Failure to Glow

Friday, September 16, 2011
In which the balloons of St. Louis are put on the visitation schedule…

Back on the ranch…
Rose had taken a sick day. Bad cold.
She discussed her possible roommate, who worked at the seminary library. She seemed a good prospect…
“She’s also read The Secret Life of Lobsters.”
“Who reads that?”
“It was actually a popular book for awhile…”
“Seriously?”
“It’s interesting. Lobster eyes are reflective. They’re all a bunch of perfectly spaced mirrors.”
Rose then went on to explain her murderous dream in Germany.
And she had found out that she was not a good candidate for Lasik.
Meanwhile, Joe and Francis hustled down the street to help their neighbor’s red-headed daughter, who was expecting her fourth child, move a dollhouse.
Carrie was working the gold protein into her hair.
Missoni sweaters…
Andy returned from the neighbor’s…
“There are mice in my room, by the way.”
From the kitchen…
CRASH!
Splintering glass and china everywhere.
“I’m sorry, Grandma! I’m sorry! Will you forgive me?!”
The poor kid had only knocked his head against the wall, which managed to knock the not-exactly-earthquake-proof-arranged plate off the shelf above the glass spread beneath it, and, well… the anticipated disaster.
In the aftermath… Rose saw the whining Snuggles at the door.
“It’s time to torture him! You are setting a terrible example for my cat when he gets here.”
Even Mom had had enough of the excessive whining, and may or may not have taken a swat at him with a throw pillow.
“Well, I’m off to listen to a real theologian now,” Carrie announced, retiring from the kitchen.
“Oh,” Dad teased. “You want to listen to John MacArthur. Good!”
Carrie gave him a warning smile.

The store for Mom and Collette. Skull and crossed-bones glow-in-the-dark adhesive nails for Linnea, lamp oil, S. Pellegrino, soft wattage light bulbs, six jumbo gourmet lollipops (in root beer, orange creamcicle, cinnamon bun, and strawberry-banana). Chunky candles in Mulled Cider and Evergreen & Cedar. And… the one thing Wal-Mart did well, maybe even better than King Reeses — peanut butter cups.
And Lowe’s for a yellow mum and Lambskin applicators for Rose’s dresser.

When they returned…
Linnea was a little bummed that she was required to wear the ‘sparkly pink headbands’ for their match that night.
Joe was leaving on the Ruckus to hang out with a buddy. [His work week spanned Monday to Thursday.]
Dad’s replacement cell phone had arrived in the mail.
Mrs. Marbles down the street had sold her house.
Some lectures given from the collective family base to Linnea, who had convinced herself that she had single-handedly lost their match the previous evening…
And Puck and Donkey were once again, inseparable.
“Earnest popped the stitches in his incision,” said Carrie. “He was doing the army crawl under the dresser while Francis was moving the book shelf for me…”
Dad checked it out; a two o’clock appointment was arranged at the bunny specialist.

As the afternoon progressed…
Linnea was scraping a chunk of glass on the porch, the remains of the morning’s miniature earthquake.
Collette walked through the living room and stepped on something squishy, what seemed to be some rather dead pasta mashed on the sole of her moccasin.
“Mama,” Puck advised seriously, “Pray to God to ask Him. He knows what that is on your shoe.”
Carrie and Puck had a water-drinking contest.
And Carrie was to be personal chef for the night to Mom, Dad, and their humorous friend from church, Chuck Riverside, whose wife seemed to have taken the Mega Bus for a weekend away at a quilting convention.
On the menu for the evening:

French Dips
Caesar Salad
I’m Dreaming of a White Christmas Soup
Irish Cream Bundt Cake with Vanilla Ice Cream

Puck took a jaunt outside with Linnea while Rose retrieved the mail…
“Onion! You got the mail sick!”
She had also refused to have the cobweb removed from her window outside…
“No. He’s been there all year.”
“We should have mummy-unwrapping parties like they used to do,” she said, once back inside. “They used to fill trains with them, there were so many.”
And some Vitamin D for Collette and Rose on the porch.
Carrie returned with her baby inside his Italian carrying case. He was arranged in, what the vets called, an ‘Elizabethan collar’. He was rather distraught as a result…
“They kept laughing,” said Carrie, “saying what a strong-willed bunny he is.”
A quick drive with Rose in the Fiat — she had decided against the Italian striping — and a return to find Francis driving off Linnea for her next match. And Puck ran up to Collette waving a dollar bill in his hand…
“Look what Uncle Francis gave me! Now I can buy free ice cream!”
After another return, Francis was sent out once again for sour cream or some other grocery article. As predicted, Collette saw him coming up the walk with a package of Chewy Chips Ahoy! and a silly grin on his face…
“Had to make it worth my while.”
“Don’t let them get near me.”
“I think I’ll just set them right… here.”
He opened the package on the table in front of her and tossed one of the little cookies onto her notebook, spreading chocolate smudges over the paper…
“Oops,” he said with a grin.

At 5:30, Magnus arrived to join them, ‘them’ being: Collette and Puck, Joe, Rose in Native-American-Zulu sweater, and Francis, to the Forest Park Balloon Glow.
On the way, they kept informal tally of the drivers who were busy texting behind the wheel…
“It’d be funny if that guy texting ran into that guy texting.”
“And they hit someone jay-walking who was texting.”
“‘I can’t believe that guy was texting and driv…’ Smash.”
“And somewhere a butterfly is flitting his wings over South Africa.”
“As it usually happens…”
“Guys, what if I drop a pin on a turtle and make him go into the water? Am I a life force? Let’s talk about deep stuff, guys. Let’s talk about theology and religions and stuff.”
“All religions except for the one I grew up with.”
And Magnus and Rose counseled Puck on the dangers of being squished by the crowds during the Glow. Puck was not convinced…
“I’m pretty strong,” he touted, somewhere around removing the packet of raw sugar that Rose had stuffed down his sweatshirt.
They met OLeif on location… Well, that had been the idea. Once again, similar to the fiasco of 2009, not a single parking spot was to be discovered as they drove from one end to the other. Puck shed a few tears, but was quickly soothed by the suggestion of dinner… sarnies, as the Scots say it: turkey and cheese or ham and cheese on the best machine-made rolls of all time: Hawai’ian sweet butter. Pringles in cans of Darth Vadar Red and Luke Skywalker Green.
Back home, including Francis after his wine-country-backroads-Friday-night-constitutional in the light rain, for Magnus’ last-minute choice of Dial M for Murder over a large meat-stuffed pizza and the Little Debbie’s.
Rose, poor girl, after having raked in only two hours of sleep the previous night, could hardly keep her eyes open at all. The crew departed around ten o’clock.

And as usual, life was pretty much a grand My-Big-Fat-Greek-Wedding-meets-Mayberry… rough patches included.