Wednesday, January 20, 2010

Shadow Stalker

It isn’t that I don’t think of you anymore. It’s that when I think of you I don’t think of me.

Only a small part of me finds it amusing that a shadow would speak to me of being left in the dark. Most of me is not yet that big a person and that is why we‘ll only ever dance across the surface of my tiny big person in passing conversation for now and maybe forever. Don’t tell me it’s not fair lest justice actually find you. 

It isn’t that I don’t love you anymore. It’s that I have to stop loving you to love me. 


January 20, 2010 

Wednesday, January 6, 2010

Missing: Tiny Red Spider Buddy

“Mom!-Mom!-Mom! Come see my buddy! Mom!” Thatcher attached his sticky hand to my fingers and dragged me out of the kitchen into the dining room. Sure enough there was one of his many buddies dangling from the light fixture with the end of it’s web about toddler chin height. This year we put the Christmas tree in the dining room and it came with about a thousand tiny red spiders. Thatch has a deep affection for the spiders. Any and all spider removal must happen under cover of darkness or nap time.

“That’s great, Thatch.”  Spiders don’t bother me so long as they’re not on me though I do prefer not to share any of my living space with them. After I removed all the holiday ornaments from the tree and Tim stripped it of it’s twinkling mockery I shoved the tree out on the porch still in it’s stand. It looks nice. Also I’m hoping those spiders still crawling out of it will eat those other weird bugs that live on the porch.

While in deep conversation with the tiny creature Thatcher suddenly discovered that he could blow his spider buddy through the air. He would take a deep breath and use it to gently lift his dangling arachnid friend in a slow smooth arc in the air. While the spider was at it’s farthest point from Thatch, Thatch would throw his head back and howl with laughter. “Look! Look how much fun I’m giving him!” Then he would quickly prepare for the spiders return and blow it again.

Until he blew harder sending the spider farther than ever before and then laughed harder and longer than ever before… head full tilt, mouth wide open in pleasure…..

And then the spider was gone.

I nearly choked. I wanted to laugh but... look what happened to him!

“Mom! Where my buddy? Where he go? Did you vacuum him!??”

I didn’t have the heart to tell him. I just offered him some juice before he could question what (who?) was in his mouth. 


January 06, 2010 

Friday, January 1, 2010

A New Year Miracle

The only real trouble with going out by yourself on your  30th birthday/ New Year when you have every intention of drinking enough alcohol to forget that you’re going out by yourself on your 30th birthday/New Year is the awkwardness that is midnight.

Trouble with midnight is the traditional New Year kiss. You’re supposed to have a fabulous bend you over backward into the new year make out session with someone you love. And if you cannot have that it should just be a lot of confetti and horn blowing and friendship and smiles.  However…. SOME people think that you can slide into the New Year faking it with a random stranger that happens to be standing there. Or hovering around there like it’s a goddamn game of musical chairs. What? You like musical chairs? Sure you do. You’ve never considered the way the chair feels.

Of course I was already silly drunkish by ten pm so I was only half aware of the circling by eleven forty-five. Usually I’m consumed with anxiety about such a thing. I mean… their feelings and all. As if it’s my job to make them feel better about circling an empty fucking chair. I mean it would be one thing if the chair were some sort of fancy lazy boy recliner or something… but we’re talking about the cold metal deal they unfold at a church potluck here. So clearly I feel sorry for them that they’re some how confused enough to be hoping to sit in it.

I remember seeing the time on the large television and thinking I should head outside to smoke a cigarette in the very near future to avoid the horror that is the midnight make out. But then I was dancing… and the band kept changing words in the song to wish me a happy birthday so I danced some more and then before you know it everyone was counting as though a rocket was about to take off and a young man who’d been trying to teach me to swing dance an hour before snaked an arm around me and tilted my chin up and BAM.

There I was. Starting my New Year out being molested by a rubbery lipped baby marine.

Damn it.

So I held my lips together against the onslaught and pulled away and smiled and made nice and whatnot. ‘Cause that’s just what ya do.  And then I managed to locate my jacket and I went outside to smoke a cigarette. The Marine followed.

“Hey I think I locked my keys in my truck! Will you go over there and take a look with me?” He was looking across the road at the parking lot.

“Not a chance.” I continued smoking.

“What? Why not? You don‘t trust me?”  he seemed genuinely shocked. Or that was part of the routine -I’m not sure.

“Gee, I don’t know? How about ‘cause I don’t wander over into dark parking lots with strangers?”

“Stranger! You’ve known me all night! See that little white truck right there? That‘s mine.”

“Not going to happen.  But I tell ya what. I’ll stand here and watch you and if anything happens to you I’ll scream and such.”

“Oh wow.” He’s rustling his hand around in his jacket pocket. “My keys are right here.”

“It’s a New Year miracle.” 



January 1, 2010