Inevitabilities

Grandgirls with their witch dummy from this past weekend. This was the first time they'd ever made a halloween dummy. Let it never be said that I don't pass on some quite valuable life skills to future generations.

I have a Murphy's Law kind of life. If the lid is going to fall off the salt shaker, it will be when I'm using it. If a tire is going to blow on my car, it will be during an ice storm when I don't have my cell phone. I've lived long enough that this is now acceptable, and I don't sweat it.

I spent yesterday running around doing a laundry list of annoying errands accompanied by Pap who is still crippled from his surgery so it took twice as long to do everything. No big deal, one of the errands was to the doctor to get his helpless bandage off and a walking cast on. Yay! Things were going smoothly, aside from the pounding headache that also kept me company all day. Just as we were wrapping things up by dropping his car at the shop to have the gas tank replaced it started to sprinkle. Still not a big deal, I had plenty of time to race home and put the cover on my leaky roofed car.

I'd piddled around doing house chores, checking mail... all that stuff you have to do because you're a grown up, while it started raining buckets outside. I took a bath and settled into the library with a book I'm editing and then realized I had one cigarette.

There are addictions, and then there is my addiction. Before I smoked I chewed my nails, before that I sucked my thumb. I'm a perfectly rational human being until I run out of cigarettes. I was wearing this very tacky t-shirt I've been sleeping in since I got it 10 years ago, it has one of those torsos in a bikini painted on the front, and the sweat pants I've also had for 10 years that are paint splattered, bleach spotted and overall raggedy. These are my comfort clothes, big, baggy, stretched out, non-fashionable - but comfortable. I wasn't thinking about what I was wearing while I contemplated my options. Mistake number one.

With Pap's car in the shop and mine under cover because of the rain, I had to wait for Princess to get home so I could use her car. She of course picked this night to stop on the way home for a capachino with friends, so by the time she did stroll in, even the cats were in hiding. I snatched her keys out of her hand, threw on some shoes (mistake number two) that were laying by the door and raced down the post midnight, dark, abandoned streets to our convenience store. When I arrived the store was empty, the clerk fetched my sanity sticks, I went to pay her and realized that I had no cash in my wallet and the checkbook was laying on the desk at home. Knowing that the bottom of my purse is always littered with misc. receipts, random earrings and change, I decided to dig around in there to get the necessary amount instead of going home for the checkbook. Mistake number three.

While I shuffled and dug and piled change on the counter people were wandering in, half way to reaching my goal a line had formed behind me, cranky people tapping their foot and sighing loudly. Eighty cents from completing my transaction I realized I'd emptied the well. I was frantically searching pockets of the purse, between the folds of my wallet, and under the flaps of my day planner, when a neatly manicured, male hand dropped a dollar on the counter. "That ought to cover it." The masculine voice said from beside me. This was when I knew that Murphy's Law was written just for me.

I never leave the house without my hair done and make up on. I'm goofy, but I love clothes and I'm normally very organized. I hold an elected position in town (the day job), so EVERYONE knows me, which is why I generally make a point to appear put together. I've been attempting to get a small business loan for my publishing company from our one and only bank. Most of the paperwork is done, it wasn't a cut and dried thing because it is a privately owned bank, the board can take any risk they want, turn down any project they want. The board was already a little nervous about my loan because publishing is a tough business, and we're so new. But, most recently they'd been leaning in my direction by virtue of my reputation as a professional.

The good samaritan was the president of that board. When I looked up to thank him, he was looking at me the same way you'd regard a roach in your tuna sandwich. He did the scan and scowl from my head to my feet... upon which were Princesses monkey slippers - the ones with the cute monkey faces slightly covered by their cute monkey middle fingers. That's when I remembered I also wasn't wearing a bra, and I was buying cigarettes. Oh well, our little company doesn't really need the debt.

Happy Bosses Day!

In consideration of National Bosses Day, some comments I found about OTHER people's bosses:

I thought my Boss was a bastard, and quit, to work for myself. My new Boss is a bastard, too ... but at least I respect him.

My boss has given automobile accident victims new hope for recovery. He walks, talks and performs rudimentary tasks, all without the benefit of a SPINE.

My boss says that what I call a glass ceiling, he calls a protective barrier.

Shame on these thankless people who fail to appreciate the great extremes the boss goes to everyday in their behalf. My employee would never say such things. She knows I'm her warrior, her shield between a productive living and the unemployment line. My employee knows that I would move heaven and earth to make her happy and she announces this fact loudly and frequently for the nominal fee of $20 a week.

What a Difference A Year Makes

Unlike my dog, our cats are not fond of the visiting grandgirls. In this rare moment of solidarity they huddle on the end table in the library that they are ABSOLUTELY FORBIDDEN to huddle on.

This weekend the grandgirls and their Mom stayed over. We used the time to decorate for Halloween inside and outside, and do some other things for the upcoming party. I couldn't help thinking as I watched my daughter with her kids, how much things have changed.

Thirteen months ago, at 3 in the morning, Pap and I were standing knee deep in filth attempting to get our crack addict oldest daughter to come home. We'd been summoned there in the middle of the night by a neighbor, one of many times they'd called us because the piece of shit that fathered her two youngest children was beating her up. On this day, both eyes were rapidly blacking, her cheek was cut and the hand shaped bruises on her arms were not nearly as horrifying as the ones on her neck.

Pap had called a police officer on our way over, he met up with us at her apartment door. The three of us talked, and talked and talked to the unkempt, jittery girl huddled on the sofa bed in the living room. We could have been talking to a wall, she wouldn't press charges because "it was my fault, he never does this sober."

This wasn't the first time we'd raced through the night to try and rescue her, and the children. We always went, she's our girl, our treasure, our oldest. But on this night, something just snapped in me, and I knew I couldn't help her, she could only help herself. We were able to have the two older girls removed and custody awarded to their father. She ran with Juliette, and moved around frequently enough we couldn't get a case going with Children's Services. She called from time to time, usually to ask for money which I wouldn't send, or to come home, which we wouldn't agree to except with conditions that she wasn't willing to meet.

She did'nt tell us she was pregnant with our new baby, but she did tell her sisters. They rallied, and went and got her and our now three year old. They were both infested with lice and scabbies, she was 7 months pregnant and had not seen a doctor... or stopped drinking and using. Bean, who makes her living as a social worker, took her and Jules in. Saw to it they got medical attention, counselling and a schedule. Pap and I provided money to Bean to help offset expenses and as we saw her really trying, we started inviting her for the weekends to give her a change of scenery.

Until Brendolynn was born the energy we put off worrying would have kept a major city in lights. The baby is perfect and thriving, but we still watch closely to make sure she's coming along mentally the way she should.

It's early yet, but watching my daughter out in the yard helping her girls fill bags with leaves, her hair a silky shining curtain down her back again, the sound of her laughter ringing through the neighborhood, gives me hope that she's turned the corner. Seeing her acceptance letter from OU in the nursing program leads me to believe she remembers who she is and where she came from. She's remembered what has value in life and what is just wasting time.

It's going to be a good year. I feel my heart repairing.

Nanny Dog on Duty

Ruger adores our new baby and has fussed himself crazy since Grandgirls Mom first brought her over. He sleeps by her basinet if she's in it, hovers by her baby seat if she's in it. Paces and races between grown people if she's making ANY sound at all. On this day, she was having a little tummy time with her Mom and Bren was not liking it, which made the dog insane with worry. He didn't calm down until Bren's Mom let him hop up and check her out real good. He's very gentle with her, I suspect they'll be best friends when she starts to toddle around.

Rug's behavior with the baby is interesting to me. We know he became ours because his original family had a baby after they had him, they didn't elaborate more than that. He has pretty much ignored the older grandgirls, once in awhile he'll bring some toy to Jazz for a game of fetch, but he even does that lethargically. But he loves, adores and worships this little baby. He pays her the attention we devote to a cherished object we've lost and later found.

Friday Night Lights...C-ville Style

NOTICE:

The football team will be entertaining before and after tonights performance by the cheerleaders.

I live in a football town. On Friday nights every household empties out and heads to the football field. It would be a good time to rob the place, because all the cops are there too. Despite a diminutive population of under 3,000, they won the state championship in 1977. They didn't see another winning season until 2003, the year my son was a senior. We start 'em young around here, the picture is of my oldest grandgirl, Jazzmin, who's in third grade. The boys her age are already playing biddy league football. All the hitting, spiking and running of the real game, with miniature players, and miniature cheerleaders.

I don't have a problem with school spirit. I don't really have a problem with football. What I do dislike about our football program is the town's tendency to make them little demi-gods. There are men off that 1977 team who are still living in 1977. That was the pinaccle of their life. I find that so sad. To have your best day ever before you're even old enough to vote. It's not quite that bad anymore.

The 13 boys that played football with my son started together in biddy league. They were undefeated all the way to High School. High hopes don't 'cha know, the pressure on these fella's was unbelievable. Their freshman and sophomore years they won more than they lost, but you must be undefeated to go to state. Junior year they lost one game. The summer before their senior year you could cut the tension in town with a knife.

They started two a days in August. I'd watch them running past the house before daylight. No talking, just the rolling thunder of sixty pairs of feet, the column led by the senior thirteen, pounding the streets to get in shape. They did everything together, my son and his twelve best friends. Dating, studying, getting into trouble, there were always 13 boys. They play 10 games a season, more if they win the district, then sectionals and then state.

They took the field that first game of the season to record attendance. They were the team to beat. Alumni flew in for the game from everywhere. All the local papers were represented, the radio stations and even the TV. It didn't get any better, they won, and won, and won. Two games from taking the district, the quarterback hurt his wrist goofing around at practice and they lost their next two games. Still a good season, but the men around this town were devastated, and didn't hesitate to let those boys know it.

My son had never made football his life, he's interested in lots of things, so this was just a ripple on the pond of life. Most of his teammates felt the same. What was important to them was their friendship, the brotherhood they formed over their years together. At the banquet that year, the tables were set up to seat four at each. As the boys wandered in they started pushing them together, until all 13 were sitting at one big table.

Four of those boys went into the military, eight went to college and will graduate this summer, one is being bailed out of jail as I write this, drunk and disorderly. The quarterback.