“Bri-ANNE!!!” It should be known that the way my mother says my name sounds like she’s calling me a girl. And she starts out every phone call like this. “Bri-Anne!!! Are you coming over Sunday with Amelie to see the rocket launch? Your brother and Striker are coming over.” “Who is this?” I like to ask into the phone, just to rile her up. “Bri-ANNNNNE!!! Sheesh. Are you coming or not?” To the meat of it: My brother’s son just turned 5. His name is Striker. For his birthday, my mom got him a rocket. It was from the Smithsonian. It had to be a good one – and educational – because, well, “… it was from the Smithsonian!” My mother emphasized this about 95 times at his party. As if there is some genius museum developer actually IN the Smithsonian building all of these toy rockets that they sell to people like my mother.
Dog-sitting, and restoring order to the chaos
We get pretty set in our ways. Used to our lives. Like them just the way they are with their set patterns and rhythms and schedules. That’s the way we like our home life and our houses. To the guy who came up with the saying, “the only constant in life is change,” we blow you a raspberry and say, “Yeah, well, when was the last time you dog-sat for your brother, you old philosophical coot!” Nothing makes you question whether the world will ever be the same again like dog-sitting. “Oh great deity, please restore order to the chaos … I have a dog towel with muddy footprints on my kitchen floor!” My brother went out of town this week for his son’s birthday, and his part-dog, part-cow named Ella came over for her regular re-orientation of the Thompson house. It’s not the dog’s fault. Human houseguests at least have some awareness that they are in someone else’s home. They realize they need to TRY to adapt their ways to your ways in order to keep from getting kicked to the curb. A dog has no concept of this — no situational awareness. No clue that there is such a thing as three strikes and then they spend the night in the shed because they kept hopping on the sofa.
Navigating a dis-connected world … for a couple days
“What do we do now … talk to each other?” I don’t know who asked it. We were all in kind of a daze. A blur. Wondering what had happened. How this could be possible. What we would do next. Was the Internet … the WIFI … the cable … even the daggone landline phone (who even has those anymore!?!) really out? And for two days? There had been some kind of outage in the neighborhood cable lines. Trucks were dispatched and crews went to work fixing it. Little ants, all up in the lines. And fix it they did. Only, there was a bigger issue with our line, and no one thought to take care of it right then. We knew this because no matter how many times we poked at our phones, tried to reset the modem or cursed at the remote control, no signals ever screamed from our devices, giving us the rush of data we sorely craved. Funny how we’ve become so used to voice-activated devices that in crisis we ACTUALLY think yelling at them will get answers: “I am NOT going to say it again, ‘WHAT … IS … WRONG … WITH … YOU!?!’ Answer me or I’ll put you under the chickens’ perch again.” Nothing. Silence. The world had gone dark. We sat around on the sofa, trembling. Staring at each other.
The birthday cake bake-off
“So, where you want me to buy your birthday cake?” I asked my wife earlier this month. On such things, I don’t just do whatever I want. I get advice. I’ve learned the hard way. You don’t take risks when it comes to birthday cakes. Countries have fought wars over less. “No, don’t buy it,” she said. “Why don’t you both make a cake.” Make … uh … wait a minute … make a cake?!? Is that even a thing? And if it is, why would you wish such a thing upon us. My daughter and me. And mainly me. Because here’s the thing about me in the kitchen. I like things a certain way. By which I mean, I don’t like when stuff gets everywhere. By which I mean, my daughter tends to get things everywhere. By which I mean, I make a big ‘ole deal about it, freak out because the cocoa powder spilled and start screaming about how she ruined Christmas … and it’s not even Christmas! That’s how crazy baking cakes gets for me. It’s not a good way to start a birthday celebration. “Or, I could just go buy a cake,” I said. “You know, we do need to support the economy and all. Don’t want another recession.”
And down crashed the little kid coffee mug
Maybe I was in a hurry. Maybe I wasn’t careful enough. Or not as careful as I usually am. The soap on my hands made the mug slick. Maybe sometimes accidents just happen and that’s all there is. Anyway, I fumbled it. Felt it slip from my grasp as fingers scrambled to catch it. The “clank” from hitting the porcelain sink in the kitchen was a sickening sound. The handle broke free, and a chip looped through the air for dramatic effect. As if to say, “Look at me! I’m flying!” “Oh no,” I gasped. The coffee mug was dead. Odd really, now that I think about it. I have never held any affinity for mugs. Not like others do. Put a new coffee mug on some people’s desks and you would think they were just given gold. Or a baby animal. They cherish it. Go ga-ga over it. Promise it a college fund.
The dog-owners’ emergency vet conundrum
To vet or not to vet. That is the question you ask when you’re out of town and you have your dog and your dog inexplicably — I don’t even know how this happens! — gets stung by a wasp between her toes. And this prompts an insect-induced stupor that makes you think she is either having a serious allergic reaction or joined the zombie corps. There is no better way to start a family reunion than with a dog injury and a moral conundrum: Do we take her in or not? Because every pet owner knows that if you take your animal to the emergency vet on a weekend, you’ll find out you over-reacted and your wallet is now thinner. But every pet owner also knows that if you don’t, something will be seriously wrong, your dog will die a horrible death and your daughter won’t speak to you until she’s 35. Whew! Talk about pressure. It’s a conundrum. My sister was down from Chicago, and a mass of Thompsons had converged upon my dad’s house on the lake in Tampa. There were dogs. Many, many dogs. And when dogs get together, they do stupid stuff that inevitably injures someone in the most preposterous way. “Dad!” my daughter said. “Something’s wrong with Lily.”
The urgent, critical address book recovery mission
I was dispatched on an urgent, critical mission to check on a woman in the hospital. It was my aunt. She had landed herself there after suffering a mini-stroke at home in Tampa. A mini-stroke is the Good Lord’s way of saying, “Listen, I’ll let you off the hook this time, but maybe slow down on the bacon?” Or at least that’s what the doctor seemed to be implying. I drove down to Tampa to see what I could do for her. She lives alone with two Pomeranians, who would steal the car if no one was keeping tabs on the keys. When I found she was doing well, suffered no permanent damage and was expected to make a full recovery in a matter of weeks, if not days, relief switched to figuring out how to get her affairs in order. So, I was dispatched on an urgent, critical mission to her condo … for her address book. Address book?!?
Family home videos, and that humbling, crazy feeling
I used to think there were few things worse than hearing the sound of my own voice played back to me. That nasally, frenetic, aimless voice that rambles through the bramble like it’s in no hurry to get anywhere. Anyone like hearing the sound of their own voice played back? Nope. But the other day I realized there is something so much worse: Like watching myself on old family videos. Realizing in full color and high definition not only what I sound like — a marauding rock slide — but also what I look like to the real world. And the truth is: I look kind of like a lunatic. My daughter was on the computer watching old movies when she frantically called me in: “Dad, you have GOT to come see this.”
Luxurious, rejuvenating shower power in a water filter
My wife has been talking about the hard water here in Northeast Florida and how bad it is for your skin and hair. Apparently, your hair gets frizzy and falls out, and your skin begins to look like a cross between a Nevada dessert and a molting lizard. All because of various mineral deposits and lime scale and a host of other things that sound totally made up by infomercial “scientists.” But I wouldn’t say that in public because I don’t want to sleep on the sofa. Oops! I’m a dutiful husband, though, and I certainly don’t want to look like a molting lizard or the Nevada dessert, especially after a night of sleeping on the couch. So, when she forwarded me an article about water filters for showers that take out bad stuff and help to rejuvenate your body and hair, I did some research, feigned interest and actually bought one. “I ordered the shower filter,” I told her. “Oh goodie!” she said clapping like a seal. “Did you get the one with the Vitamin C infused ceramic beads and the micro luffa sponges and the seaweed extract that turns chlorine into butterscotch candy?”
Reflections on a family Fourth of July cookout
Sometimes deadlines are not the friends of writers. They fall at inopportune times. Before events actually happen, leaving the writer to hypothesize, to conjecturize, to see the future and try to tell what happens before it actually does. And that’s what I’m doing this week. Because I desperately want to write about my family’s Fourth of July cookout. But it happened after my column was due. Only … I just can’t wait! I know how it will go. I know how it will turn out. And I think it went something like … The Fourth of July cookout at my mother’s house. Actually, it’s not a cookout. My wife for years has been saying we should make it a REAL cookout. Make it easy and just grill. My mother does have a grill. Only, it’s NOT for grilling. She uses it for wheeling the cats in their baskets to the car when she has to take them to the vet. Every word of that is the God’s honest truth. She wheels her cats to the car in a grill! You can spend all the time you want trying to make sense of that, but good luck. It will never add up. Every Fourth of July we go over to my mother’s. It’s just blocks from the fireworks. We take a bunch of food that we cook on our own. It’s the kind of food that will clog your arteries and make you the weight of a granite boulder. The kind […]