Have you ever heard the song, Gladly, the Cross-Eyed Bear?
No?
Well, then you haven’t listened to Victoria singing Gladly, the Cross I’d Bear, have you?
Monday evening we went to see Keith and Esther’s new kittens. There are two striped ones, a black one like Tippy, and a gray and white one. When we came in, Tippy leaped from her box and raced toward us, hissing and snarling. But we stayed back and everybody kept quiet, and before long she calmed down and climbed back into her box to feed her babies. Soon she was purring, paws going in and out, in and out.
Monday, my new CD writer arrived. So the next day, Teddy decided to install my new hard drive and the CD writer for me--and totally demolished my computer, or so I thought. It wouldn’t even boot up.
I came back into the living room and found Teddy staring perplexed at a black screen that read “Cannot find device with which to run programming”, or something on that order.
I said, “I think you forgot a major plug-in, that’s all.”
He assured me (probably feeling a wee bit scornful over his mother’s stupidity) that he had indeed plugged everything in properly. After several more failed attempts at starting the computer, he informed me that it was 10:30, and he had to go to bed, because he had to get up early. (That’s a real aberration for him; he usually stays up diddling around with this and that until his mother threatens to box his ears if he doesn’t go to bed right now.) (I would have to stand on my tiptoes to do it, but I’d do it.) (So he grins at me, bids me a fond goodnight, and makes his way down the stairs, dragging a string or something behind him in order to make the cats chase him down the steps.)
At the noise of my continuous howling, Larry finally extricated himself from his recliner and stumbled his way to my desk to see what could possibly be the troubles. He nodded over the instructions for a while, pulled drives out and put them back in, restarted the computer half a dozen times, -- and came up with the same black screen with ominous information on it that Teddy had gotten.
“I think a cord isn’t plugged into the right thing,” I said.
“They’re all plugged in,” he said.
“But perhaps not into the right thing,” I insisted.
He made a few unintelligible growly noises and went back to sleeping over the instructions. And I began using Dorcas’ computer.
I was sure *I* hadn’t the faintest notion what to do with the poor thing, other than to put it out of its misery. (Speaking of the computer, you know.) (I think.) ;~)
Two hours later, during a fit of momentary wakefulness, he discovered that the main cord--that wide, flat, seatbeltish-looking thing--was not plugged into the main hard drive: rather, it was wadded and rumpled underneath the tower.
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA
hee hee hee hee hee hee hee
HAHAHAHAHAHA
(I thought it was funny)
(Can openers work better when you plug them in, too.)
“Now,” I said happily, “as soon as the hard drive is running, I will have 30 MGs!!!” (It was really GBs, but I didn't know that, then.)
“Yes, well,” he cleared his throat nervously and looked longingly in the direction of his recliner, “I’m too tired to do it now; I have to shower and go to bed, because I have to get up early.”
Déjà vu, all over again.
“That’s okay,” I assured him; “I can do it myself.”
After all--I was nearly positive he could not. But by the same token, I was not at all sure I could.
But the next day…yes, I DID it! All by myself, I DID IT!!!
Well... uh... that is... with the telephone tucked against my ear, I did it.
But I did do it.
They send no instructions--so, of course, you have to go to the computer shop and keep the repairman in business, they hope. They don’t even tell you what brand of gizmo it is, or its serial number, or anything, the horrible rip-off agents. I called Connecting Point, and, wonder of wonders, the computer technician who answered the phone led me at an extraordinarily fast clip through the installation steps. I used MS-DOS Prompt and typed in all sorts of hieroglyphics… and before I knew it, whiz bing blooey--my hard drive was up and running, and there I was then, with 20 more MGs!!! (Only they were GBs.)
Do not ask me how to do it; I do not know.
I promptly saved several folders full of information onto it, just to prove I could. You can give your hard drives labels... soooo... I entitled mine, “InLikeFlynn.”
I installed the CD writer, too; it is now ready to use. I shall not again be caught with a crashed computer and no backup files!
Victoria is a few feet behind me as I type, pounding away with hammers and wedges and blocks; and plying screwdrivers, nails, and pliers. She’s singing I Am Marching Up To Zion as she pounds right in time to the beat. She gives Caleb’s tool set more use than she gives her dolls, I think. But then, sometimes, both Caleb and Victoria play house...and Caleb, being the ‘Daddy’, is not adverse to feeding and caring for the doll. I’m raisin’ ’em all normal in every way, I sho’ ’nuff am.
One afternoon, a little girl named Bailey who attends the daycare where Dorcas works told Dorcas, “My ear hurts because I can’t go outside.”
Dorcas decided it was high time to buy herself a little notebook in which to write all the funny things she hears the children say throughout the day--and they say plenty, you can be sure.
That evening, we had chicken noodle soup for supper, using those yummy frozen noodles that taste like homemade noodles. Mmmm!
We were in a severe thunderstorm watch that night. For a while there was only lightning some distance away.
Victoria, looking out the front door at the sky, said quietly, “If it starts to thunder, we’re all done for.”
“But sometimes there are tornadoes,” she told me seriously.
“Yes,” I concurred, “So we should be glad we have a basement!”
Soon a gentle rain was falling.
“Where’s my umbrella?” I said, not really meaning it…but I do like to walk in the rain. Barefoot. Uh, that is, so long as the worms aren’t out.
I barely got the words out of my mouth before SWOOOSH!!!--an open umbrella was in my hand, courtesy of Helpful Hester. Not exactly the same persona as Helpful Hattie, but close.
By a quarter till four in the morning, it was pouring.
OH! Guess what came in the mail Monday!!! Eligibility confirmation from Medicaid! Yes, they are going to pay Teddy’s bills! I promptly called all three hospitals, the two therapists, and three doctors, to tell them to redirect their bills to Medicaid. Now there’s something I don’t like to do…but it’s better than getting angry, overdue bills from them once a month. Well, actually, they haven’t been angry, because they assumed our insurance was going to cover it, and they know insurance companies can be dreadfully slow.
I’m ever so relieved!
I think, with part of our tax refund, I will get myself a pair of glasses. Good grief, in order to do the bookwork nowadays, I have to sit on my knees on a kitchen chair--even with those $10.00 Slim-of-the-comic-Gasoline-Alley specs--in order to be far enough away from the ledger to see what I’m doing. If I wait much longer, I’ll have to stand on the chair, and then I’ll have to invest in arm extensions, which may or may not cost as much as glasses, anyway.
My mother-in-law is funny... she ponders and studies over new babies, trying to determine whom he looks like: he has Henry’s left ear, Myrtle’s right ear, Herman’s nose, Ralph’s chin, Dagmar’s mouth, and Imogene’s hands. And he’s going to be tall like Woodrow. Or short like Chalmers.
She was going through this routine at the hospital, and I laughed at her and said, “Norma! If none of us had seen this adorable little baby, and were just listening to your description, our imaginations would be drawing the funniest picture, with all those people’s odd parts mixed together.”
Of course she laughed…and then Lawrence, being no blood relation, said, “Well, I think he looks like me.”
Esther then promptly declared that she thought the baby looked like her.
Last week I hauled so many heavy bags and boxes up the stairs, I couldn’t even reach behind me to scratch my back properly the first couple days of this week. Instead, I had to scratch on doorjambs and fence posts and such like.
MoooooooOOOOOOOOoooooo.
But just you wait: I’ll soon be so tough, I’ll be tossing 100-lb. bags over each shoulder and springing up the steps in two bounding leaps. Nobody had better mess with me!!!
I took a bunch of clothes and stuff to the Goodwill late one night, including three mice, five stuffed rabbits, and a large growly bear. Well, actually, I kept the large growly bear; I brought him back home with me. And then he took a shower and went to bed.
That one was the husband. He was growly because he had not wished to come with me, but I coerced him into it.
The truth is, I really DID take a giant bear to the Goodwill. This one was the stuffed one.
It was that gigantic bear Janice made for one of the little boys for Christmas…I can never remember if it was for Teddy or Joseph. I do remember, however, that after we got it (at Mama and Daddy’s house), it was sitting in their big blond rocker, and Joseph, just one and a half, took it by the front paws and pulled it to him, intending to hold it. He didn’t reckon on its great weight, however, and as soon as he got it to the edge of the chair, he could no longer hold it up. He lost his balance and sat down quite suddenly, and the bear likewise sat down quite suddenly on top of him.
I rescued him while everyone laughed. I put the bear back into the chair.
But Joseph was not one to give up easily. It was not five minutes before he decided to hold that bear again. Once again, the bear took him down and sat on him. I again helped him up to the tune of everyone’s laughter. Joseph shook his head.
“Doo beeeg,” he said, backing up and staring at the big bruin in newfound respect.
He did not again try to hold the bear; but later, after we went home, I put the bear on the couch. A short time later, I heard Joseph giggling, and then Teddy’s giggles added to it…and I decided I had better investigate. I peeked around the corner of the living room and found--Joseph on the couch, high atop the bear. He turned around and peered down into the bear’s face.
“Me sit YOU!!!” he informed the bear triumphantly, and Teddy went into peels of laughter.
I think I already told you that story once...and I think I also told you about the time I tried to wash it in the tub. After it was totally waterlogged, I tried to pick it up--and I very nearly wound up headfirst in the tub with it. Drenched grizzlies are no featherweights, let me tell you.
Anyway, I’ll betcha the Goodwill employees got a strange start when they arrived for work in the morning and found a humungous stuffed bear dangling from their back doorknob.
Thursday, the frozen food came from the company with whom we had conducted a fund-raiser. They said we raised more than most schools that have 500 students--$7,759!!
For being the second-highest seller in the school, Caleb won a book about airplanes: A Look Inside: Cross-Sections of Planes.
The school will receive approximately $2,500 in cash from the sale of the products. They have purchased two computers for use in the Accounting classes with part of the proceeds.
Caleb and Victoria sat right down to look at Caleb’s new book.
“Here’s a Japanese plane,” said Caleb informatively.
“OH!” said Victoria, “Remember, those are the ones that got bombed!”
“Yes,” affirmed Caleb, “some of our planes shot them down.”
Victoria nodded solemnly. “That’s because they were the wicked ones!” she told him.
Friday I received a big box from a friend--a ‘grandmother’s toy’--for baby Aaron to play with when he comes here. It’s a Fisher Price “Kick and Learn Piano” that has five big piano keys on it, lights, etc., and it plays several different songs, does animal sounds and numbers, or you can play your own song.
Victoria had a marvelous time with it…she played with it from the time I opened it--about 2:00 p.m.--until 3:30, when the kids came home from school.
“Look what we got!” Victoria exclaimed excitedly to the first person in the door, who happened to be her next elder brother.
Caleb reached out to push a button, and Victoria gasped worriedly, “Oh! Don’t wear it out! It’s for baby Aaron!”
A few minutes ago, I heard ‘someone’ in the kitchen. “Bring me some coffee, please?” I requested.
No one answered.
“Is someone in the kitchen?” I called.
No answer.
But I could hear someone in there. I called louder, “Who’s in the kitchen??”
Caleb trotted into the kitchen to find out. “It’s Socks,” he called back, “but I don’t think he can answer you!”
The last day of school for the grade school children is Friday, May 18th. Dismissal for the Jr./Sr. High School is Tuesday, May 22nd. Graduates will receive their diplomas after a service on Friday, May 18th, and there will be a lunch served in the basement of the church afterwards.
Larry didn’t work for David the last couple of days of the week, on account of rain. He instead worked on a pickup, left over from Columbus Auto Sale days, at our friend's auto shop. The pickup belongs to Lincoln Auto of Denver, and we are obligated to finish it for them.
One day I was looking for Joseph…”Where is he?” I queried, peering down the stairs at his room, to see if his light was on.
“He’s out in the garage,” Caleb informed me, “changing the gas in his car!” (He meant ‘oil’.)
Once again, we went to the Second-Hand DropBox (not the Goodwill; I was afraid that, after the previous night’s donations, they’d have guards posted to nab us if we returned to the scene of the crime) with several bags full of Jetsam and Flotsam, A-One First-Class Top-Rate Junk and Stuff. I even donated my old Singer sewing machine, which I may regret doing, about the time my Bernina sputters to a standstill.
Joseph and Larry have traded vehicles: now Joseph drives the Isuzu (the little charcoal-gray car that used to be Dorcas’), and Larry drives the Bronco. Friday evening Joseph and Larry put a new front fender on the Isuzu, something that has needed to be done ever since the car was purchased. It sure looks nice! It’s a pretty little car, and it’s all fixed up; Joseph is pleased. It suits him.
The Bronco is another story...it’s in sad repair, and there is no easy (or cheap) fix. Larry is looking at an SUV of some sort in Madison...and if *I* know anything about anything, that means he’ll soon be coming home with it.
Teddy is almost ready to repaint his pickup...he’s got all the body work done. Let’s hope he keeps it out of the ditch, this go-around! (Poor kid.) (It was those nutty girls’ fault, you know.)
It rained without letup for days, and there seemed to be no end in sight. The boxes out by the alley are not a pretty sight. The garbage men, when they come tomorrow, are gonna want to compact us, they sho’ ‘nuff are.
Larry plans to work on Hester and Lydia’s poor bedraggled room each evening, but the recliner invariably gets a grip on him and refuses to relinquish its hold. Long hours of construction work don’t leave much energy for anything else, I’m afraid.
Friday night, the dishwasher bit the dust; it refused to spray water. The wash machine is about to give up the ghost, and, to add insult to injury, my CD player is on its last leg. Why are household appliances set to expire concurrently, regardless of date of purchase? Even the refrigerator is threatening to loosen its moorings--and the interior shelving is succumbing to gravity.
Ah, well... Let the paper plate industry increase its holdings!
Imagine this: Saturday, in spite of other predictions, the sun came out! Amazing. I thought it had gone on permanent hiatus.
Dorcas, Hester, Caleb, Victoria, and I got ready to go to Fremont to shop for summer clothes for Dorcas. The children were finishing their lunch, and I was collecting my camera case, putting more film into it…
Meanwhile, Larry and Teddy hauled the old organ out and took it to the Salvation Army.
I helped Victoria on with her shoes--shoes that we’d gotten last summer that had been too big for her until now.
“Just because I’m four years old, that means that these fit me!” she explained happily. And further, “These are tennis shoes--and that’s so that when we go to play tennis, I can play, too!”
(Of course, she always did play, whether she had sneakers on, or sandals on, or whatever she had on.)
Caleb found a garter snake in the back yard, and Joseph obligingly put it in a bucket so he could bring it into the house to show me. Teddy then pulled it from the bucket and dangled it tantalizingly above Kitty’s head, and she made ready to spring at it, till I ordered him to stop it, put the poor thing back in the bucket, and get it back outside where it can do its duty: catching bugs and mice.
“Well,” he said dubiously, holding the snake out and giving it a sizing-up look, “I don’t think this little feller is going to be eating mice any time soon.”
“Okay, then,” I said, “go to Earl May’s and get a few pythons. They’ll get rid of the mice for us.”
“Yeah!” said Teddy in glee, pulling at Caleb’s ear. “And the pesky little brothers, too!”
“HEY!” said Caleb, giggling.
The grass got itself mowed that afternoon. In the beginning, it was a mass of yellow blooms. Yeah, zee lions, zay were dandy. They really need a huge dose of weed killer, but thunderstorms were predicted for that night and the next day, so we knew better than to waste the expensive stuff until we are guaranteed a couple of sunny days.
Larry said, “If we take the heads off the top, the lawn will look better,” and look better it does, although I am quite certain that that line of attack merely causes the roots to grow bigger, thicker, tougher, deeper, and meaner. They will doubtless soon regroup and come back with reinforcements, having the ability to devour children, small animals, and the implement that beheaded them alike. Eñ guärdé!
So goes a Saturday afternoon at the Jackson Domicile.
The teenage boys of our church have been responsible for the care of the lawns around the church, and my parents’ house, too, ever since I can remember. There is always an adult or two in charge.
When I was little, I looked forward to Thursdays, because that was the day the young people converged on church and lawn--girls cleaned the sanctuary, nursery, office, etc.; boys cleaned the basement and did the outside work. I was sure to be found in one place or the other (although I wasn’t really ‘old’ enough), helping whomever looked to be needing help the most--or whomever seemed the friendliest…or even whomever could be counted on to stay after the work was done and give me a game of Frisbee…or badminton…or catch with a baseball…or a bike ride.
And now and then I could be caught crawling through a doorway under cover of a pew, unplugging a vacuum…tying a lawn mower to a tree with my combination lock…or whatever entered my mischievous head at the moment. I tried to be helpful enough that the young people, whom I dearly loved, would think my shenanigans were funny, rather than bothersome. (I do not know if I got the job accomplished or not.)
Well, one time one of the young men left an idling mower in our back yard and went off to get himself a drink before he started. He got sidetracked somewhere... and I, about age seven and no more than forty-five pounds, suddenly decided to mow the lawn. It looked like such fun, you see.
It was rather difficult for me to get the thing rolling, but determination can conquer all sorts of odds. I knew I had to hurry, because the boy would be coming back shortly, and would be quite aghast to discover the pastor’s small daughter doing his job. So I went at the fastest clip I could muster. The corners were certainly complicated and thorny, but I got ’er accomplished, I did. After rushing down the last row of grass, I hastily put the mower back in the exact location the boy had left it, and retreated to the back porch with another boy’s broom.
And none too soon, either--I’d no sooner started sweeping the top step than the mowing boy came trotting back around the corner. He started off across the lawn, heading for his mower--and then stopped short and looked around him. He frowned, and walked slowly to the mower, looking down at the grass as he went. He reached out and felt the bag--and it was full. He straightened and glanced around the corner of the house.
Another boy was just finishing the church’s side lawn; there was no way he could have done it. And he knew the third boy was on the north side of the church sweeping and edging the walk…
He lifted his head and gave me a measuring look.
I smiled at him--I had to, because I was about to laugh, and the best way to keep from exploding in such circumstances is to smile. A nice big smile, to sort of release the pressure, you know, much like a valve on a pressure cooker does.
He shook his head, bewildered. Had he already mowed, and forgotten? Then, “Sarah Lynn?” he queried. “Do you know anything about this grass getting cut?”
I raised an eyebrow. “What about it?” I said.
He gave me a long look. “Did you do it?” he finally asked.
I assumed my best innocent look. “Do I look like I’m big enough to do a thing like that?”
He grinned at me. “No, you don’t. But then, you don’t look big enough to do a lot of the things you do!” He laughed. “You did do it, didn’t you?”
I grinned back at him. “Yes.”
“Well...” he laughed again. “Thanks!” And then you know what he did? He took me to the Dairy Queen and bought me the tallest ice cream cone I’d ever had in my life! He was my favorite “big boy” for a while, after that.
Meanwhile, the several members of Jackson, Inc., were finally ready to depart. The route to Fremont takes us past several feed yards, a meat-packing company, and a rendering service. The lilacs are all in bloom, and there are a lot of them…but they can’t hold a candle to them there country smells, uh-uh, nosiree.
Well, Dorcas and I were talking, and we heard Caleb say, “Ewww! Peeee-EEWWW!”--and then Victoria dissolved into gales of mirth. She laughed so hard she could hardly catch a breath.
I looked into my rear-view mirror to see what in the world was so all-fired funny about a stench like that--and there was Caleb with his bear, putting both its paws over its nose, making dreadful faces and saying, “Ewww! Peewwwieee…yuck, gag, aauugghh, bleah, poooeey!” Finally the bear buried its entire head with all four paws, while Caleb said in his best growly-bear voice, “I can’t bear it!” -- and Victoria screeched with laughter. Even Hester got her nose out of her book long enough to join in the merriment.
As we drove along, Dorcas periodically rolled the window down and took a picture, for the sunlight was falling on the cornfields and ponds and neat farm places at just the right angle to make for good picture-taking. The littles in the back seat giggled when the wind rushed in and blew their hair and belongings around. I cautioned them to hang onto things, so they didn’t blow out the window…and I thought of a time one of my prize possessions escaped the car I was riding in, when I was perhaps four or five years old:
Remember the little circular thingamajiggers Howard Johnson's used to give to children, where the smaller top circle could spin atop the larger bottom circle by way of a brad, and there were windows in the top circle, so that you could line up data, and find out such things as the capitals of the states, or make a perpetual calendar, and such like?
Well, I got one once... and I thought it was the neatest thing this side of sourdough muffins... But a couple of hours later, as we were traveling along, it blew out the window. I howled.
And then my father did something he rarely did: he made an illegal U-turn in the middle of the Interstate, drove back, made another U-turn, parked on the shoulder, climbed out, and got my circle whateveryoucallit for me.
I thought my Daddy was the best Daddy in the whole, wide world.
Dorcas found many very pretty vests--and they were all half price, $.99 each. She also got blouses and skirts, and a pair of shoes. Hester got a vest with bears woven into the design, a sweater to go under it, and a skirt to match. She got a pile of the old Nancy Drew books, too. Caleb and Victoria also got some books, and for Victoria I got a dress and a cute navy and white windbreaker, something she’s been needing rather badly. I got Lydia a skirt.
Lydia didn’t come; she stayed home with Teddy and Joseph. Larry was home periodically, too; he fixed the dishwasher. I am quite certain Lydia has Fifth Disease again. She has all the hallmarks: fever, swollen glands--particularly on the back of her head and neck--, sore throat, and achiness.
It was sunny and nice the entire afternoon--a real change…but you should have seen all the water in the ditches and fields, all the way along Route 30.
On the way home, we stopped at Willow Woods, a small housing development near North Bend, where there are several small lakes. There was a killdeer nesting in the stones along the banks, and she ran a little ways from her nest and went into her 'injured wing' routine. I took lots of pictures of her; I was able to get better pictures than ever before of a killdeer. I backed away and sat bolt still, and soon she came back and settled into her nest.
I never could find the nest before she came back again, although I looked high and low for it. The eggs can blend in with the stones so well, I was afraid I was going to step on them, so I didn't walk around much in that area. And after she came back, I didn't want to scare her away again, of course.
While I was taking pictures, Victoria had a marvelous time 'skipping' rocks, although it might have been better described as 'bouncing.'"Make sure you don't thrown in any little bird eggs!" warned Hester, and from then on, Victoria turned each rock that she picked up over and over in her hands, inspecting it closely, before deciding it really was a rock, and pitching it into the lake.
Later, as we were nearing Schuyler, we met a state patrol. I slowed down, although I’d been going only a couple miles an hour over the speed limit. Victoria sat up straight and peered out the window to see why I was slowing.
Spying the patrolman, she said, “Oh! It’s a policeman! And he didn’t even turn his siren on.” She tipped her head and smiled sweetly. “Wasn’t that nice of him?”
By the way: would you like to know what was wrong with the dishwasher, and why it wouldn’t spray any water, just in case that ever happens to yours?
It needed its float jiggled.
Sooo…if your dishwasher starts misbehaving, just jiggle her float!
And then duck.
Saturday night the thunder rolled and crashed, and the rain poured down. But the ditches were already full and brimming, all the way along Route 30!
Ah, well. We have purchased a new umbrella. Sooo... let it rain.
(That’s all one needs for big rainstorms, isn’t it?--an umbrella? After all!--one can turn them upside down and use them for boats.)
Sunday morning I stayed home with Lydia. Larry stayed with her in the evening.
I made the error of going to church Sunday evening without eating supper…and I was hungry enough that people within twenty square yards of me could have conducted gastromancy (fortune-telling by listening to the sounds of the stomach) quite easily.
Now…back to the everlasting basement cleaning and clothes washing.
Uh, oh... the kids have discovered the chocolate milk ... sooo... If I want some, I’d better go stake my claim -- right now.
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