Last Monday, Victoria wanted to go outside and play. I called Time and Temperature: “62°,” said the Man in the Moon (that’s what Hannah used to call that recorded man’s voice)--or at least I thought he said 62°. So I put a jacket and gloves on Victoria and let her go outside. An hour later when I took her with me on some errands, the temperature displayed on the sign at the bank said 35°. And poor Victoria was an ice cube.
What did the Man in the Moon say, anyway?
Later, I went to Wal-Mart to get some pajamas for Caleb for Christmas. I wandered aimlessly around for a while looking at baggy pants (I thought those were going out of style?--but what do you expect, from Corntown), a wall of shelves the length of a football field full of socks of every size from 0-3 months to men’s XL, and a volley of lime green, olive green, and orange T-shirts covered with Harry Potter designs, of whom I highly disapprove. The rack that usually holds the packages of pajamas was full of small boys’ dress shirts.
I went for help.
There was a lady stocking (using the word ‘stocking’ as a verb, not a noun, and the word ‘lady’ as a noun, not an adjective, so that you are to understand that ‘stocking’ was something the lady was doing) gloves and mittens into tall display brackets, and it was to her that I appealed. She promptly led me to a circular clothes rack on which hung chenille robes in dark rich colors--and a few pajama sets.
The cardboard tags dangling from the sleeves were marked from size XS to XL. I pulled out a Medium and checked the label inside the collar: Size 8. Too small. I pulled out a Large. Size 7, said the label.
!
An 8 is a Medium, and a 7 is a Large, eh?
Thinking one of those pjs had been mismarked, I looked at all the other Mediums and Larges. They were all the same: The M’s were 8’s, and the L’s were 7’s. Botheration!
I pulled out an XL, thinking it would surely be a 10 or a 12. Or perhaps a 6.
Wrong.
It was a 14, and it looked big enough to fit Joseph. Many of the pajamas sported the ever-present, detested Harry Potter, but not a single pair were in size 10, which was the size I needed. I would even have purchased a size 12, but there were none of those, either. There really were absolutely none in his size. (Caleb’s; not Harry’s.)
The lady who had shown me to the rack asked about the weather. Very windy--35 mph--and cold, I told her, and spitting a snowflake or two now and then. She told me that she lived in Osceola, had a three-year-old boy, and her husband had just called to tell her it was snowing there and getting colder by the second. She was to get off work at 11:00 p.m., and she hadn’t brought a coat. She waved a new pair of gloves at me.
“I am buying these,” she told me cheerfully.
I offered to bring her a coat; she turned it down. But after going home, I knew I couldn’t live with myself if I didn’t take that lady a coat; so I took her the one and only coat we had in her size.
The look on her face made it worth the trip. She promised to leave it at the service desk in two days, as that was her next day work.
Maybe sometime within the coming millennia I shall remember to pick it up.
Last Friday evening after baking those two pumpkins, I was taking the baked pumpkin from its shell, Victoria close at hand to supervise operations.
“Ow!” I yelped, throwing a piece into the blender in haste. It was hot.
“Ooo, don’t do that again,” Victoria admonished me. “I’m not going to do that when I’m your age,” she resolved, “I’m going to have whoever I marry do it.”
One day I gave her a small box of ornaments I no longer wanted, all sorts of little doodads I thought she would like to play with. There was a small resin teddy bear in a red bag, a little vinyl Snoopy in a red hat and tassel standing on a chimney, tiny flocked teddy bears in a red metal wagon, Sylvester playing a violin, a wooden trapeze artist hanging upside down, a wooden snowman in ice skates with a red woolen scarf around his neck, and a volley of others.
Victoria was delighted. “I’m going to save these for when I get married!” she enthused.
Hearing all this talk about getting married, I decided that, as mother of the bride-to-be, I was entitled to some clarification. “Whom are you planning to marry?” I queried with what I hoped was the proper amount of polite inquiry.
“Oh,” she shrugged airily as if that were of little consequence in the scheme of things, “Daddy or someone, I suppose,” and she smiled at me with a conspiratorial air.
Tuesday afternoon I took all of Larry’s suits--yes, every last one--to the cleaners, making request for one to be finished by the next afternoon, since he would need it for church that evening. Taking suits to the cleaners on Tuesdays has always been a risky thing for me to do, on account of the fact that I am a flea-brain, and it is more likely than not that I will forget for weeks--even months--to return to said cleaners to retrieve said suits. For this reason, Larry advises me never to take all his suits to the cleaners at once.
Nevertheless, feeling indomitable and exuberant just because I had actually remembered (finally) to take those suits to the cleaners in the first place, I threw all caution to the wind and tossed every last suit into the Suburban, and off I went.
Guess what I did Wednesday afternoon?
Ha! You think you know, don’t you? I wonder if you do...
One evening Larry and I went to Menards for a pet door, after which we came home so Larry could fall asleep while the instructional video played. Caleb and Victoria watched it intently, and when it was over, Larry roused enough to tell them to go install the door, since now they knew precisely how to do it.
“Yes, and when you’re done,” said Teddy, “You just throw the cats through it a few times, and they’ll learn exactly what it’s for.”
“That’s funny,” remarked Caleb smoothly, “On the video, the man said you should coax your pet through.”
“Shows how much he knows,” groused Teddy; “Most people understand that in order to get a cat to go where you want him to go, you have to get behind him and push.”
“But you have to be careful!” cautioned Victoria in a bit of alarm. She had quite recently watched a video about horses, and her brow furrowed anxiously. “They’re liable to kick!”
And she nearly jumped out of her skin when everyone burst out laughing.
Wednesday, I finished Lydia’s dress. It turned out ever so pretty, and both dresses fit the girls to a tee. I hung it up and rushed off to help Victoria get ready for church.
“You can find a barrette to match your dress,” I told her, “While I iron the dress.”
She pulled out her barrette drawer, and I headed for the ironing board. In a few minutes I was buttoning her up the back.
“Where’s the barrette?” I asked.
“On the counter in the bathroom,” replied Victoria.
“What color is it?” I inquired.
“Red,” she answered.
So far, so good. Now...did she get the nice red barrette, or the old ratty red barrette?
“What’s it look like?” I pressed further.
“It looks red,” responded Victoria without missing a beat.
I gave up and went to see for myself.
After church that evening, I wrapped another pile of Christmas presents.
Thursday, I completed the mending and the washing. That done, I went to visit Mama, and offered to wrap presents for her. I happened to know that she had oodles and gobs of Avon gifts in her basement, some of which were probably 25 years old. She fussed, saying I didn’t have time, and had I fixed supper yet, and did I have a lot of clothes to wash, and on and on; but I insisted, and she finally agreed--after I was already on my way to the basement. (I learned to ignore my mother’s fussing long before I ever became a teenager.)
When I arrived back upstairs with a large box chock full of gifts, Mama made a face and said, “Oh, NO!”
I laughed and headed back down for more. What did she think, that I was going to go get three presents, wrap them, and call it good? I planned to wrap all her presents.
Ever since I got married, I think, she has thought that the best thing for me to do is to stand at the stove and stir the stew. If she finds out I’m doing such a frivolous deed as typing, or sewing, or painting, or gardening, or gallivanting around the countryside with a camera in hand, or--heaven forbid--if she learns that one of the children have actually opened a bag of vegetables and dumped them into a pan, well...I know by the look on her face that I’m not at all behaving properly, that’s all. But, as I said, I’ve had good practice at ignoring such things--and that’s precisely what I did.
Part of the trouble, you see, is that Mama is not the sort who has ever wanted people helping her; she is an independent person who spent her life doing things for others, and having to rely on others for her every need for the last few months has been hard on her. Anyway, at least she knows for certain and for sure that we really love her.
After bringing up five more big boxes, I called home for reinforcements. Teddy and Joseph came in Teddy’s pickup, hauled the boxes out, and took them home for me. I followed shortly. First, I wrote a list of everyone to whom Mama wanted to give a gift, and then I started sorting.
When I was too tired to sort further, I sat down and watched the film ‘The Diary of Anne Frank’. It ended right when the German soldiers were storming up the steps and jerking open the secret door. What tragedies and horrors befell countless millions during those years...and to think some people say the Holocaust never happened! I think they know better; they are not even being honest with themselves.
Friday, I thought I had all the presents sorted--and then Mama called to tell me that Lura Kay had told her that there were many presents in the closet in Mama’s room. So Larry came with me to get them. There were so many--five big boxes--that he went back home for the Suburban. We hauled them home, and then I sorted some more. And that’s all I got done that day; it was a big job. There are not enough presents for the men and boys, but there are plenty for the women and girls. We’ll have to remedy that, I suppose; that’s hardly fair, since the men are the primary breadwinners...
Saturday, I wrapped presents all day. That evening, Larry and I took all our family’s things to Mama’s and put them under her tree. We plan to open presents with her after the Christmas dinner at church. She has never been the sort to ask anyone to do things for her, or to accept help if she didn’t need it, but she’s not fussing anymore about me wrapping presents for her; in fact, she acted downright pleased to see all those presents clustered around the Christmas tree.
“It sure looks like Christmas must be coming!” she said, laughing.
Joseph went to Keith and Esther’s house to help Keith put up his Christmas lights. Now...will someone please put up OURS??!
Today after church, we drove out to Lake Babcock to see the geese and ducks that are migrating through. There were Canada and Snow geese, and all sorts of ducks-mallards, canvasbacks, blue-winged teals, Northern shovelers, Northern pintails, green-winged teals, lesser scaups, and American coots--on the lakes. The geese stroll or swim about grandly, heads held high in aristocratic arrogance, disdainful of the lesser waterfowl around them; while the ducks chase about in wild, water-roiling abandon.
“What are they doing?!” asked Caleb in amazement, watching the ducks through the binoculars as they sent water spraying high into the blue sky with their frenzied cavorting about.
“Oh, I think they are playing ‘Duck, Duck, Goose’,” I answered; “At least, that’s what it looks like to me.”
Caleb giggled.
Parts of the lake was frozen, although it all looked azure blue, reflecting the beautiful blue of the autumn sky.
“Look!” I exclaimed to the littles, “The water’s stiff! The geese are walking right on top of the water.”
Caleb giggled again. “That’s ice,” he told me softly, just as if I didn’t know better, and children should be gentle with their poor, uninformed mothers.
“Oh,” I answered, sounding surprised.
I am pleased as punch I managed to catch all that on video.
P.S.: You still think I forgot to pick up Larry’s suit from the cleaners Wednesday afternoon, don’t you?
Do you really want to know?
Okay...I’ll tell you.
On Wednesday afternoon...
I...
Are you sure you want to know?
Okay, okay.
I forgot to pick it up, and he had to wear his CarHart overalls and his red plaid lumberjack shirt to church.
No, not really.
On Wednesday afternoon I donned my coat, put Victoria’s coat on her, gathered up my purse, marched out to the Suburban, helped Victoria into her seat, drove to Columbus Dry Cleaners, and got Larry’s suit.
Ha! And you thought I forgot.
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.