Chapter Forty-Seven
So in good news, the buns [as in fuzzy] were doing well following rabbit surgery, even if a little sore. And in the worst bad news I could conjure, my dreams had been inadvertently and mostly just suggestively laced with images of Singham and his gravity-defying world. And then those stupid smoke detectors blistered my ear drums – again – before the breakfast bacon even came out of the oven. [One thing’s for certain, we’ll never experience anything on the level of Mrs. O’Leary’s cow around here.] I also discovered that draping nine strips of bacon across a muffin tin is a more effective way of catching grease than a drip pan, probably mostly because my drip pan was currently being used for Puck’s rocks-in-plaster dig. But not as easy to clean, I should note for future. I exited the shower some time later smelling of cucumber and green tea – I hope – to the blasting chorus of my son singing the SpongeBob SquarePants theme song to the cat on the couch while he built Legos. I really don’t understand the continued references to this talking sea sponge. Puck rarely ever watches it. Unless my siblings are stuck simultaneously babysitting and snoozing through biology lectures in the other room, which eventually ends up being a slow migration back to SpongeBob only. Hey, on some level, a 2-D cartoon marine animal counts as biology. Even if you’re old enough to legally smoke.
“You can’t escape, Crackers! Peach!”
“Why do you keep calling her peach, bud?…”
“Because she likes peaches.”
Crackers has never even seen a peach, in my recollection. But the kid has his reasons… Also, The Bear basically commanded me to make a purchase this morning. My Valentine’s gift he said. I’ve had my eye on this rather expensive National Geographic genealogy DNA kit for some time. The lure of intricate cross-cultural percentage spreadsheets and thousands of years of color-coded pie charts is just too much. And Joe already agreed to take the official saliva swab. [It works best with the male line.] So I hope to have an official, final, professional break-down of where we come from in the next few months. I can’t say I’m not hoping for a little Native American history in there somewhere. Also Icelandic, which I’m not sure they can prove, exactly… Speaking of people… until you’ve personally witnessed the… unusual tribe of folks we like to call “home schooled kids in the nearby suburbs during the 1980’s and beyond”, you can’t fully appreciate the level at which these guys [and I have to include myself in this math problem] are fully acquainted with each other around here. I think it’s a fair statement to repeat that my brother is good friends with his sister’s husband’s sister’s brother-in-law’s sister’s part-Hasidic-Canadian husband. So I guess it’s about time to introduce a little new blood to the equation. Hence Lulu from Kentucky, into the Silverspoon family. But also home schooled… We sometimes have trouble cracking that mold. And Christian schools don’t count as authentic mold-breakers. Anyway, I bring all that up because this week Gloria announced that Curly and Lulu would be flying into Rome for the honeymoon sometime in mid-May. Yeah, way too much irrelevant backstory for that one-line piece of information. I’m all for a good itinerary though… Puck gave The Bear a hugging squeeze after Andy Griffith lunch…
“I love you so much, Dad.”
“More than the Earth?”
“Yes!”
“More than Mars?”
“Yes! More than all the planets!”
It goes both ways… We finally got going before two. Just a handful of errands. Target. Dark skinny jeans for my boy. White hi-polymer erasers for my big boy. Puck wears out jeans about a half fraction less fast than his dad. We were also supposed to pick up something munch-able to toss on the snack table for all the kids with coughs and colds and coughed-up hands on Sunday morning. I always find myself a little resentful of this. When The Bear innocently suggested we pick up a bag of Schnuck’s bakery cookies, I think my jaw dropped in shock. I’m no foodie, but there is no way I’m spending good money on good cookies for preschoolers who don’t have the common sense not to sneeze February illness all over the lemon squares and brownies in the church foyer every Sunday. So… I was super tempted to grab a package, each, of freeze-dried corn kernels and freeze-dried peas. That’d show them. We ended up with a package of knock-off Fig Newtons [small wicked laugh] instead. I was mildly appeased. Then all I had to do was escort our son out of the store without being distracted by all the unique textures, shapes, and colors that Target offers, or curiosities like sidewalk chalk color-labeled as “macaroni and cheese”.
We got over to the Silverspoon’s eventually. Theodore was taking apart the metal box-shelves in the garage to transfer to our place. Two dozen pink, peach, yellow, and cream roses sat in a silver vase on the counter – Gloria’s valentine. She drove back to join us on a walk – Puck, myself, and Sebastian. We encountered a much younger fluffy and curly-haired canine specimen on our cold jaunt, who thought my Israeli scarf was a chew toy. Maybe I should stop wearing that particular article of clothing outside the house… The Bear suffered another head-neck-ache and employing the patched red rice pack around his shoulders. Gloria had also brought back special deli meats, gouda, and muenster for sourdough panini and sent us off with several recently adjusted green plants and promise of new silver-gray sheets for the bed because The Bear’s hands snagged on the high thread-count sheets we currently own [also from Gloria]. We never leave empty-handed. In fact, we always feel rich, for more than a few reasons, whenever we drive home from being with family.
