Icebergs, iPods & Creamsicle Light OR How to Banish Those Stinky Brat Blues

Being grateful is a bit of an art. It takes practice..sure, but I have also noticed that some folks have a natural aptitude for it...as for me...I do it with considerably less panache. It has come easier to me since having my babies, as most moms will tell you. Any mention of sick babies, starving kids or abused teens has us running for our own babies and giving them bone-crushing hugs and sloppy kisses.


Still, I have to admit, that I can be slow to see the glory of the place I stand in, and far too fast to "lack to marvel". This week in particular I was having a righteous case of the "are you kidding me's". Really...snow again? REALLLLLYYYYY!!!! I mean sure, it's okay to look ahead to the magnificence of spring, but to throw a foot stomping (not that you could hear them stomping because they were still wrapped in wool socks) fit was a bit much, yes? But God decided to handle me like He always does...by being REALLLYYYY obvious...because honestly, I can be crazy dense.

So...I woke this morning feeling royally miffed as my blanket-warmed feet hit the cold floor. I schlepped my way to the kitchen, with my eyes obstinately squeezed shut, to pack my husband's lunch. I'm sure I looked like a mole as I rooted around in the fridge for anything that even remotely had the shape of ham and bread (poor hubby...I still don't know exactly what he ate for lunch that day). I opened the kitchen curtains before I grudgingly sat to read and pray. AND WHAT DO YOU KNOW?....There...laid out before me was an absolute banquet of beautiful...

The sun was so bright my eyes watered and the sky was so hard and cold and brittlely blue that I just knew had to put on boots and stand under it. I ran to the office and grabbed my camera and threw on my coat as I slipped out the back door...literally. Overnight, our whole yard had been turned into an icy wonderland. I felt my breath push out of me and fall right to the ground around my feet. Every surface was smooth with ice and the trees were dressed in white swags with frosty trinkets and charms. Sliding down the hill, I started clicking my camera; driven by an anxious feeling that I just had to capture it all. I pushed the button again and again until my fingers were too stiff.

When I looked back toward the house, I saw my boys' faces smashed against the kitchen windows. I crunched my way back to the house, and the very clear vision of myself this summer fault-finding with Michigan's dreaded heat and humidity had me laughing out loud. Yep, I got it (I mean even I have my limits of denseness ): Find the joy in every moment. The rest of the day had me wringing every minute of extraordinary out of it.

As evening comes now, the boys are all doing their nighttime things: my oldest is playing guitar hero (dreaming of his own band someday) and my middle guy is watching AFV (which is ALWAYS on somewhere in the world) and giggling at the babies and pratfalls (unless someone gets hurt and then I hear him say "hey, that's not funny"...which I love about him). My youngest has already been tucked into bed (protesting the whole way that he isn't sleepy), but is breathing evenly and completely silent by the time my foot hits the bottom stair.

The shadows are falling now as I swivel in my office chair and I turn my face toward the creamsicle light and wait for the last of it to melt down. I close my eyes so tightly that I see turquoise flashes on the backs of my lids like my own personal light show. I listen to Asia "Heat of the Moment" on my iPod with old school walk-man headphones (caught indefinitely between 1989 & 2011 and loving every minute of it ) and I shut out the sounds of the house behind me... the doggies, the dishwasher and the extra spin cycle of the washing machine. I can feel the dimness coming and my smile fades with the light...like the setting sun controls the corners of my mouth. But before the sun sets for good it flares one more time into brightness and my mouth curls up again and I delight in the idea that there's always something to be joyful about if I'd only just open my eyes a little wider.

ps...no surprise here, but our pupper got the right idea long before me... :)

BUT WAIT...THERE'S MORE!!

I was gaffawing and almost spit water through my nose this evening when I read the following online headline :

"Celine Dion's Exercise Trick"

Umm...ohhh....oooo, me...me... pick me.. I know what it is!!!  SHE'S CRAZY HORSE RICH AND 10 FEET TALL... For the low low price of $19,950,000.99 per Vegas show and a painful and costly surgery to lengthen my stubby gnome-like legs, I too can have Celine's Secret Exercise Trick...

Remind me to add that to MY workout regimen tomorrow morning!!

(ps....itty bitty disclaimer here...I never did actually click the link to see what the "trick" was....I was to busy trying to save myself from drowning in my own glass of water)

(pss...yes, yes...I know... she seems like a perfectly lovely woman...not hatin' just sayin')

(psss...in the interest of full disclosure...I was also making short work of a ginormous chocolate/peanut butter filled Easter egg ((that was the a demo for my son's youth group sale)) while reading this little ditty...don't judge....it was either that or gluten free crackers...I mean...come on!!)

"The Right and Wrong Way to Deliver Funeral Arrangements" Or "The Day I Almost Got Rubbed Out"

Sit down children. I want to tell you a little story. A story that shows that even in times of great loss; there can be great laughter…well, for my sister and me anyhow.

Picture it: Sicily, 1932....no wait, that's another short Italian...

Oh yeah. Eastpointe, 1995....

My uncle got my sister and me a sweet (pun intended...cheap but it was there) gig delivering flowers on Sweetest Day. We were working for a big florist in the Detroit area (starts with a "V" and ends with an "iano"). It was easy, really...wearing a uniform of jeans, sweatshirts and work boots; we would pick up and drop off flowers all day long. We got to drive a gigantic white van with sketchy steering. If you wanted to change lanes, you had to twirl the wheel about 3 times...it was very entertaining; almost like the witch's wheel at Cedar Point.

Things were going great. We ate and drank and laughed, all punctuated with the joy of delivering flowers to sweethearts across the Metro Detroit Area. What girl could ask for a better day? AND...To top it all off, I had called in sick to my regular J.O.B. for this little sanity break. The day was all rainbows and flowers and Big Macs and Lattes.
UNTIL...we stopped back at the shop for our next delivery.  My uncle seemed a little harried...which is saying something because he's usually so laid back you'd think he was high on his "Macho Man"cologne. Anywho, there seemed to be a lack of drivers and there was an important delivery that had to go out to a funeral home. My sissy and I were standing off to the side out of the way of all the commotion when my uncle spotted us (apparently there's only so much big hair you can hide behind foliage).

"Hey, you two, Come 'ere. I wants you two to go take these flowers over to "Super Italian Name Funeral Home". (The name has been changed to protect the aunt and mother of my children)

Sounded reasonable...so we nodded our heads okay and started loading up the truck. We were given directions and no further instructions. Easy ,peasy chicken pleasey...no problemo...just another delivery by the professional drivers from "V's" florist.  On our 25 minute drive we talked and laughed and had no inkling of the foolishness to come.

When we pulled up to "Dearly Departed Guido's are Our Business" we kind of scoped things out. I parked the van in the front row, and we hopped out and grabbed a bunch of the arrangements. We knew this was a somber occasion and we put on our best "condolence" faces. We walked through the front doors and looked for the little sign that said "Old-as-Dirt Italian So and So in here". The parlor was to the left, so we headed in with arms full of flowers. We quietly went to the front, so as not to disturb the wailing mourners, and started arranging the flowers around the casket (which either held Yoda or someone's great grandma).

There were various pillars and stands, and Mary and I conscientiously placed each arrangement for the maximum effect; debating the merits of one stand over another. We made sure each one is a little slice of paradise in its own right. As we worked, I realized the strident wails have died down. It's right around now that my Spidey senses kicked in. Mary and I shared a look that said "do we turn around?" We cowgirl up and did to find all twenty-ish people in the room staring open mouthed at us. The "Wailer" (every good Italian funeral has one) on the couch has her hanky over her mouth and she's shaking her head in confusion looking at us and then back to "Grandma Yoda" and back to us, and I now knew that something is probably not right.

Because Mary and I have the uni-mind, we circumspectly put down any un-positioned flowers and begin to back slowly out of the room. We spied one of the relatives marching back toward the office. Now I was sure some thing's off. We turned and booked it to the door with the funeral director in hot pursuit. I jumped in the driver's seat and started to take off as Mary hopped in the passenger's seat. The big van lumbered out of the parking, lot mostly on two wheels, and I put the pedal to the metal and went from zero to 35 in ...well like 2 minutes honestly, but we made our not-so-clean get-away.

Yep...something was definitely wrong with the execution of that delivery. We drove all the way back to "Vs" (in the "no cell phone smaller than a Buick" era) and asked my uncle exactly where and how one delivers funeral floral arrangements.

It seems that there is a door AT THE BACK OF THE FUNERAL HOME where one drops off arrangements to the blooo-bi-dee-blah FUNERAL DIRECTOR!! Drivers do not, in fact, arrange flowers around the casket themselves; however conscientiously and enthusiastically they "undertake" this task.
In my minds eye, I see Grandma Yoda's family laughing about this in the years following; praising us for bringing levity to a difficult day. "Thank God for those girls", they say over cannolis and coffee. "If we could only find them thank them personally."
In truth, my sister and I were saved having to move out of state only because we know people. I have never gone back to "V's" Florist. I have, in fact, been back to "Bring Us Your Deadiano's" funeral home. I just kept my hanky over my face while crying softly, "mia culpa, mia culpa".

"Quasimodo...It's Got a Certain Ring to It!!" or "My Mommy is Boris Karloff & Other Scary Tales"

So I'm totally having one of those days where I feel like I'm two neck-bolts and a zigzag scar away from being chased by villagers. You know those times, right? (please say yes, pleeeease say yes...or at least smile politely and nod your head at my lunacy)  I mean, seriously, it's one of those days where I feel like slippin' on a scratchy sack, changin' my name to Quasimodo and callin' it a day. What is up with that?!

And ps..Do dudes EVER feel like this?...
I'm guessing...ummm...wait for it...wait for it....
uh, NO.

Ah well...I guess you can't feel like

Wonder Woman every day :)...

So, I guess there's only one thing left to say,

"Good Eeeevening"

(channeling Boris Karloff ). 

Or as they say in the church tower/laboratory

(pronounced "La-bore-atory"),

"URRRGHHH, yes Master"