Indian Summer, Red October
“Mom, can you set my old clothes out tomorrow so I can be ready for the mud path?”
Two bright eyes stared back at me in the rear view mirror. It was almost eight o’clock on a Wednesday night, and Puck was already making plans for Thursday’s Quiet Hour.
“Sure, pal.”
He grinned. “Good. So I will be prepared to muddle up the backyard. I love gooey stuff. It’s a boys’ life.”
On Thursday, while I prepared breakfast, Puck serenaded me from the kitchen table. “GOOD BILL NEVER WON! GOOD BILL NEVER WON! GOOD BILL NEVER WON! HE WAS A GOOD MAN, BUT HE… NEVER WON!!”
I don’t know either.
So that “mud patch” during Quiet Hour, turned into the expected hodgepodge of mud, buckets, water, and even a very large lump of charcoal – still not sure where that came from – which Puck dubbed his “charcoal crayon” and sketched on the house brick. Added various bits to his “charcoal soup”, and requested an old cloth to clean up. I tossed it to him, where it landed with a flop on the porch.
“Sorry, pal.”
“Cloths don’t fly too well,” he replied. Don’t blame yourself.”
Then the bathroom flooded again, courtesy of Puck. Dish soap and boiling water eventually solved the continuing natural disaster. To help out, while I scalded porcelain, Puck brushed and wiped down Crackers…
“I need another wipe for her, Mom. I want her to look as pretty as a bobcat!”
4:00: Game One: NLDS. Fortunately, they took care of things early and erased any tremors by the third inning, which I grasped through a wild crackle on the old radio.
After dinner, Puck continued to arrange the old forgotten desk in the basement into his new office, while I took a few minutes to catch up across a panel of windows televising yellowish sky and Indian Summer trees in the wind. He walked up and down the stairs with several armloads, and a small blackboard which he tried to “thumbtack” to the wall in his room.
“Mom! Do you know how strong plaster is?” he scoffed. “Humongously strong! It broke plastic and metal! That’s, like, impossible!”
I decided to check on that damage… later…
Bær returned from Men’s Prayer to a happy baseball wife with a box of Cosmic Brownies. I know how to celebrate. One by one.