Last Monday Joseph’s tooth was hurting so, I think he was practically living on Tylenol, and nothing else. I got an appointment for Tuesday morning, and the dentist repacked his tooth with the old kind of medicine; the new kind he’d used the previous week was making his tooth hurt. It was better already, by the time he got home.
There is now a six-week-old baby at the daycare where Dorcas works--and the poor thing is left there all day long. Some people take their children there at 4:00 a.m., and don’t come back to get them until 4:00 p.m. I think that’s awful, the way people dump their kids for so long, and go off on their jolly way. Yes, I realize that there are some who must work; but a good many of them work because they want the things money can buy more than they want to “train up their child in the way that he should go”. And there are even a few who actually say they work because they “want time to themselves, and can’t stand to be home with the kids all day”! They shouldn’t have bothered having children in the first place.
Okay, I’m done ranting and raving about that.
For now.
But just wait till next time!
One evening Caleb industriously wound every music box in the bookcase, then, as the cacophony played on, he observed, “Boy! Those don’t sound like they go together very well!”
And they didn’t.
Thursday I started cleaning the basement. Did you know it’s a big job to sort out and put in order the accumulation of 22 years of marriage and nine children?
I tell the family, “We have entirely too much stuff, and most of it is nothing but junk. I’m going to throw everything out!”
But I start picking things up, pursuant to sticking it in a garbage bag, and I realize, “This isn’t junk after all.”
There are Fisher Price toys that cannot be replaced, because they are no longer being made. There are clothes I’ve sewn that are still in excellent shape, and the younger children will be wearing them soon. There are old favorite toys that delight the children when I find them. There are keepsakes and mementos… So, instead of throwing everything out, I am once again meticulously sorting and arranging--and that takes a long time.
The mice are panic-stricken.
Thursday evening we went to Wal-Mart for a couple of small fans--and a Cozy Cruiser Bike Trailer/Jogger for Victoria. (Yes, that is indeed what it’s called.) It’s a carriage one can pull behind one’s bike hauling one or two children, up to 100 pounds together; or the handle can be used to push it. The swiveling front tire lifts and folds back underneath when it is used as a carriage. Netting zips down in the front, and a plastic covering can also be zipped over the top for protection against rain and puddles. Victoria and I will be traveling in style!
There is a little compartment behind the seat “--for groceries, and such,” said Larry. “--for toys and stuff,” explained Caleb. But that’s not at all what I was thinking of. Can you guess what *I* will haul back there?? Yep; my camera.
The directions for putting the carriage together consist entirely of pictures and nothing else. Larry, upon our arrival back home, seated himself in his recliner and began looking at them. But that’s the wrong chair for him to sit in, if he expects to stay sentient for any length of time. The ‘destructions’, as Caleb used to call them, were soon reposing calmly on his lap, while Larry rested restfully. But he eventually woke up, aired up the tires…opened up the instructions again--and fell asleep over them again. He roused himself just enough to say that as soon as he’d finished watching the video that was playing--a documentary on the White House--he would put the carriage together. He did not explain how he would know when he was done ‘watching’ it.
But eventually Victoria made enough noise playing ‘house’ beside him that he actually awoke and got the vehicle put together--all but four pieces, including cute little red hubcaps and a couple of unidentifiable purple objects that look remarkably like foot pegs. He fell asleep before he got those last four pieces fastened on. But the vehicle (minus those four pieces) was finished in time for Victoria to sit in it for a few minutes before bedtime. She sat there and giggled, silly little girl, until I said ”bedtime”. And then she went off to bed, still giggling, and asking what time the next day we should plan for a ride.
That night, after everyone had gone to bed, I suddenly heard a cat snarl and growl, and then cry out as if it had gotten hurt. It was Socks, I just knew it was. Somehow he’d gotten out again, probably through a window that had not yet had its screen replaced. I was barefoot, and it was cold and wet outside. But Larry still had his boots on, and he happened to be halfway awake right then…
“Larry!” I cried, “that horrible yellow neighbor cat is attacking Socks! Quick, go get him before he gets hurt!”
Larry looked at me. “How do you know it’s Socks?” he asked calmly, just as a cat shrieked.
“It is, it IS!!” I exclaimed. “Hurry!!”
He got to his feet and sauntered down the hallway. I heard another scream.
“HURRY!” I yelled.
Larry peered out the front door. “I don’t see anything,” he remarked.
“Of COURSE not!!” I said, “They’re on the other side of the house!! GO!!!”
He went. Not quickly, but he went.
He got to the back of the house in time to see the yellow cat leap high into the air and come down, talons fully extended, on top of Socks. They rolled, the kitten squalling. Larry called him, and he started coming toward Larry, and then that horrible Ol’ Yeller jumped him again, hitting him right in the face with his rear claws. Socks shrieked, and the cat rolled over with him, biting and clawing at him.
Then, finally, Ol’ Yeller saw Larry coming--and by now, Larry was running, and he released Socks and ran away. Socks came to Larry, who picked him up gently and cuddled him close. By the time Larry came back in the front door, the kitten was purring loudly.
He had a cut on his eyelid, and a small cut on his nose, but he looked to be in pretty good health for such an awful-sounding cat fight.
But by the time a couple of hours had passed, it was swollen all around his eye, and the eyelid was discolored. In the morning it looked worse than ever, but it seemed to be improving as the day wore on. I knew he could see out of it just fine, thankfully.
Friday I took Victoria for a ride in her carriage for the first time. Joseph, the brat, beat me to it, though; I was just finishing curling my hair when I realized Victoria was not thundering excitedly up and down the hall in her tennis shoes any longer--and her delighted laughter that I was hearing was coming in through the screen in the front door! I went to the door and looked out, and, sure enough: there was Joseph, peeling pell-mell down the street--on MY bike, with Victoria, in her little carriage, in tow.
Ah, well…he was nice enough to hitch it up for me, and bring around to the front of the house…
It’s bright purple, red, and yellow. It’s cute, and nifty, and handy; and doesn’t throw me off balance at all when I ride. Lots better than those old bike seats for children that you attach to your bike…and then you put a kid in it who weighs a good third of your own weight…and you go pedaling down the road…all is right in the world…it's turning nicely on its axis… But suddenly!!!----The kiddo decides to hunt for earthworms. He flips his head around, leans over, and stares at the ground...or maybe he decides to make like a dodo bird and see where he's been--and he has to see fast.
Guess what happens?
No, no; I don’t fall over; I've never once fallen over with a baby in the carrier.
But I sure enough do look like a drunken sailor!
In between the church and my parents' house--right across the street from us--there used to be a small hollow. I called it “The Valley”, and my friends and I, when we were very young, played all sorts of games there. When it rained, water accumulated in it. In the winter, it froze into a small pond. Well, I thought perhaps I should try my bike out on it, just to see how slippery it was, you know.
I got a good distance away, and rode at it with all my might and main. When I got right smack-dab in the middle of the ice, I slammed on my brakes and cranked the handlebars far to one side.
Have you ever felt exactly like a top?
Well, *I* have.
First I spun madly while still on two wheels--and then I capsized, and went on spinning like that.
When I finally quit spinning, guess what I did?
I tried it again.
Just to see if the same thing would happen all over again, you know. Yep. The same thing happened all over again. Deja vu, all over again.
Just a minute; Kitty is knocking at the back door; I must go let her in…
…Okay, I’m back.
It really does sound like she knocks on the door... We couldn't figure out how she did that, until, finally, someone saw her: she stuck her claws into the rubber around the door frame, pulled it quickly as far away from the door as she could, let it loose, and grabbed it again. Over and over.
WHAP! WHAP! WHAP! She waits a few seconds, and then WHAP! WHAP!! WHAP!!!--she does it again. And she keeps it up until somebody lets her in. But no matter what part of the house we are in, as soon as we get up and start toward the back door, the ‘knocking’ stops. Kitty can hear us coming!
The next couple of days I spent cleaning the basement. Trouble is, I get lost in the underground tunnels and labyrinths, and wind up in some country where they speak a different language. I expect to be done with the basement cleaning by May--in the year 2083.
At the moment, there is neither hide nor hair to be seen of the littles upstairs here, because they are all having a jolly good time in the little kitchen under the stairs. That was the first thing I cleaned, just so they could play in it. In this ‘little kitchen’, there are a refrigerator, a stove, a cupboard, and a sink--and they are all exactly the right size for Victoria, and for Caleb, too. He’s been having as much fun down there as Victoria, I think, especially because Hester and Lydia took them crackers and cheese and apples and Corn Chex.
I sure hope they don’t take any honey down there when I’m not looking, and get all stuck to the walls or the underside of the staircase, and I'll never be able to get them out again, without a power washer or something.
Larry thinks he knows where the water is coming from that flooded the little girls’ room: there must be a crack around the chimney somewhere. So when it rains, water leaks into the chimney and goes down the ash pit--and the ash pit ends in the little girls’ room. All around the ash pit door are telltale signs of water leaking in. Or pouring in, as the case may be.
My brother, who first lived in this house, had the ash pit built so that it went down into the basement in order that more ashes could be collected before the pit would need to be emptied. But we have installed a door on the outside of the chimney, so that we needn’t lug ashes out through a basement bedroom, coating carpet, furniture, curtains, and all with the fine gray powder.
One time after we first moved in, Larry filled a little trailer with ashes...and then he and a friend went driving off to find a good place to dump it. But--the trailer was not covered.
They went driving out on Highway 81, heading for the canal, where there was a place they could unload near a big field. They passed a man on a motorcycle...Larry looked in his rear-view mirror to see if he could pull back in--and lo and behold, there were ashes flying all over the place, laying a fog screen behind them. The guy on the motorcycle had one arm over his face, and was driving with only one hand on the handlebars.
Good grief! The poor guy couldn’t see where he was going!
Larry took the first road off the highway, and got away fast, before the men with the white stripes down their navy trouser legs came after him. Or before the motorcyclist landed in the ditch.
Saturday afternoon I went out to take pictures of my flowers, and wound up spending forty-five minutes clearing leaves out my flower bed, pulling weeds, cutting down several volunteer trees, hauling the logs to the mill, reducing them to pulp (I am very good at reducing things to pulp), and reconstituting them into paper. I sent Caleb in to ask Teddy if he could come carry away the logs I was cutting up.
Soon Teddy came out, looked around, picked up a small twig with both hands, and holding it up against him with both hands as a person would do with a very heavy log, he staggered off toward the back yard while Caleb giggled appreciatively.
He did bring back the wheelbarrow and fill it for me; but then he had to get ready for practice; he was going to be singing with a boys’ group. So Larry hauled the mess I’d made off to the alley, where who knows how long it will stay before somebody decides it might be okay to haul it to the dump.
Later that evening, Larry cut around the furniture in the girls’ room and took out the wet carpet; he said that come Monday, he would move the furniture and get the rest of the carpet out. I said he wouldn’t get the job done if he didn’t finish right then. He said he would, too; and I said he wouldn’t either, any such thing.
Guess who was right?
No, I’m not going to tell you; I said guess.
You should see us in church--Larry and I-- trying to share the hymnbook
. He wants it right at the tip of his nose, and I want it out as far as I can reach. So we fuss and stew over it, jerking and tugging and whopping each other over the head with it, biffing and banging and yelling and hollering... It’s how the icky new Contemporary ‘Christian’ music got its beat.
. He wants it right at the tip of his nose, and I want it out as far as I can reach. So we fuss and stew over it, jerking and tugging and whopping each other over the head with it, biffing and banging and yelling and hollering... It’s how the icky new Contemporary ‘Christian’ music got its beat. I never exaggerate.
There was a tornado in the little town of Hoisington, Kansas, Saturday night. One person was killed, and 26 were hurt, three critically. Sirens didn’t go off at all until after the tornado had already hit. One man said he and his family had been watching weather reports on TV, where they were telling of a few tornado watches, when all of a sudden he heard a roaring noise.
He said, and I quote, “That don’t sound great! Git fer the basement!”
So they gat fer the basement, arriving only seconds before the tornado hit.
Their house was not damaged too badly; but it sat in the middle of a whole lot of others that were totally destroyed. The roof was taken right off the hospital, and all the patients had to be transferred to another hospital in a nearby town.
I have always thought storms were rather exciting…but I sure don’t wish for anybody‘s houses to be demolished, or for people to be hurt. If a tornado ever strikes our house, I hope everybody tracks down all the pages of my 100+ albums, and brings back all my pictures. Imagine losing all those pictures. The newspaper told of the woman whose husband had been killed sobbing and saying that she’d lost everything--even all her pictures. The man had not accompanied his wife to their basement, although she tried to coax him to, because, he said, “They will blow the sirens if there’s anything to worry about.”
Robert studies every day without fail, from the time school starts in the morning. He brings his two oldest daughters, who are in first grade and kindergarten, and he attends chapel (taught by my sister), and then studies till noon, when he takes his little girls home for lunch. He usually hauls along several of their small cousins, dropping them off at their respective homes along the way; and then a little before 1:00 he is back again, the children in tow; and he studies until school gets out at 3:30. After that, he returns phone calls and visits a few people, and does a bit of studying at home. He is certainly no slacker!
And that’s just one more way he reminds me of my father.
Joseph has now discovered what those two purple unidentifiable leftover carriage pieces are, from when his father was putting it together and fell asleep before he was quite done (and when he awoke, the destructions had taken themselves elsewhere, along with his remembery about where those pieces went). They are the brakes!!! Just a small article of importance, you know; nothing vital. The brakes! Furthermore, there is something missing, and Joseph cannot put them on for me. I shall just have to tell Victoria to drag her heels, I guess.
Well, it's 11:28 p.m. JDT--Jackson DaylightSavings Time--and we are waiting for news from the David City Hospital. That means it’s 11:18 p.m. CDT; we set our clocks ten minutes fast so we won't be late for any important dates. Further, in that way we keep our math skills up, because every time we look at the clock, we automatically and without conscious thought subtract ten minutes.
There was once a time when Larry decided he didn't like the clocks that way, so he set them all for the RIGHT time. Unfortunately, he neglected to tell any of the rest of us.
I needed my sister's rolling pin. (Not for use on the clocks, either.) The one I got her, long, long ago. The one that has the words “Husband Tamer” printed on the side of it.
Last night I was putting on some Absorbine, and Larry offered to use the blowdryer on it. Do you know what that would feel like? It would feel like you were being parboiled, that’s what it would feel like.
I scowled at him and gave him a shove, even though he doesn’t shove easily, and I usually wind up pushing myself backwards.
He laughed at me. “Well, I put Grizzly Grease on my boots, and you’re supposed to heat it with a blowdryer so that it soaks in good; so I thought--“ He shrugged up one shoulder and grinned. “Just being helpful!”
I pulled his ear.
And now, I shall sign off, leaving you to wonder, right along with us, just exactly when the news will arrive from David City.
P.S.: Okay, since I didn’t get my letter printed before the news came, I decided I just couldn’t bear to leave you in suspense till next week:
It’s a Boy!!!!
Bobby and Hannah are now the parents of a new baby boy!!!! (as opposed to an OLD baby boy)
His name is Aaron Samuel Wright, and he weighed 9 lbs. 10 oz. He is 21 ½ inches long. He was born at 4:43 a.m., April 24th.
What all that means is:
I AM A GRANDMA!!! And, of course, Larry is a GRANDPA. You must now treat us with the respect due such distinguished positions.
All are okay (even Bobby); and, at Bobby's latest report, "The baby is loud!" And he has a head full of dark hair.
* * *
We have just returned from visiting the David City hospital, and I want to tell you this very important bit of data:
I have now held my very first grandchild, and I hereby declare him to be exactly what I ordered:
Perfect!
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