neatly laid next to the doll-house silverware, was a pack of three cigarettes. They were free.  And mine.  My mother was not on the plane. My father was not on the plane. I knew no one and no one knew me.

There was just one problem. The stewardesses had accidentally forgotten to include matches with my cigarettes. I was sure it was an accident because they obviously could tell I was much older than fourteen. Everyone else seemed to have matches. They were required to put the cigarettes on the trays. It was Product Placement of the 'sixties, but for some reason they had forgotten my matches.

I was seated in a row by myself.  (this was very, very long ago)  There was a gentleman in front of me and one behind me. If I asked either of them for a match, surely they would insist on politely lighting the cigarette for me like Cary Grant lighting a cigarette for Grace Kelly. I had no idea how to start the thing. Was it suck or blow?  It could prove very embarrassing. I pondered and pondered until the stewardess, still in her suit and hat, came and took my meal tray, full cigarettes pack still on it.  I'm not sure why she winked when she went by.

And then we landed and my sister met the plane and I never did get that first cigarette. It's probably a good thing because I did get a first piece of chocolate sometime long ago and I have been addicted to that ever since. Addiction is addiction I suppose. Chocolate is cheaper, though.

 And it doesn't make your dressy clothes smell bad should you want to wear them to the airport or somewhere.

X-Ray Vision

I recently had some x-rays taken and learned the answer to something I have been wondering about for years: When you are being x-rayed you don't have to remove all your clothes unless there is metal in there somewhere. Nobody ever tells you these things if you don't ask.

By this time in my life I've had plenty of x-rays. When a mammogram (essentially an x-ray) showed I had breast cancer a couple of years ago they wanted more pictures.  And more. And some just before each surgery. I had so many x-rays for the next three months that I think the top half of me practically glowed in the dark.

I also broke my arm when I was three and I must have been x-rayed but I don't remember. I'm sure my mom was with me. I do remember the next time I went for x-rays I was much more grown up.

When I was seventeen the doctor wanted x-rays of a spur I had on my hip to determine if it was time for a surgery he was considering. Being seventeen I was able to drive to the radiologist's office by myself. At seventeen you certainly don't need your mother or anyone to go with you to the doctor.  Sheesh!  Did they think I was a baby? And, besides, I was very mature for my age.

The office staff greeted me, the wait was not so long that I remember being nervous, and then I was ushered into a changing room and handed one of those hospital gowns. The kind that has two ties in the back. Victoria would be keeping no secrets in this thing.

It took me awhile. I knew there was nothing to be embarrassed about. These people were professionals.Trained medical professionals. They saw people without their clothes on all day long. It was their job. I would stop acting like a baby and get undressed.  I hesitated some more when it came to removing my underwear, but, this was an x-ray of my hip, after all, and surely they would need to have access to it. I wrapped myself in the air-conditioned gown and stepped into the hall. 

I was led  down a passageway and magically across the continents into Antarctica where they had apparently left their x-ray machine. I could not see the refrigeration coils that led up to the metal table but they were obviously under there. The temperature of the table was approximately seventy degrees below zero. I resolved not to touch my tongue to it and hoped none of the other bare parts of my body would get stuck either.

 A trained medical professional came into the room.  I knew he was a trained medical professional because he was wearing a white coat.  He was also absolutely gorgeous.  His big blue eyes matched the color of the scrubs he wore under the white coat.  His eyelashes would have made a llama jealous.  He...wait!!!  He was a medical  professional and I was very nearly a frozen specimen he needed to x-ray.

He moved my legs to the Pretzel Position. "Now hold it, hold it.  Don't breathe."  Next he moved them to the Gordian Knot position. "Hold it, hold it.  Don't breathe."  The Upward Facing Frog position. He adjusted. He turned my legs. "Hold it, hold it. Don't breathe."

Finally, I was allowed to return to North America where I quickly dressed and left as fast as my frozen legs would take me. I was proud that I had faced the ordeal in a grown-up, mature manner.

As it happened, it was decided that I didn't need the surgery at that time but four years later, after I was an old married lady, the problem came up again and the doctor sent me for more x-rays. It was to a different lab, a different office with a different staff, except for one thing.  The x-ray tech was the same guy. I recognized the llama-lashes.

The metal table was just as cold on my bare skin as it had been previously. I was wearing, sort of, another one of Victoria's cast-offs.  The tech, in his white coat, greeted me professionally. He, of course, didn't remember me. After all, it had been four years, I had changed a lot, he had x-rayed hundreds, if not thousands since I last saw him and I didn't expect him to recall a patient from so long ago. I didn't mention our previous encounter

He moved to the end of the table--- not the end where my face was--- took one look, then stopped.  "Haven't I x-rayed you before?" he asked.

I can't imagine how in the world he recognized me.

The Tickle Tree

Partly because of a stomach bug and partly because my mind is blank and partly because a change of pace is due, today I want you to get out your crayons--the 64 Big Box--and illustrate this story.  I can see the pictures clearly in my mind but they don't come out of my fingers.  A few years ago (yes, years, not decades!) it took Second Place in the Tulsa Library Adult Creative Writing Contest.  I already spent the $100 that came with it.

                                   Timothy Thompson and the Tickle Tree

                                                              by

                                                       Pat Carey

 
Timothy Thompson was most often right. If he couldn't be right, he didn't want to play. Timothy put his shoes on first thing in the morning and tied them by himself. Then he sat on the steps of his big front porch.

Olivia Claire McPherson, who lived next door, didn't care about being right; she just liked to play.  Usually Olivia Claire, if she wore shoes at all, wore a red shoe on one foot and a blue shoe on the other or sometimes the other way around.  And she always went out of her way to stomp in puddles.

Today Olivia Claire walked to Timothy's house with one foot on the sidewalk and one foot in the rainwater that was running along the curb.

"Come out and play, Timothy," Olivia Claire said.  "There's a Tickle Tree in Mrs. Watson's yard right around the corner.  I'll show you."

"There's no such thing as a Tickle Tree," said Timothy

"Then you'll miss it," Olivia Claire said, as she stomp-splashed, stomp-splashed away.  And then Timothy heard her laughing, laughing, laughing from around the corner.

The next day Timothy, brown shoes neatly tied, was sitting on his porch steps when Olivia Claire came by.  She was wearing her best ball gown, the one her Mama bought at a garage sale for fifty cents.

"I'm going to the Tickle Tree, Timothy," she said.  "Do you want to come?"

There's no such thing as a Tickle Tree," Timothy said.  "My mother helped me look up trees on the internet. Mrs. Watson's tree is a Weeping Willow tree, NOT a Tickle Tree."

"Then you'll miss it," said Olivia Claire.  Her ball gown swirled around her as she twisted and twirled away. And Timothy heard her laughing, laughing, laughing from around the corner.

When Timothy got up the next morning he chose his blue canvas tennis shoes and carefully tied the shoestrings.  It had rained again last night so before Timothy sat on the front steps he first dried them off with a towel his mother gave him.

Today Olivia Claire was wearing flip-flops, one with shiny buttons all around and the other with fuzzy feathers across the toes.  "Hi, Timothy.  Do you want to play?  I'm flying today," she said.

"Kids can't fly.  Only birds," said Timothy.  But he came down the steps and walked, with very good posture, to the sidewalk.  Olivia Claire made zig-zigs back and forth, her arms stretched out widely as she flew along.

In Mrs. Watson's yard a tree stood next to the sidewalk.  It had long, thin branches with long, thin leaves that hung almost to the ground.  Olivia Claire disappeared into the leaves but Timothy stopped. He could go around it or he could duck down under. He heard Olivia Claire giggling but he couldn't see her. Finally, Timothy began to walk toward the branches. They tickled his forehead, then they tickled his nose, then they tickled his chin.  Timothy began to smile.  He grinned.  He giggled.  And before he knew it he was laughing, laughing, laughing.

He kept on laughing all the way home as he and Olivia Claire stomped in each puddle and then followed the footprints all the back again to the Tickle Tree.

                                               The End

Massage Therapy

When I win the Publisher's Clearinghouse Sweepstakes I am going to have a standing appointment with my massage therapist. Heck, maybe I'll just hire her and have her on staff. That would be the ultimate luxury for me. One of my gifts from Dennis for our anniversary is a massage appointment, but Diane, the lady I usually go to, is booked till Friday. I can hardly wait.

When we first moved to Tulsa I saw signs on bus stop benches all over town for a massage at a really good price.  It almost seemed like too good a price, but not knowing the market here, and being anxious to have a relaxing massage after working at rehabbing our house and then moving, I decided to treat myself. 

When I mentioned it to Robyn, my daughter-in-law, her eyebrows shot up.  "I don't think that's really the place you want to go," she said.  She always thinks I'm naïve about things.  Like I don't know my way around the big, bad world. Huh! I haven't been around this long for nothing.  Besides, what I do know is saving money, so I called the number on the bus stop bench. I didn't have to wait too long for the appointment and they gave me directions

The first time I had a massage was when Dennis went to a convention in Anaheim, California as President of the Oklahoma Commercial Realtors and I got to go along.  There was an expense account and the hotel had a massage therapist, and bingo! I was hooked.  But they are kind of expensive and the only other times I had gotten massages they were gifts when we lived in St. Louis.  However, each time I've gone it had been in a spa-like setting.

The Bus Bench massage location didn't seem too spa-like when I pulled into the parking lot.  It was in an older area of town in a strip shopping center. "Well, this is one reason the prices are low," I told myself.  It did seem a little odd that when I got to the door it was locked.  I had to ring a bell, then someone came and let me in and verified I had an appointment before they unlocked the door, though it didn't seem too busy there for the middle of the afternoon.  I was glad I was going to give them some business.  In this economy we all have to work together. There  were no other women waiting with me and I felt bad that they didn't have more customers. It didn't seem too spa-like inside either, though.  The waiting area was small, the industrial grade blue carpet was dirty. I hoped they would be able to replace that as soon as their business built up more.

Two men were in a glassed-in office smoking cigars. I was glad for the glass.  Cigar smoke would certainly not contribute to a spa atmosphere.  They stared at me for a moment, like they had never seen a little (stop smirking!) old grandma coming for a massage. Then went back to smoking their cigars.  No wonder things were slow, I thought.  They didn't seem to know how to treat a paying customer, and they didn't even look like spa employees should look, either.  No wonder this place didn't seem too prosperous.  Someone really needed to take it in hand and make it more welcoming.  Maybe they were the owners. They needed to quit smoking cigars and get down to business!

The massage therapist came to get me. She was wearing tiny shorts and a t-shirt. I decided I would try to tip her well so she could afford to buy some scrubs like in the big spa massage locations. Her massage room was similar to those I had been in before, a little darker, perhaps, but maybe the candles were the aroma-therapy kind.  I began chatting with the young lady, as I am wont to do. She told me she only makes the tips people gave her, the whole massage fee goes to the owners. That made me worry about her because she really wasn't very good at the massage. I considered giving those owners a piece of my mind when I went out, but they were kind of scary looking so I decided against that.   My time was up but before I paid her she asked me if I would like to take a shower.  I don't think that has ever been offered anywhere before. I  actually felt like I needed one but declined to take it there and hurried home to my own shower.  Things had just seemed strange. But, what did I know?  I have to admit---but not to Robyn!---that I'm really not too experienced at these things.

When you move to a new location it takes awhile to learn your way around  and recognize streets and businesses so imagine how exciting it was when we were watching the news a few weeks later and I recognized a picture of  my Bus Bench massage parlor in the news promo. "Oh, look," I said to Dennis "my massage parlor is TV". Then, the news story:  You'll never guess!  I was apparently the only woman who had paid for a legitimate massage at that location as long as they had been open.  It was busted, along with several others, for being the "Other Kind" of massage parlor.

I didn't call Robyn to tell her to watch the news.

The Flinging of the Clothes

My grandmother had a set of seven tea towels that had embroidered pictures on them and the sayings: Wash on Monday, Iron on Tuesday, Sew on Wednesday, Market on Thursday, Clean on Friday, Bake on Saturday, Worship on Sunday. One for each day. I'm not sure if she followed this schedule exactly but I think she made a pretty good stab at it.

I, on the other hand, only partially work the list.  I know I worship on Sunday, and other days too, actually. The rest may be spread out a little. Or ignored. That ironing thing: I've heard of it but the exact concept escapes me. I know it involves some kind of super-heated medieval torture instruments but they aren't seen in polite company these days.

The Washing on Monday, however, if you do it right, now that can be a great celebration.  It doesn't have to be on Monday, any day will work. At our house when the boys were younger we had The Flinging of the Clothes night.  Josh's friend, Brian would even join us, rushing in the door at the last minute yelling "Did I miss the Flinging?"  I think Brian was actually the one who bestowed the name on our festivity the first time he witnessed it.

The observance evolved, over the years. First with Dennis going to the Laundromat during our early marriage and washing all the whites with a burgundy sweatshirt.  He wore hot pink underwear for about six months after that. I think there was a method to his madness but it still didn't get him out of laundry duty. Then when the boys were really young I did it all and there were many arguments over why in the world is it easier to hide your dirty clothes under the bed and behind the door than it is to put them in the hamper? And the underwear and towels left on the kids' bathroom floor every morning! Sheesh!! Were you raised by bears?

Here is a handy household hint:  if your kids can't seem to get things from the bathroom to the hamper, put a hamper in the bathroom itself.  We bought trashcans with swinging lids just for this purpose and put them in the bathroom and in each of the bedrooms.  The smaller size of a trashcan instead of real hamper works best and it's fun to toss something from across the room and set that lid spinning.

Finally we made peace with the laundry monster and turned it into a family activity.  Okay, Dennis didn't participate in the Flinging but he usually managed to hit the hamper in our closet. At the time we had a two-story house with a balcony that overlooked the entry hall.  On the appropriate evening everyone who had dirty laundry upstairs gathered up his trash can/hamper and dumped the contents over the balcony.  It made quite an impressive pile. There may have been some aiming at your brother involved when things were being thrown over. Then the boys brought everything into the family room and added them to Dennis's and my things making an even bigger pile.  Then I lit a match to the pile and we all danced----oh, wait, that's a fantasy I toyed with from time to time. I mean, then began the Flinging.

Our washing machine had settings for Normal, Permanent Press and Delicate, so everybody grabbed something and we zinged the big pile into six smaller---make that less big---piles of light and dark colors for each setting.  It was similar to the scenes of the tomato fights in Spain that you see on  TV every year. Wild and boisterous, fast and furious.

Being the only female in a house full of males, I got the Delicate pile all to myself for the most part unless someone thought it was hilariously funny to run around and pretend to have Mickey Mouse ears by wearing a piece of my intimate apparel on his head.  Or during the period that someone who shall be nameless wore Hammer Pants that were marked for delicate washing. (Hey, this may be another blog--with pictures--although this all can be avoided with a little persuasion on someone's part. The sum of $500 in small bills under the rock by the back door should do it. Or a new cordless mouse. Just sayin')

A load in the washer and a load in the dryer when we went to bed made it seem by morning that the job was well on it's way.  As long as everybody participated in The Fling, I would wash and fold the clothes during school hours and at night people put away their own things.

When the boys were little we had those plastic grocery carts. (I know they were boys but boys can learn about shopping and dolls and things like that!) I would put the clothes in each of their carts and they took them to their rooms to be put away. The free-spirited child opened his drawer, turned the cart upside down and dumped in the clothes.  The other (let's not say anal retentive, let's say more serious) refolded the clothes, because I didn't do them right, and placed them in his drawer in precise layers. When their clothes got too big for the cart they used the laundry baskets. One continued to carefully put them away, the other kept the basket in his room and just lived out of it for the week.  Why waste extra motion opening up that drawer over and over?

Each boy learned to use the washer and dryer himself when Junior High started. The fact that they were graded on bringing their gym clothes back on Mondays freshly laundered and someone's mother may have forgotten to wash them that weekend and--Fine! I'll do it myself!!--happened made it rather simple. 

Today they each have their own washer and dryer, their own kids and their own big piles of dirty clothes. (I heard that Brian changed his name, became a Naval officer and someone else on board ship does his laundry for him, but  I know he knows how to do laundry when he's on leave) I don't know if they have instituted The Flinging of the Clothes but if not they are missing a lot of fun. Their kids are just about the right age now.

The other day I ran the washing machine and when I went to empty it into the dryer I found I had forgotten to put the clothes in. Somebody in this house wanted to blame it on a Senior Moment or worse, but I think I just need to start my own Mini-Fling to get things back in sync. Then maybe I better work on some of those other tea towel days, maybe the baking one, something chocolate, perhaps. Three down, some other number to go.  My grandmother would be proud.

How My Baby Got His Leg Broke

So you want to know how it happened that Jake broke his leg when he was a baby. You can't leave it alone. You and every social worker and "concerned citizen" in California at the time!

It probably started before he was even born.  He was a kicker.  He played whole soccer games in my insides, even kicking Dennis if he got too close. After the game he would roll back and forth, back and forth, from one side of my stomach to the other. They must have had root beer for their after-game treat because he would have hiccups for hours on end.  Just sitting in church with my maternity top bouncing around like I was covering up a pot on rolling-boil got to be pretty embarrassing. When he was finally born, legs and arms flailing about, fists punching the air, I looked at him and said "So that's what you've been doing in there all this time!"

As a newborn he wiggled, as a baby he bounced, and by the time he was eight months old he was almost impossible to hold. In fact, I had caught him by his ankles more than once when he pushed against me wanting to get down. I tell you all this to say, "IT WAS NOT MY FAULT!" 

The nursery at our church was in a separate building.  I was chatting with the lady at the nursery door before I dropped him off.....wait!....I mean HANDED him to her just like Good Mothers do every Sunday all over the world. There was a sidewalk; I was still standing outside the door. I had not even started to give him to her yet. You know how some babies kind of "buck" against you?  This was Jake's move. By the time he was eight months old he had practiced this over and over.  He straightened his legs out, pushing with all his might as he had done dozens of times before--And this time I didn't catch him.

The nursery worker threw out her arms, I made a desperate grab, and we both watched in horror as Jake fell to the concrete sidewalk. He screamed, I screamed and Dennis heard us from inside the other building and four rooms away. The California Institute of Technology may have taken note of a blip on their Richter scale. I was sure I had seen him hit his head. I called the doctor from the church office.

Since it was evening she said,"Watch him through the night, wake him every fifteen minutes to see if his eyes have dilated, and bring him in to the office in the morning." Yeah, right. He cried off and on all night long, no need to wake him. We figured he had a massive headache so we were very careful about his head. We grabbed his legs instead. Dennis set his carrier on the sink while he shaved in the morning and leaned against Jake's legs as he reached over him. Of course, Jake wailed. I lifted him by the legs to change his diaper. He wailed. When I dressed him to take him to the doctor, I looked all over to find an outfit that didn't pull over his head, Good Mother that I was, I pulled it over his legs instead. He wailed.

By the time we got to the doctor's office Jake had finally fallen asleep from sheer exhaustion, leaning up against my chest.  As soon as the doctor saw us there, looking like Madonna and Child, she knew he had not hit his head.  She reached over and touched his leg. That woke him up! She sent us over to the hospital for x-rays. Sure enough, a fractured femur.

Then came the questions. This was 1976, just at the beginning of public awareness of child abuse. "Mrs. Carey, would you tell me again where you were when this injury occurred?'  "Mrs. Carey, you say you were the one holding him when he allegedly fell?"  "Mrs. Carey, how did you feel about the fact that he was wiggling so much?  Did it make you angry?"  Each person I spoke to at the hospital demanded details, then passed me on to someone else who wanted to hear, again,  exactly why this child had the injury he had, and have me fill out yet another form. They did not give me any Mother of the Year awards.  I was saved because there was a witness, the nursery worker, who had seen Jake fall. After many hours they finally let me go home with my baby instead of placing him in foster care.

An adult who had the same injury would have had to wear the cast for six months, the orthopedist told us, but being a baby, with an exceptionally Good Mother, he healed in just six weeks.  During that time he even learned to crawl, although he crawled dragging the cast behind him.  When the cast came off he still crawled with one leg behind. That's the way he learned.  I couldn't teach him everything!

The cast was quite a conversation starter when we went out to the store or to the park  Naturally, everybody who saw us asked "Oh, what happened?" to which big brother, Josh, three, would answer.  "My mommy dropped him on the hard concrete and broke his leg!" Thanks, Josh.

 You would think that child would want to stay on the good side of a mom who would do that to a baby.

The Grandma in My Mirror

I just walked by a mirror and my grandmother's face stared out at me. I don't know when she got here. If I'm not looking in a mirror, I'm sure I'm still a thirty-year-old hot red-head.  Okay, maybe not hot. But warm!

My sisters, you may recall, got the dominant genes in our family: dark hair, tall, straight noses, etc.  In fact, they were really quite beautiful.  One modeled and was often compared to the young Elizabeth Taylor. My sisters looked like each other.  I looked like the red-headed step-child. I was red-headed anyway.

My own, sweet husband, who to this day insists that he fell in love with me the first time he saw me, (here is where you say "Awww.") said, when he met my sisters "Wow, your sisters are gorgeous." And later---wait for it, wait for it---"You don't look a thing like your sisters."

But, here is the payoff:  If you never looked  like Elizabeth Taylor (not that one, the young one, smarty pants!)  it doesn't startle you as much when you begin to age.  My sisters are still taking forever to carefully get dressed, do their hair and apply their make-up (and they are still looking fabulous!) before they leave the house.  I can get out quick. I am the only one of us who has grey hair and it saves all kinds of time and money. Make-up?  Sometimes yes, sometimes no.  But when my sister and I went out to eat and she didn't get the Senior Discount because she didn't look old enough (she was) and they gave it to me without asking ( I wasn't), I didn't turn it down.

I can't tell you how many times little kids have seen me from across a room  and started running toward me, yelling "Grandma!"  Sometimes they stop when they get close enough to see I'm not the grandma they were expecting, but other times they come all the way to me with their arms held high to be picked up. So I pick them up. I get lots of hugs that way.

When you look like everybody's grandma people hold doors for you, they let you go first in lines and sometimes they even get up and give you a seat if you are in a crowded waiting room. They offer to carry things for you and hold doors open till you get there. And don't forget about the Senior Discount. I get it legitimately now. If I forget to comb my hair now and then, people make allowances. I don't drive at night anymore so if I don't want to go someplace I have a good excuse.  And when I do drive someplace, as long as I have Dennis with me, I get to park up close, in the handicap space.

At first it seemed strange when I went to a new doctor and he was younger than me, or I got stopped by a policeman who looked about half my age. Now, I have one son who's a doctor and one who's a cop, so I'm more used to it but I'm still pretty sure I know more than they do anyway.

Since I had my mastectomy I have had to make regular visits to a plastic surgeon's office for treatments.  I have to admit that I study closely the other people in the waiting room.  There are some that I'm positive are there to consult about, or are in the midst of, face lifts and all kinds of surgeries to make themselves look younger. Not me. These wrinkles are hard-earned and every one of them has a memory behind it.  I like to think the more lines on my face the more lines in my brain.  Those people don't know what they'll be missing.

I'm staying away from the full-length mirror though.

Saved By The Kid

The first time they put that squalling, squirmy, screeching little baby in your arms and you have counted his fingers and toes and marveled over how beautiful someone who looks a lot like Winston Churchill can be you begin to realize how a mother bear can rip someone's arm off if she thinks her baby might be in danger. You swear by all that is holy that you will protect this child forever no matter the threat.

And then you turn around and he's standing there towering over you and his muscles are like tree limbs and you think "Okay, my protecting days are over."  Except you pray morning and night for angels to surround him and protect him where you can't. You don't have to tell him. And then you turn around again and he is the one protecting you. The Circle of Life, I guess.

 Call me a hypocrite because I wouldn't even let my boys play with guns when they were little, but as long as Jake decided to be a cop and have guns, why not call him if there is a snake (okay, a LONG pipe cleaner*) in the laundry room?  Or, like once when we first moved to Tulsa and I came home from church to find the front door open (is there a pattern here?**) I called Jake instead of the Tulsa cops. No sense being embarrassed by the whole "Oops, I think I forgot to close the door" thing in front of the cops in case I had just forgotten to close the door. Which apparently I did.

And whenever I sell something on Craig's List and someone is going to come to my house to pick it up, I get Jake to come over wearing his shirt that says POLICE on it and wearing his gun. Just in case. 

I don't think he will remember this, but Jake actually started protecting me, in a way, when he was only ten.  I had  just started working at the furniture store and, well, you know how sometimes there is someone who just gets on your nerves, not matter what they do and every time you are around them they do something dumb and you want to strangle them?  I was that someone for one of the managers at the store.

It seems like no matter what I did it was not right for this guy.  I was new and I admit to a few--ok, maybe a lot--of mistakes.  But he seemed to delight in calling me on them in front of people.  It was like he watched me, waiting for me to screw up.  And I obliged him.  I tried not to bring it home, but you know how that works.  I may have mentioned it a couple of times.  Or cried in the bathroom where nobody was supposed to hear.

We only had one car at the time and Dennis and the boys came to pick me up from work.  I was going to take a small table to a customer on the way home, so this manager carried it out to the car. I  thanked him and introduced him to Dennis, Josh and Jake. It was summer, the car windows were open, and after the manager loaded the table into the back of the car, but before he got all the way to the front door, Jake turned to me, his ten-year-old voice carrying through the parking lot,  and said  "Is that the man who's mean to you, Mom?"

When I got to work the next day it was as if I was the long lost daughter of the founders.  This manager was never nicer to me, we actually became good friends and I stayed at that job for nine years.

Thanks, Jake, for protecting me even then.  I'll be calling you if I see anything suspicious in the laundry room.  Or if anybody is mean to me.

*See Reptile Dysfunction--July 28
**See It Was A Dark and Stormy Night  August 22

Dinner Reservations

I don't think I'm going to invite any more of Dennis's bosses to dinner.  They just seem to cause trouble.  I'm sure they don't mean to, but then again, look at the record.

The first time I invited Dennis's boss over we lived in our first little house near St. Louis and there was barely enough room for everyone to sit, much less eat, so we thought we would just have hors d'oeuvres and then go out to a restaurant.  The only problem was, I didn't know exactly what an hors d'oeuvre was.  Dennis took French in college but he didn't seem to know either.

I asked around where I worked. Someone said cheese fondue. I was to melt Velveeta cheese in a chafing dish, add tomato soup and dip chunks of bread in it. (Sounds yummy, doesn't it?) The problem was, I didn't know what a chafing dish was. I asked around at work. Someone said "I have a chafing dish you can borrow," and I was set.

I chopped the Velveeta into chunks before the company arrived, and when everybody got there, started melting the cheese. Now, I don't know if the chafing dish itself was faulty, or if I was not supposed to actually put it on the stove to melt the cheese in it, but just as I picked up the dish by it's wooden handle to carry it into the living room, the handle broke off, the boiling cheese splashed all over my legs (thank the Lord I was wearing thick wool pants) and all over the kitchen walls and floor. I stood there in shock with the hot cheese congealing on my legs while the boss's sweet wife got on her hands and knees and cleaned up the cheese.  We decided to go to the restaurant for our hors d'oeuvres. After I changed clothes. At least we were all saved from having to eat the Velveeta/tomato soup concoction

The next time we had a boss to dinner we had moved to California and he was a single man with the interesting name of Sandy. We had a dining room for the first time.  I polished all the silver and got out the good plates. It should have been simple. Steaks on the grill, baked potatoes and salad.  I asked Dennis the other day if he remembered much about the evening and he said, "I don't recall much.  I don't think Sandy ate much, really, after he pulled the long red hair out of his salad."  Sandy was blond and Dennis had short brown hair. Hmmm. Who do you think had long, red hair at the time?

                                          The Long-Haired Suspect and Josh

        

Boss three and his wife came to dinner after a job change a few years later.  A simple pot roast, no culinary disasters, but earlier on the day of the dinner party, eight-month old Jake had fallen and broken his leg. (OK, I dropped him. We'll discuss it another blog!) Poor Jake cried the whole evening and I don't think I ever even got to the table, nor could those who did get to the table hear each other talk. I'm fairly sure they left early.

I had pretty much learned my lesson.  Any food we shared with bosses from then on was eaten at restaurants.  We did have that one instance when the chef quit before our food was finished and the maître d' and the restaurant owner finished cooking and hours later when we finally got our food everything tasted like combat boots a l'orange.  But I had nothing to do with that!  And that time the waitress quit and stormed out of the restaurant in the middle of our meal, maybe I contributed some but I think she was just having a fight with her boyfriend at the time.

So we moved to Tulsa, Dennis's boss's birthday was coming up and it seemed like a good idea to have him and his wife to dinner. (What can I say? My memory is not entirely what it should be these days.)  You will be delighted to know that everything went extremely well. I spent all day making both clam chowder and home-made vegetable soup.  I made both French bread and apple pie from scratch. Every one exclaimed how delicious everything was and had seconds, maybe thirds.  Aside from being a little crowded in our small house, the evening was a roaring success.

A few weeks later the boss died.  I swear it was not my fault!