Ch. 159; Vol. 10
I didn’t really feel like attending a VBS leaders meeting for two hours Saturday morning. But you do what you have to do. I dropped off my boys at the Silverspoon’s and chugged over there to find out what I had signed myself up for in a week or so.
The tree-mold-heat-pollen and Midwest gunk and bi-polar weather patterns had messed with my head for over a week. The loopyness of the situation even altered my capabilities to read accurately from a distance. Driving through Cottleville and reading an above-head street banner as…
“International FOOL Festival”
…instead of…
“International FOOD Festival”
…is one example.
I left early from the leaders’ meeting. After I skipped out early on the involuntary line dancing lessons in anticipation of a cowboy-themed Vacation Bible School. Besides, I was half-dizzy from millions of surfing invisible organic spores.
Anyway, back in the refreshing cool of the Silverspoon house, my Puck was getting ready to watch some Babar while The Bear worked through wedding photography pricing lists with Izzy.
Gloria came back with roasted salted cashews which Theodore could “eat all night” as he put it, and…
“I got you something because I’ve been gone for so long,” she told me.
Reeses Klondike bars.
Theodore joined the boys grilling on the deck where The Bear singed the hairs off his hand. Puck was giving Gloria lessons in Minecraft from his station on the counter…
“Sometimes you can ‘spawned’ dogs, too.”
“Spawn, eh?”
“That’s how you get dogs sometimes, if you’re impatient.”
“Oh. Are you American?”
“Sometimes you can put a bone on your schedule and a spawnding dog thing so you can spawned a dog.”
There was beef. And pork, and chicken. And fruits and veg and homemade guacamole. Corn on the cob, which made Puck’s eyes light up…
“Could I have a CORN STICK, MOM?”
He made small talk with the neighbor as we left…
“Whatcha doin’? Cleaning your driveway?… Sure is dirty, isn’t it?… Hot day. Isn’t it?”
Shakespeare.
We were taking another crack at it.
Joined by a styrofoam cooler of lime and grapefruit La Croix, and too much Trader Joe’s for our own good, I suppose. Plus half a warehouse of blankets to carpet the green at the corner right of the stage in the warm afternoon of a Saturday park packed with too many people.
“Ah, wine and bug spray,” Carrie observed. “The smells of summer.”
The three sisters joined us with Red Strike and his wife and people from India, Egypt, Peru, Texas, and wherever else all these thousands of people come from, before the primary production at eight. And not before Puck had made friends with a young guy sitting in the shade – Mr. Tom – to whom Puck offered a can of grapefruit La Croix. A little geocaching with The Bear…
“Come on, Dad! I’ll beat ya to the freezer box so we can get something delicious to EAT!”
“So… Puck?” I asked him later during our three-hour wait-and-snack, “What are the chances of you falling asleep during the play?”
He replied in all Kindergarten seriousness, “I don’t think you should count on that.”
He didn’t fall asleep.
But he sat like a charm. He laughed on his own cues. And had only one real comment to make during the whole production, which was a question…
“Where is Shakespeare?”
Lucy, Red Strike’s wife – a professional pastry chef and circus arts instructor – started up a game of toss-and-catch with Puck. A pocket kleenex pack and apple fruit leather. Puck was having the time of his life…
“I think Puck’s found a new crush,” Carrie grinned.
[*Photos by The Bear.]