If Dreams Were Reality
I never know what to think about a day that ignites with dreams of parched red corn ears cooked in milk, orange-mangos that grow without peels, and square dancing exhibitions at church featuring Clayton Kershaw of the LA Dodgers…
Dad’s daily devotion covered death this morning, and mentioned the age-old concept “naked I come, naked I go”. Puck had a qualm to unpack…
“You are naked when you die?”
“Well… your soul’s naked; let’s put it that way.”
“Why?”
“Well, does you soul need clothes?”
“No… But. The people on earth still are not naked, right?”
“Right…”
Breakfast. Usually I know there’s going to be trouble when dialogue runs like this… “Puck, what is that for?” “Nothing. Just for ‘a experient’.” Next time I looked over, he was brushing Crackers with an old toothbrush dipped in a glass of water. Unbelievably, she seemed to enjoy the “experient”, if not tolerate it. “She has to be washed!” he declared in Ronald Reagan charisma. As he reported later, “I think those cats want me to get in trouble by making me want to touch them.”
Actually, I wouldn’t be entirely surprised if that was true.
I’ve actually started to forget to check the daily temperature lately. Granted, I always have an eye on the sky. As I write this nonsense, the exploding red bulb under glass is about to squeeze past the top notch, like in early 1950’s cartoons, and explode into a zone we like to call – UN-NA-TU-RAL. Picture, if you will, that last word echoed in the voice of a power-glutted under-lord about to rise from a lightening-zapped abyss to flatten the over-world spilling out in lush green gardens and rainbows. [Well… not the rainbows. I have a problem with rainbows. And probably not for the reason you’d think. But that’s another thought completely…] Anyway, the ever-deducing oracles claim that the afternoons of July the 24th and July the 25thwill split the Fahrenheit measure of 107. And for anyone living north of Houston… that should be very impressive. Should be. Except that we’ve already had a handful of those since June anyway.
Puck decided he wanted to write up his own prayer cards for his writing lesson today. So out came a deck of index cards and a pack of markers in all colors. I think this kid loves paper more than I do.
By the way, you know I’m busy when I completely forget about the giant dark chocolate Hershey’s bar on top of the piano until four o’clock in the afternoon.
Despite my son’s sharky appetite, he still looks for every excuse in the book to get out of sitting through an entire meal. This evening, after dismissing himself to the bathroom – which was taking an extraordinarily long amount of time – he finally returned to my calls with a stethoscope plugged into his ears, listening to the kitchen countertop. “You think there’s something in there, boy?” I asked, ordering him back to his chair. “Yup,” he shrugged. “Who knows? Treasure.” He then proceeded to share his own whack-dreams from the previous night. “…and a pair of scissors snapped all by itself… and you know those little false gods? There were some of those by a little house. And I also saw us taking a trip in the big green van together.”
Guess it’s not just me.
Sometimes even I’m surprised by the things that have to come out of my mouth if I need to leave the room for a minute or two. “Puck, get your foot off the table. Only Vikings eat like that. And they don’t even exist anymore.”
The evening transversed into the unusual territory of Rose IM-ing me “not” to Google image search John Stamos’ bellybutton.
Anyway, to make things worse, I was beginning to think my Clayton Kershaw dream had evil sub-qualities around the time he actually pounded Lance Berkman squarely on his recently surgeried right knee at the plate, shortly later removing Puma from the game. How about I just do-si-do you back to Dallas, mister.
Not really.
Oh brother.
Thoughts of the Day
I made another stupid-off-the-bat resolve to myself yesterday while brushing Puck’s teeth at 6pm. That resolve being – “I’m going to be perfect from this moment onwards.”
Again.
I’m not talking Elsie Dinsmore here – yes, I was home-schooled in the 90’s – but something practically perfect in every way. And, no, I don’t mean it at all, because I know it’s impossible. But kudos for effort, right, Benjamin Franklin? The man who sighted “Cleanliness” as one of the top thirteen must-have virtues. As… I eat a burrito on the couch in a holey Coca-Cola t-shirt, faded running shorts, and haven’t washed my hair in three days… O, Collette… I told you baseball season makes me mad. And by mad, of course, I mean crazy.