Well, it's true that eight ain't enough for a baseball team, but I had eight kids one time, one at a time that is, and not every team needs a short stop anyway.
Even after all these years, I still mumble when someone asks me how many kids I had. Those kids multiplied and now there are 25 and that's not counting their spouses. People can be downright rude about big families. Some people even asked me if I knew what was causing me to have all those kids. Well of course I did, by then anyway. There was a time when I didn't. I searched the cabbage patch on my uncle's farm every summer until I was in junior high school. That year our gym teacher showed us "that" movie. In those day when I was having my children a woman couldn't do much about birth control and our family was Catholic so I was working toward the star on my crown. I think I actually only needed seven children to secure my heavenly tiara, but the extra kid was loved too.
I'm not saying my kids were accidents, and of course they didn't come from a cabbage patch, but none of them were started in a petri dish either.
A large family presents all kinds of challenges and solutions are often "out of the box." For instance, we put the Christmas tree and the gifts in the playpen and let the toddlers run free and Tootsie Pops were only allowed during church on Sunday morning and the kids could have as many as it took to keep them quiet for that long hour each Sunday. One time I forgot one of the kids. We were on our way to church and I had all the Toostie Pops packed but I had a feeling something was missing. When I realized it was our youngest we sped through the neighborhood in panic and were very relieved to find her still on the bed where we had put her. She was immobilized in her bunting like a stranded turtle and sleeping like the proverbial baby.
Let the economists and journalists worry about the dynamics of raising those octuplets. I have been thinking about socks. Without factoring in the other six children, the young woman in California can expect to wash an excess of 190,456 socks in the next 18 years. That's two socks per octuplet and hey!, what about Christmas socks. Some poor grandmother is going to be pretty busy sewing all those sequins on eight felt creations and if Santa puts a limit of $10 per sock each year it will still cost him $144,000. And pity the poor tooth fairy!
Now if those silly thoughts don't give you the willies, think about birthday celebrations. Even if each child is limited to three guests the McDonald's across the nation will stop answering their phones and Ronald McDonald will hang onto those stripped socks as he hides in the playgrounds.
What do you think! Should there be eight cakes or one cake with eight candles? One cake would need 80 candles when the kids turn ten.
A trip to the store presents logistical problems that are mind bending. Remember when you got your two toddlers snugged up in their snow suits and the boots finally pulled over those hard high top shoes and the last hand finally mittened and then the first kids said, "I have to pee."
And I don't know about you but I still haven't mastered hooking up car seats and where would you connect eight of them anyway.
Just think. Eight! Halloween costumes, kindergartners who announce the night before the day that you are the homeroom mother who needs to bring treats, scout meetings and badges to sew on uniforms, soccer games, dance recitals, Little League, report cards, in-school detentions, dentists, immunizations, first communions, proms and weddings.
My daughter-in-law is planning to breed her purebred dog. She hopes to make enough money to put her TWO children through college. I don't know, the cost of college is skyrocketing, but then... maybe she should consider in vitro fertilization. I hear there is a doctor in California that can help. Just imagine eight times the usual number of newborn puppies!
Merriam Webster said enough was plenty and plenty is sufficient. I say I wouldn't want eight babies at one time even if I found them in a cabbage patch.
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
Thursday, February 5, 2009
Waiting on Love
The puppy love spawned by Valentine Day festivities in my fifth-grade classrooms was still alive when spring, that time of the year when young men's hearts are said to turn to fancy, arrived in 1949. In the fifth grade at Largent school, where they served real food for lunch, there was a young, blond, Adonis, also in the fifth grade.
As was the custom back then, each of us decorated a box for Valentine Day and placed it in the back of the classroom. The boxes had slots so we could drop a valentine in the box for the owner. Of course, it was expected that everyone would give a valentine to everyone, but if we didn't sign our name to the paper missals, who would know if we didn't give one to the class nerd, or if we gave the most beautiful one to the boy every girl swooned over.
Some valentines were handmade with lace and paper doilies or with velvet cutouts glued all over them. Some cards had a sucker stuck through the commercial love note, which made it hard to put through the slot, and some were cut out of ready-made books.
The cards had different messages but they all were about love. A kitty-shaped cutout might say, "I think you are purr..fect." A card with a picture of the earth on it said, "I'd go to the end of the world for you."
I decorated my shoe box with red and white crepe paper, stretching the ribbon of paper to make the edges curl and then I taped the white strip around the box that I covered with red. I glued white heart-shaped doilies around the top of the box and made a good-sized slit, so any card would fit, and I printed my name on one small doily.
Lonnie's box was covered with cloth. His mother gave him some cotton scraps that she had left from a quilt she was making. He glued the scraps to the box and it looked like his cat had used it for a scratching post. He printed his name on the box with red paint so everyone would know it was his.
I bought a real commercial card for Lonnie. It was pink, but it had a boy and a girl riding in a white car with heart shaped puffs of smoke coming out of the exhaust pipe. Inside the card said, "Lover's Lane, here we come."
On Valentine Day our teacher passed out cupcakces decorated with candy hearts and cups of red punch. Then we opened our valentine boxers. Lonnie had more valentines than anyone in the room, boys or girls.
Lonnie never said anything about the card I sent him, but in the spring he called me up and asked me to meet him in the balcony of the Liberty Theater on Saturday. My mother wouldn't let me go.
On Monday, I learned that Lonnie had called every girl in the class, with the same invitation, and then he invited all the boys to come to the balcony to watch the girls arrive. There were only a few girls who showed up at the theater, but I was so happy I wasn't one of them.
Whatever Lonnie's heart was turning to that spring of 1949, it wasn't anything fancy. I was so glad my mother made me wait for another spring and another young man.
As was the custom back then, each of us decorated a box for Valentine Day and placed it in the back of the classroom. The boxes had slots so we could drop a valentine in the box for the owner. Of course, it was expected that everyone would give a valentine to everyone, but if we didn't sign our name to the paper missals, who would know if we didn't give one to the class nerd, or if we gave the most beautiful one to the boy every girl swooned over.
Some valentines were handmade with lace and paper doilies or with velvet cutouts glued all over them. Some cards had a sucker stuck through the commercial love note, which made it hard to put through the slot, and some were cut out of ready-made books.
The cards had different messages but they all were about love. A kitty-shaped cutout might say, "I think you are purr..fect." A card with a picture of the earth on it said, "I'd go to the end of the world for you."
I decorated my shoe box with red and white crepe paper, stretching the ribbon of paper to make the edges curl and then I taped the white strip around the box that I covered with red. I glued white heart-shaped doilies around the top of the box and made a good-sized slit, so any card would fit, and I printed my name on one small doily.
Lonnie's box was covered with cloth. His mother gave him some cotton scraps that she had left from a quilt she was making. He glued the scraps to the box and it looked like his cat had used it for a scratching post. He printed his name on the box with red paint so everyone would know it was his.
I bought a real commercial card for Lonnie. It was pink, but it had a boy and a girl riding in a white car with heart shaped puffs of smoke coming out of the exhaust pipe. Inside the card said, "Lover's Lane, here we come."
On Valentine Day our teacher passed out cupcakces decorated with candy hearts and cups of red punch. Then we opened our valentine boxers. Lonnie had more valentines than anyone in the room, boys or girls.
Lonnie never said anything about the card I sent him, but in the spring he called me up and asked me to meet him in the balcony of the Liberty Theater on Saturday. My mother wouldn't let me go.
On Monday, I learned that Lonnie had called every girl in the class, with the same invitation, and then he invited all the boys to come to the balcony to watch the girls arrive. There were only a few girls who showed up at the theater, but I was so happy I wasn't one of them.
Whatever Lonnie's heart was turning to that spring of 1949, it wasn't anything fancy. I was so glad my mother made me wait for another spring and another young man.
Waiting Patiently for Spring
This morning as I pulled my comforter closer to my chin I heard a child crying. I peeked under my window shad and watched the young mother across the street as she put her two little ones into their cold car seats and began scraping her windshield. They complained, with the language of babes, of being drug out of a warm bed in the middle of the winter.
My heart went out to all three of them and I thought of other working mothers who had to go through that process every morning.
When my children were little I was wealthy enough to stay at home with them. Wealthy enough to serve red beans and macaroni the last two days before payday, but we got by.
Winter drug on in Eastern Montana for months and by the time the children could be put in the fenced yard for an hour or two I was looking for employment in the classified sections.
Fifty years from now my grandchildren, who dash from their mother's warm car into the cozy school building for a warm breakfast before classes start will probably talk about the winter of "ought nine" when it was almost 20 below but there won't be any exaggerations of distances trekked across the frozen tundra in their twenty-first century stories.
I walked ten blocks to my school, not the legendary ten miles, but girls weren't allowed to wear jeans and we thought we were too old to wear long cotton stockings or snow suits so we dashed from one car dealer to the next, braving the wind chills that were not factored into the temperatures back then.
The elders say winters aren't what they used to be. They talk about the winter of 1954 when record breaking minus 70 was recorded on Roger's Pass as though it was typical. I do recall my transmission froze when the temperature dropped to minus 52 in 1957.
The milk, in glass bottles back then, was left on our porch each morning and as it froze it lifted the cardboard lids and the ice crystals of cream rose into the air. That was before clothes dryers and the sheets on the line froze stiff and then they were brought in to thaw by the stove. Kids who stuck their tongues on sleds knew better then to pull away from the metal and carried the sled home so someone could release them from their bondage with some warm water.
The winter of '78, 1978 that is, was brutal and my young son had an early morning paper route. I wish now that I had given him a ride around his route, but back then parents tried to raise their kids to be tough. I made hot chocolate to thaw him out before he walked to meet the school bus five blocks away.
Winter hangs heavy on the horizon these mornings. Ice crystals shimmer in the pink rays filtered through clouds tinted blue with sub-zero temperatures. These days I retreat behind the berms left by the faithful snowplow that terrorizes my cat. The squirrels that my husband feeds gather around the feeder and look toward the kitchen window where we sip our morning coffee.
We peer out into the world of white searching for the slightest signs of change. On clear days it is still daylight when the evening news begins. Valentine cards share space with St. Patrick's day in the greeting card section and some stores are even sporting pastel colors for kitchens and mothers.
The playground swings and slides are idle now, but will come to life with jump ropes and marbles in less than 60 days.
My heart went out to all three of them and I thought of other working mothers who had to go through that process every morning.
When my children were little I was wealthy enough to stay at home with them. Wealthy enough to serve red beans and macaroni the last two days before payday, but we got by.
Winter drug on in Eastern Montana for months and by the time the children could be put in the fenced yard for an hour or two I was looking for employment in the classified sections.
Fifty years from now my grandchildren, who dash from their mother's warm car into the cozy school building for a warm breakfast before classes start will probably talk about the winter of "ought nine" when it was almost 20 below but there won't be any exaggerations of distances trekked across the frozen tundra in their twenty-first century stories.
I walked ten blocks to my school, not the legendary ten miles, but girls weren't allowed to wear jeans and we thought we were too old to wear long cotton stockings or snow suits so we dashed from one car dealer to the next, braving the wind chills that were not factored into the temperatures back then.
The elders say winters aren't what they used to be. They talk about the winter of 1954 when record breaking minus 70 was recorded on Roger's Pass as though it was typical. I do recall my transmission froze when the temperature dropped to minus 52 in 1957.
The milk, in glass bottles back then, was left on our porch each morning and as it froze it lifted the cardboard lids and the ice crystals of cream rose into the air. That was before clothes dryers and the sheets on the line froze stiff and then they were brought in to thaw by the stove. Kids who stuck their tongues on sleds knew better then to pull away from the metal and carried the sled home so someone could release them from their bondage with some warm water.
The winter of '78, 1978 that is, was brutal and my young son had an early morning paper route. I wish now that I had given him a ride around his route, but back then parents tried to raise their kids to be tough. I made hot chocolate to thaw him out before he walked to meet the school bus five blocks away.
Winter hangs heavy on the horizon these mornings. Ice crystals shimmer in the pink rays filtered through clouds tinted blue with sub-zero temperatures. These days I retreat behind the berms left by the faithful snowplow that terrorizes my cat. The squirrels that my husband feeds gather around the feeder and look toward the kitchen window where we sip our morning coffee.
We peer out into the world of white searching for the slightest signs of change. On clear days it is still daylight when the evening news begins. Valentine cards share space with St. Patrick's day in the greeting card section and some stores are even sporting pastel colors for kitchens and mothers.
The playground swings and slides are idle now, but will come to life with jump ropes and marbles in less than 60 days.
Excuse me, but your sitting in my Chair
We human beings are territorial creatures as evidenced by our preoccupation with where we sit.
Last week, the instructor of the Senior Strength class told us she had been reading about how senior citizens (the man at my house calls us senile citizens) can exercise their brains by challenging the "other" side of the brain. Try brushing your teeth with the "other hand" or putting the "other" leg into your pants first or sitting in "other" places. So she instructed us to sit in a different chair during the next class.
Seems like a simple brain exercise, doesn't it? Wrong! You haven't heard such grumbling and fussing since first grade when seats were assigned. Remember when you were told "get back to YOUR seat", or "Do not get out of YOUR seats", or asked, "What are you doing in Mary's chair"?
One of the oldsters in our class moved back only one chair and when the tattle tales in the class reported a woman in the front row who hadn't moved at all, the woman firmly announced she didn't plan to move.
Unlike a study that showed that mental patients were much less likely to shout out when sitting in a different chair, the senior exercisers grumbled or giggled about their discomfort and a few who were used to hiding behind a larger participant complained of being exposed.
A study at the University of Georgia revealed that individuals who usually sat at the end of a row of seats were more likely to claim the spot as theirs while students in the middle rows didn't display that territorial behavior. On the other hand, female students were more likely to claim a place as their own.
One wonders if those results would be the same if the study were done in a church. Pastors, priest and busybodies, need only scan the sanctuary to discover who is not in their church on a given day. Sometimes family's claim an entire pew through continual use over the years. I wouldn't dream of sitting in someone place at church and the parishioners know that the Son does not sit on the left hand of their Father in heaven.
Even in our homes we have assigned seating. Everyone in the family knows where to sit at the table, even those who haven't been home since the last holiday. Although Archie Bunker doesn't live there, any man of the house can claim his recliner with a certain look.
From car seat to booster seat to selected head phones, kids sit in the same place in the family car until the enter driver's ed.
There seems to be all kinds of chairs and some are coveted like thrones and endowed chairs at universities. Others are dreaded like dentist chairs, or "the" chair in death row.
Maybe we shouldn't mess around with seating arrangements. After all even a bear could tell when "somebody has been sitting in my chair" even if the chair was just right for Goldie Locks.
Last week, the instructor of the Senior Strength class told us she had been reading about how senior citizens (the man at my house calls us senile citizens) can exercise their brains by challenging the "other" side of the brain. Try brushing your teeth with the "other hand" or putting the "other" leg into your pants first or sitting in "other" places. So she instructed us to sit in a different chair during the next class.
Seems like a simple brain exercise, doesn't it? Wrong! You haven't heard such grumbling and fussing since first grade when seats were assigned. Remember when you were told "get back to YOUR seat", or "Do not get out of YOUR seats", or asked, "What are you doing in Mary's chair"?
One of the oldsters in our class moved back only one chair and when the tattle tales in the class reported a woman in the front row who hadn't moved at all, the woman firmly announced she didn't plan to move.
Unlike a study that showed that mental patients were much less likely to shout out when sitting in a different chair, the senior exercisers grumbled or giggled about their discomfort and a few who were used to hiding behind a larger participant complained of being exposed.
A study at the University of Georgia revealed that individuals who usually sat at the end of a row of seats were more likely to claim the spot as theirs while students in the middle rows didn't display that territorial behavior. On the other hand, female students were more likely to claim a place as their own.
One wonders if those results would be the same if the study were done in a church. Pastors, priest and busybodies, need only scan the sanctuary to discover who is not in their church on a given day. Sometimes family's claim an entire pew through continual use over the years. I wouldn't dream of sitting in someone place at church and the parishioners know that the Son does not sit on the left hand of their Father in heaven.
Even in our homes we have assigned seating. Everyone in the family knows where to sit at the table, even those who haven't been home since the last holiday. Although Archie Bunker doesn't live there, any man of the house can claim his recliner with a certain look.
From car seat to booster seat to selected head phones, kids sit in the same place in the family car until the enter driver's ed.
There seems to be all kinds of chairs and some are coveted like thrones and endowed chairs at universities. Others are dreaded like dentist chairs, or "the" chair in death row.
Maybe we shouldn't mess around with seating arrangements. After all even a bear could tell when "somebody has been sitting in my chair" even if the chair was just right for Goldie Locks.
Solutions in Resolutions
The universal feast of consumptions over now we collectively, like lemmings, rush into the new year with plans to alter the shape of our bodies. My girl friend and I were talking about our crazy years and shared some laughs about what used to be, to us, serious business. She had marvelous boobs back then, but years and gravity have made her my bosom buddy. We had abs and quads instead of bellys and butts. Now we have degenerative arthritis and tummys and our waists are "girths". What an ugly word. Reminds me of another friend who hated the word obese because it sounded oooooooooobeeeeeeeese! Now firm butts have become satchels and triceps are wings that flap when we do jumping jacks.
We've, my friend and I, have been through a lot together; Weight Watchers, TOPS, CURVES, aerobics, yoga, kickboxing, water aerobics, jogging, running, walking and now strolling. We have enough equipment between us to start our own fitness center if we weren't using it for clothes hangers.
We tried South Beach, Atkins, Cabbage soup, Fit for Life, Jane Fonda, Jack LaLane and Richard Simmons. We recently sold the videos, books and CDs in a garage sale and used the funds to go to bingo at the senior center.
We used to get on the scale and write those incriminating numbers on our calendars so our families could chide us for failing to keep the dietary promises we made each January and renewed after Valentine Day, and Easter and Mother's Day and the Fourth of July and many birthday bashes and onward to Halloween and Thanksgiving and finally into the valley of eggnog.
Now we eat what we want and stay pretty much the same weight. "Let's meet for lunch" is the rallying cry. Do breakfast, not slimfast, is our motto!
What is the point of getting to the golden years if you can't eat with enjoyment. The elderly have very little left they can do for fun. Can't afford a movie and if they did they couldn't afford the $10 medium-sized popcorn, and why go to a movie if you can't have popcorn. You know they say our taste buds will die but the last one to go is the sweet one, so maybe we should toast our existence while we can still taste the toast.
No more closet dividers separating the sizes, everything fits now. We have discovered elastic waists and sweats. Queen size? Why not. Sounds like royalty to me. Junior sizes are for junior girls or little old ladies with crepe paper necks.
So I tell my bosom friend, "Hey, relax and enjoy the rest of the trip." We may have lost our baby fat like the proverbial kittens who found what they lost and were rewarded with pie.
Besides, I heard they cut the back of your dress down the middle before they put you in the coffin.
We've, my friend and I, have been through a lot together; Weight Watchers, TOPS, CURVES, aerobics, yoga, kickboxing, water aerobics, jogging, running, walking and now strolling. We have enough equipment between us to start our own fitness center if we weren't using it for clothes hangers.
We tried South Beach, Atkins, Cabbage soup, Fit for Life, Jane Fonda, Jack LaLane and Richard Simmons. We recently sold the videos, books and CDs in a garage sale and used the funds to go to bingo at the senior center.
We used to get on the scale and write those incriminating numbers on our calendars so our families could chide us for failing to keep the dietary promises we made each January and renewed after Valentine Day, and Easter and Mother's Day and the Fourth of July and many birthday bashes and onward to Halloween and Thanksgiving and finally into the valley of eggnog.
Now we eat what we want and stay pretty much the same weight. "Let's meet for lunch" is the rallying cry. Do breakfast, not slimfast, is our motto!
What is the point of getting to the golden years if you can't eat with enjoyment. The elderly have very little left they can do for fun. Can't afford a movie and if they did they couldn't afford the $10 medium-sized popcorn, and why go to a movie if you can't have popcorn. You know they say our taste buds will die but the last one to go is the sweet one, so maybe we should toast our existence while we can still taste the toast.
No more closet dividers separating the sizes, everything fits now. We have discovered elastic waists and sweats. Queen size? Why not. Sounds like royalty to me. Junior sizes are for junior girls or little old ladies with crepe paper necks.
So I tell my bosom friend, "Hey, relax and enjoy the rest of the trip." We may have lost our baby fat like the proverbial kittens who found what they lost and were rewarded with pie.
Besides, I heard they cut the back of your dress down the middle before they put you in the coffin.
Friday, January 30, 2009
This too shall pass
I think I have the Januaries. Cold, bored, cranky and tired of winter. Here we are in the depths of a Montana winter and our only hope is a groundhog who lives in New England. Talk about audacity! The icicles hanging from the eaves of my house are so long that I'm not sure if their are stalactites or the other kind that grow from the ground up and when I turn on the lamps in my cave I notice that humans I hven't seen since last summer are living behind their own icicle prison across the street.
The thermometer was reading minus 37 degrees the day my husband decided to talk to me about the utility bills.
"Utility bills! You mean the comforts of home!" I snarled.
I knew the mantra. If we just cut back a little on the lights and heat we could afford a trip to Hawaii next year. I figure if we turn the thermostat any further down we won't live to see another year. The cold is hard on senior citizens I remind him. He tell me we are spending one fifth of our fixed income on utility bills. I tell him my grandmother would have sold her soul for electricity and natural gas.
Her day began before the sun. she was the first one up. She put kindling in the range to start the fire to warm the home, heat some water and cook breakfast. Sometimes she had to melt water to take to the cow which is where the milk for breakfast would come from.
Me, I like luxurys such as plumbing. He complains of the water bill in the summer when the automatic underground sprinklers water the lawn before I get up in the morning. I like faucets that bring warm and cold water with the turn of a wrist. And a flush toilet? When I think of grandma making that cold trip through the bare cottonwoods to the outhouse I can only imagine the cold wind sweeping through those two hole necessary houses.
Heck, I even like the garbage truck that clangs and bangs when the one-armed bandit takes away the evidence of my decadent life style before the neighbors are awake.
One person's luxury is another's necessities. I think we could probably do without television, but I wouldn't want to give up the computer that allows me to leave my igloo each day with online visits. He thinks the telphone is an annoyance. Although he doesn't complain about electric frying pans, coffee pots, crock pots and the microwave, he is certain the washer and dryer will send us to the poorhouse.
I try to ride out his complaints and wait until he is in bed or out of the house to turn the furnace up, because I know he too has the Januaries. There isn 't much a body can do for that disease. I try to keep a pot of soup on the stove and the ever-ready tea kettle filled. He puts on long underwear and extra socks to ride his recoiner from "Good Morning America" to David Letterman's goodnight.
We will both feel better this month. Groundhogs and valentines hint of hope and love, and the electric bill will be much lower. Each year, caught up in the magic of the holidays he builds a forest of electric Christmas trees in our yard and lives in denial until January when the bill for all that extra power comes arrives.
Funny thing, no matter how old we get, we forget the Januaries of our life as soon as they pass and we celebrate the good times with renewed faith. Hope you do too.
The thermometer was reading minus 37 degrees the day my husband decided to talk to me about the utility bills.
"Utility bills! You mean the comforts of home!" I snarled.
I knew the mantra. If we just cut back a little on the lights and heat we could afford a trip to Hawaii next year. I figure if we turn the thermostat any further down we won't live to see another year. The cold is hard on senior citizens I remind him. He tell me we are spending one fifth of our fixed income on utility bills. I tell him my grandmother would have sold her soul for electricity and natural gas.
Her day began before the sun. she was the first one up. She put kindling in the range to start the fire to warm the home, heat some water and cook breakfast. Sometimes she had to melt water to take to the cow which is where the milk for breakfast would come from.
Me, I like luxurys such as plumbing. He complains of the water bill in the summer when the automatic underground sprinklers water the lawn before I get up in the morning. I like faucets that bring warm and cold water with the turn of a wrist. And a flush toilet? When I think of grandma making that cold trip through the bare cottonwoods to the outhouse I can only imagine the cold wind sweeping through those two hole necessary houses.
Heck, I even like the garbage truck that clangs and bangs when the one-armed bandit takes away the evidence of my decadent life style before the neighbors are awake.
One person's luxury is another's necessities. I think we could probably do without television, but I wouldn't want to give up the computer that allows me to leave my igloo each day with online visits. He thinks the telphone is an annoyance. Although he doesn't complain about electric frying pans, coffee pots, crock pots and the microwave, he is certain the washer and dryer will send us to the poorhouse.
I try to ride out his complaints and wait until he is in bed or out of the house to turn the furnace up, because I know he too has the Januaries. There isn 't much a body can do for that disease. I try to keep a pot of soup on the stove and the ever-ready tea kettle filled. He puts on long underwear and extra socks to ride his recoiner from "Good Morning America" to David Letterman's goodnight.
We will both feel better this month. Groundhogs and valentines hint of hope and love, and the electric bill will be much lower. Each year, caught up in the magic of the holidays he builds a forest of electric Christmas trees in our yard and lives in denial until January when the bill for all that extra power comes arrives.
Funny thing, no matter how old we get, we forget the Januaries of our life as soon as they pass and we celebrate the good times with renewed faith. Hope you do too.
Monday, December 29, 2008
THE GIFT
Do you hear what I hear? Ringing through the sky?
Do you know what I know? In your palace warm mighty king?
Hark!
It's the fuzzy, brown and black ball of fur with white neck hair and white stocking feet.
He needs to go out.
It is a beagle puppy, your beagle puppy o mighty king.
Those were my less than joyous thoughts after Christmas in 2007.
That year our children were so excited about giving their dad the dog he had always wanted. Of course, the gift tag said to Dad AND Mom. They said we needed something to keep us young. They said when they saw the box full of puppies at the gas station when they stopped to get gas they just knew a puppy would be the perfect gift for us.
When we learned the kids had paid a quarter of a thousand dollars for the dog we knew we would have to let him survive.
We named him W. T. Beuford. Beuford moved into a cardboard box next to my side of the bed because the old man can't hear much anymore. That is why on nights when "the crest of the new fallen snow gave a luster of midday to objects below" the early risers and night stalkers of Libby knew I owned a green bathrobe. I straddled the snow berms with my thin robe drawn to my neck while I waited and waited for Beuford to go. Then I could return to the palace warm like the might king who slept through the winter. By spring, Beuford could wait until morning so he moved into the bed and under the covers and we three kings were all warm.
During his teething period, Beuford shredded my slippers from Santa and chewed upon the digital camera, some DVDs and CDs and the zipper in my winter coat. Left in the car during a shopping trip for more doggie treats he chewed through the seatbelts in the back seat.
You could say the dog has been the gift that keeps on giving. My husband keeps the path to the clothesline cleared of those gifts. We have grown accustomed to his ways, including his voice. Hound puppies do not whimper. They are loud and even after his "little surgery" his voice is still shrill. He has become an early warning system that is activated only by his ESP.
"Well, I don't know. Hounds are pretty hard to train, but we'll do what we can with him," the puppy school teacher said. Beuford did well and graduated with honors wearing a cap and gown without losing his dignity but he quickly forgot all he learned.
Beuford celebrated his second Christmas this year. He's a big boy now. Eleven pounds too much said the vet. He can hear a the crinkling of a food wrapper from anywhere in the house and when he tilts his head and gazes at you with those big brown eyes he seems to say, "What ya got? Can I have some? Huh? Huh? He's happy and it shows when he chases the wind with his long ears flapping like wings of bird preparring for lift off or when he is on his back shuffling side to side with a wide toothy grin as he balances a ball between his front paws.
Beuford goes to bed on command now, on the palace kings side, because he knows his job is to keep the old man warm. Now it is Beuford who startles awake and asks, "do you hear what I hear?" when the old man tries to sneak a cookie from the jar in the dark of winter.
Our kids are pretty smart. They knew exactly what we needed in our old age. I hope all of you got what you needed for Christmas this year.
Do you hear what I hear? Ringing through the sky?
Do you know what I know? In your palace warm mighty king?
Hark!
It's the fuzzy, brown and black ball of fur with white neck hair and white stocking feet.
He needs to go out.
It is a beagle puppy, your beagle puppy o mighty king.
Those were my less than joyous thoughts after Christmas in 2007.
That year our children were so excited about giving their dad the dog he had always wanted. Of course, the gift tag said to Dad AND Mom. They said we needed something to keep us young. They said when they saw the box full of puppies at the gas station when they stopped to get gas they just knew a puppy would be the perfect gift for us.
When we learned the kids had paid a quarter of a thousand dollars for the dog we knew we would have to let him survive.
We named him W. T. Beuford. Beuford moved into a cardboard box next to my side of the bed because the old man can't hear much anymore. That is why on nights when "the crest of the new fallen snow gave a luster of midday to objects below" the early risers and night stalkers of Libby knew I owned a green bathrobe. I straddled the snow berms with my thin robe drawn to my neck while I waited and waited for Beuford to go. Then I could return to the palace warm like the might king who slept through the winter. By spring, Beuford could wait until morning so he moved into the bed and under the covers and we three kings were all warm.
During his teething period, Beuford shredded my slippers from Santa and chewed upon the digital camera, some DVDs and CDs and the zipper in my winter coat. Left in the car during a shopping trip for more doggie treats he chewed through the seatbelts in the back seat.
You could say the dog has been the gift that keeps on giving. My husband keeps the path to the clothesline cleared of those gifts. We have grown accustomed to his ways, including his voice. Hound puppies do not whimper. They are loud and even after his "little surgery" his voice is still shrill. He has become an early warning system that is activated only by his ESP.
"Well, I don't know. Hounds are pretty hard to train, but we'll do what we can with him," the puppy school teacher said. Beuford did well and graduated with honors wearing a cap and gown without losing his dignity but he quickly forgot all he learned.
Beuford celebrated his second Christmas this year. He's a big boy now. Eleven pounds too much said the vet. He can hear a the crinkling of a food wrapper from anywhere in the house and when he tilts his head and gazes at you with those big brown eyes he seems to say, "What ya got? Can I have some? Huh? Huh? He's happy and it shows when he chases the wind with his long ears flapping like wings of bird preparring for lift off or when he is on his back shuffling side to side with a wide toothy grin as he balances a ball between his front paws.
Beuford goes to bed on command now, on the palace kings side, because he knows his job is to keep the old man warm. Now it is Beuford who startles awake and asks, "do you hear what I hear?" when the old man tries to sneak a cookie from the jar in the dark of winter.
Our kids are pretty smart. They knew exactly what we needed in our old age. I hope all of you got what you needed for Christmas this year.
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