All That Noise

Sunday, February 12, 2012

Puck smashed through the door.
“I slept till night!”
“Huh…”
“I thought I was a monster!”
The intruder cuddled in between them.
“We have a little visitor!” he announced happily, as Snickers also joined the party. “She bursted in like a firework!”

It was unusual to arrive at a completely empty Snicketts house on a late Sunday morning. But Carrie-Bri and Elodie-Rose had driven a homemade dessert over to Memorial for the women’s shelter dinner, Joe was helping Yaotl move a new stove into his house, and the rest of the family had not yet returned from church. It wasn’t long, however, before the gathering began to reassemble for Carrie’s homemade taco dip (of which the hostess from Friday night’s female church shindig had requested the recipe) and arguing over who had hogged too many of the tortilla chips to accompany. Rose, who had apparently been sick, was feeling well enough to kick Francis in his derrière. Francis took a swing back at her.
“You can’t kick me!” Rose announced. “I’m sick.”
“Yeah,” Carrie said accusingly. “All she did yesterday was pat her stomach and say, ‘I think Fritos would help my throat feel better’.”
“And apparently forward clips about cats eating watermelon and David Hasselhoff music videos,” Collette laughed.
“She also had two bowls of cream of wheat,” Mom added.
Dad shuffled through a bag of conversation hearts.
“Did you eat all the purples?” he asked Collette.
As usual, he read every piece. Even inspected the blank ones to be sure, and made Mom read them as well. Mom had finally chucked the bag away. She couldn’t take anymore of the “Ur Hot”, “Text Me”, and “My Baby”.
As OLeif continued further studies in Dad’s basement office, the rest of the kids and Puck, including Joe, who had just returned to slather two slices of leftover cheese pizza with taco dip, convened in the living room to discuss everything as usual.
“Is it bad that I almost used my iPhone as a fork?” he asked.
Carrie nabbed Puck between bunny cuddlings.
“Don’t you want me to cuddle you like a bunny?” she asked him, reeling in the flailing limbs of the grumpy-faced little man.
“No, Sun! I have to drink my milk!”
Rose had discovered several prints of painted Arabian horses and their sultan masters that she was considering for future framing. She had also decided to employ Magnus in further original drawings for her living room. A consultation would commence in the near future.
At this point, a brief journal of Rose’s experiences camping at Cuivre River in 2003 surfaced, which Puck had found wedged above the set of 1993 encyclopedias. In addition to having been left out in the rain, the pages included little gems such as…

“I might be able to go fishing. I want to catch a fish big enough to eat. I hope Mom won’t mind cleaning it.”
“Today I got a new swimming suit because Trooper ate my other one.”
“I put my crawfish, fish, and snail in my fish tank. I think my fish got eaten.”

“Hey, Francis,” said Rose. “Remember the time I raked all that dirt into piles in the yard for you to play in, and then you got in trouble for getting dirty?”
Francis remembered.
He also remembered the time he and Creole had built their own dirt piles just before the lawn was mown so they could watch the dirt fly.
Francis wanted to go shooting at the shooting range.
“It’s closed,” Rose informed him.
“No, it’s not. It closes when I want it to close.”
“Stop patting your stomach. It closes at four on Sundays.”
“Why would you say that?”
But Rose was already moving on to other topics.
“Walgreen’s called to see if I was ok.”
Carrie walked by Joe and slapped him.
Puck emerged from the hallway carrying a large washer.
“Is this what God looks like?”
“No…”
“Does this look like the one true God? And this is one. God is three persons.”
Carrie was squishing Rose on the love seat.
“Stop kicking. Ow! My kidney!”
“Get off!”
“I’m trying to teach Rose affection.”
“Affection?! Let me poke your rib where it’ll pop!”
“It’s like fighting spaghetti. You can’t really win.”
“That’s because you stink!”
“Francis. Come sit on my lap and tell me all your wildest dreams.”
“I need a hair cut, Carrie,” said Joe. “I’m going out on meetings this week.”
However, before this situation could be properly addressed, he and Rose began quibbling about her unpaid parking ticket.
“I gave it to you and you lost it.”
“I didn’t. I gave it back.”
“No, you lost it.”
“You’re just a feather brain.”
Rose was diverted into explaining her current studies…
“I’ve decided that after I pass my Windows 7 test, I will reward myself by repotting my plants.”
She walked by Joe and slapped him.
By this hour, Mom and Puck had completed “Puck and Grandma Time”, and the ten compatriots of the family were joined together to destroy two bags of chocolates wrapped in foil stamped with witty sayings…
“Look at the stars!?” Rose squawked.
“Is my eyelid swollen?” asked Carrie.
“What are you? The stupid train going down the dumb-dumb tracks?” Joe asked someone, while checking the forecasted precipitation for Monday.
OLeif was poking Linnea in the ear at a rate of .4 miles per hour.
“Hey, Puck?” Joe asked. “When’re we gonna build that rocket?”
“When we get enough ‘cord’-board!”
“I was so mad at Benedict the other night,” Carrie was saying. “You know what he said? I would have punched him, except that we were in Ladue…”
“Let’s have a family sing-along,” Mom had suggested.
“Mom, Carrie already feels bad.”
“Who wants to take pictures of me?” Joe asked.
Rose was busy ordering a laundry sack and pepper spray. Something about complaints of “green hair” between the three younger girls, and Rose installing fifty-pound batteries at work… while curled up under the piano, plugging her ears against the cacophony. And Joe wiggled a stinky sock in the face of Linnea, who had removed herself to lounge on the floor.

So the evening hours were creeping in already. Carrie was considering joining Rose at a co-ed wedding shower with church folk in the city after her Skype date and Rose’s Bible study. Joe had fallen asleep on Mom’s and Dad’s bed after mentioning something about biking 50 miles in his room while listening to the Bible. Francis departed for his own Bible study. And Linnea joined Gretyl on a walk in the cold twilight.
As the little Silverspoon family was waved off into the night, Puck shared thoughts of the day.
“I’m going to keep Donkey in this peanut jar, because I’m afraid of ghosts.”
OLeif endeavored a mildly lengthy interactive explanation of the power of God against the works of evil forces and the unknown…
“So,” OLeif concluded, “when you’re afraid of ghosts, what can you do?”
“Lock Donkey up in a drawer.”
It wasn’t five minutes later, and a sleepy Puck threatened dreamland until Collette reminded them that he had to select his favorite scent of bubble bath at the store.
He chose Bubble Gum.
“Could I trouble you to carry this, Mama?” he asked when they returned to the parking lot.