From Mountain Home to Sydney
Monday, June 25, 2007
It had been busy.
After a total of five and a half hours on the road, a cooler of cheese, crackers, salami, and Reeses peanut butter cups, and a stop in a tiny dust-blown town to feed Puck his bottle, they arrived in Mountain Home, Arkansas, one of OLeif’s home towns.
Collette had been surprised with the beauty of the southern country. Blue hills in the summer haze, brilliant orange butterfly weeds, thick red dirt, deep green woods and rolling yellow hills passing far into the distance…
Even Mountain Home had some small town charm. Although her original image of a backwoods overgrown one gas-station, one tiny grocery store (or maybe no grocery at all) town seemed to dissipate the nearer they approached their destination.
To Collette, it was like seeing OLeif as a young boy for the first time. He had lived in Mountain Home from nine till he was twelve. Although from his many memories there, it seemed as though it had been a longer portion of his life.
While OLeif attended Arthur Duncan’s wedding rehearsal, Puck and Collette crashed a bit in the hotel until he returned to bring them to the rehearsal dinner at Cooper Park. The air was humid and heavy. And storms were in the air.
Collette and Puck were greeted by the whole Duncan family upon entering the small reception room. America waved a hello from her table as did Holly-Kate Candlewick, whom Collette was to meet for the first time. She had seen pictures of her before, but her red hair was gone, replaced with blonde. Collette soon found that both she and her brother, Patmos Checkers, had the sort of faces that one had to keep looking at, for some reason.
“Hey, Collette,” Arthur tapped her on the shoulder and gave her a hug. “You dyed your hair, I see. Not as drastic a change as your husband here.”
“Yeah,” OLeif laughed. “He didn’t even recognize me at first.”
Arthur was one of those types of guys who had “courteous” labeled on every bone of his body. How he could even possibly notice that Collette had a rather subtle different color of hair since the last time he had seen her, three years ago, she couldn’t know.
Dinner was already served – stuffed chicken, vegetables, rolls, and the traditional sweet tea (for which Collette simply could not acquire a taste). They sat with half of the Duncan family and Sherlock Nibblelung (who had also been in OLeif’s and Collette’s wedding), his wife, Shirley, and their son, William.
Collette had forgotten the tradition of many southern girls. Their particular habit seemed to involve pristine clothing, jewelry, well-groomed hair, neatly-done make-up and nails, and they were often tanned. Collette usually felt doppy upon entering the south. Arthur’s soon-to-be-wife, Kathy Swim, was made-up in such a manner as she sat daintily slicing her chicken and carrying on conversation with the table in her charming southern drawl.
Meanwhile, OLeif and Sherlock were swapping old tales of childhood – the potato guns and tarp-tents, arguing over theology…
“Arthur and I pretty much argued over what our parents believed, and Sherlock kept telling us that friends should never discuss politics or religion.”
America and her mother, Miss Annie, took their turns holding Puck. It was good to see America again. She was still working in Alaska where “her intended”, all of fifteen and a half years older than herself, was a school teacher to high school students.
“Just look at her living a glamorous single life in Alaska,” Shirley was saying.
“Oh, it’s not always glamorous,” America shook her head, smiling at Puck. “It’s more like waiting around for your man to finally marry you. But he will eventually.”
Puck and William seemed to hit it off. William, who was having a fussy evening, was occasionally joined by Puck, who was obliged to offer sympathy cries as he felt so led. Collette and Shirley laughed with their husbands over their past shenanigans, and the evening was soon brought to a close.
The next day, OLeif drove them around to the two houses where the Silverspoons had lived during the three years, both tucked under old trees. The first house sat on a yard which sloped down to a small valley and back up another hill. Then there was the Duncan house, situated on the other side of a quiet highway.
Soon it was time to meet up with Denae, Curly, and Izzy, who had also arrived for the wedding and to visit with old friends. OLeif, Collette, and Puck entered the church just in time for OLeif to change into his best-man tux as the storms rolled into Mountain Home.
The wedding was short and sweet – a large party – about twenty persons altogether. America played the cello. The girls waltzed to the front in sunny pink and mint green dresses. And the ceremony was soon finished without any extras, save for their first communion together which was commemorated by the sound recording of Arthur’s violin playing Meditation from Thais. After the wedding party had departed from the altar, the audience sat waiting in their seats until America (who was still sitting by her cello near the piano), called out to them cheerfully:
“Ya’ll can go now.”
The reception was longer and louder. After OLeif had given a simple and heartfelt toast to his old friend, the dance floor was soon filled with youngsters and high school kids displaying little to no embarrassment while performing the usual wedding dances.
“The Southern Baptists are just falling over right now,” America laughed as the young crowd shimmied to Mambo No. 5.
“Is this song appropriate for a wedding?” Arthur asked, somewhat concerned. “I guess I didn’t check over the play-list very well.”
But the young crowd didn’t seem to mind.
“Can I dance with him?” Arthur asked, holding out his arms to Puck.
Puck spent a few minutes on the dance floor and was returned before the bouquet-toss.
Out on the table, aside from the larger white wedding cake, a smaller cake shaped and iced into a firetruck, sat next to the guest book. (Arthur was going to become a fire fighter).
Before Puck and his new-found baby friend parted ways, OLeif introduced them to their first greeting.
“Knuckle bump,” he held out Puck’s fist to William’s.
And Sherlock bumped William’s fist into Puck’s.
As they left the reception, OLeif and Collette said their goodbyes to Arthur.
“That’s my wife,” Arthur said proudly, admiring little Kathy from across the room.
They were off to Cancun for a week.
Then the Silverspoon’s headed out to a Mexican dinner at a nearby restaurant as the rain brushed through the town.
Meanwhile, Puck had managed to remain an angel baby through the lack of good cold air conditioning on the long drive, the hauling around to and fro from place to place, and he slept through the night in unfamiliar settings.
He looked around in wide-eyed thought, pondering the Mexican restaurant hardly giving a peep except for a laugh here and there at Curly’s funny faces and at Denae who held him on her lap during dinner.
Sunday saw another drive home, made longer by the heavy traffic at one heated point of the day. Puck amused himself watching the brown and white pattern of his mom’s skirt hung over his car seat to shield him from the sun, while Collette washed down his warm little arms, legs, and neck with cool cloths.
Finally it was back once again to St. Louis and an early celebration for Rose’s 17th birthday. After Dad sent Joe to haul in Cecil Whittaker’s, Rose opened her pile of gifts, including an iPod sound system from Joe, three coloring books of the coral reef, ancient Egypt, and the seven wonders of the ancient world and a deck of National Geographic nature playing cards (which Collette had spied at a grocery store back when she was about to pop) from OLeif, Collette, and Puck, and a dragonfly tea light holder and money toward her new iPod (which she had already purchased) from the family.
The weekend ended after a long, but good, three days.
Monday dawned to the reminder that Carrie-Bri and Eve were headed out on a 4:47pm plane to Sydney after stopping first in Denver and L.A.
Elazar had called Carrie and Eve earlier that morning to confirm plans.
“Even though we speak the same language, there’s still a barrier there,” Carrie was saying. “I couldn’t really understand everything he was talking about for our first day in Sydney. Something about dinner and koalas and a bridge… And I didn’t know they say ‘gee whiz’ over there. When he said that, Eve had to take over the conversation. I was cracking up.”
After Carrie had finished her last term paper (after another 28-pager earlier that evening) at 12:30am the night before, she packed her backpack Monday morning. Once finished, she sunbathed on the roof with a cup of tea. Come early afternoon, Mrs. English, Eve, and Annamaria picked up Mom and Carrie to head for the airport at two o’clock.
What thrills awaited.