Ch. 233; Vol. 10
The 10:24PM Tuesday night text I had missed from Carrie:
“Hospital just called. Gma has blood clots in her lungs. Life threatening.”
Ug.
Sort of like Great Grandma Jewel had been all her life, Grandma Snicketts was basically healthy. But a fall makes dominoes, especially with low oxygen levels. Which… was where Grandma now found herself at the age of 84.
Carrie and I walked into the hospital several hours later.
The big, bright windows were promising as we took the elevator up a few floors. But I wondered if maybe “the end was soon near”.
Naturally, Grandma surprised us.
Aunt Corliss was already there. Grandma, talking – a lot – remembering details from decades ago that I had forgotten, stubborn of course, and in a good mood.
Also, half a giant chicken salad sandwich and a slice of cheesecake for lunch only helped more.
She doesn’t even have to try to fight. It just comes naturally, I guess.
Linnea walked in the front door – red-faced from the heat – selling tubs of volleyball cookie dough with a friend.
“Do you know who the Flinstones are, Collette?”
Society had failed my sister.
Then she left for QT and World Market [pomegranate sodas] before some kind of kiddie pool youth party at church.
I tried to convince Puck to take another drive on his bike later that afternoon, but the chap had other plans…
“I don’t want to risk going to the emergency station. You’re not getting me interested in it, Mom. I promise.”
“Puck we have a problem.”
“What, Sun?”
“You haven’t given me a kiss yet today.”
Puck just stared back at her.
“You know, that’s illegal in some countries?”
“Uh huh…”
“I could call the police and say, ‘My nephew didn’t give me a kiss today.’”
Puck was really trying to figure out the validity of this one. Wasn’t too convinced yet…
“That’s what they do in the Netherlands,” Carrie added the clincher.
I’m pretty sure the prize was obtained.
Francis met Mom and myself at church to gather tables and chairs for his Eagle ceremony on Friday. The boy who leaves salami petri dishes in the basement. The chap who – because of his sanitation habits, or lack thereof – requires this sign written by Mom to be left on the basement door…
There was an almost-complete Silverspoon reunion that evening. Curly and Lulu were in town. Kitts and Mini Elvis had flown in early that afternoon. Only Relevance was stuck down in Austin. So dinner was waiting at the Silverspoon’s.
Fried zucchini chips, slabs of meat, and something about cheesecake by Curly and Lulu that wouldn’t be set until midnight.
A wide-eyed sticky-up-haired baby sitting in his uncle’s arms.
“He is a stout kid,” was Bær’s verdict. “Like a block of wood. There are no organs in there. Just meat.”
Of course on the ride home when I drove across the train tracks without looking, Puck had some choice words…
“Mom. You should have looked.”
“You’re right. I wasn’t thinking about it.”
“Well, don’t blame me if you get to Heaven because the train crashed into us.”
Sometimes I wonder what percentage of this child is actually a man in his 70’s, father of four, grandfather of eleven.