Is it Already Holy Week?
Sunday, April 1, 2012
After dreams of escorting Asian celebrity tourists through an Icelandic airport, Collette’s hair was not exactly cooperating that morning. She had the idea she looked more like Andrew the Apostle from the Jesus film than anything else.
Meanwhile, Puck’s scrambled eggs weren’t cooperating either. A forkful landed in a exploding splat on the floor…
“Pick them all up, Puck.”
“Yes. Mama. But. Some of them are as small as plankton.”
He sat Chick-Love on the table and pressed back the tufts of feather on the top of his head…
“And here’s his hair – strapped out like a hurricane, and going fast!” he said to himself as breakfast resumed.
Puck marched into the sanctuary with the other four year-olds, proudly waving his palm branch.
Mom had hung an eight-brass-bell-bowl chain from the roof over the patio, a gift from Grandma Combs, when the rain came.
Carrie had slapped down three trays of fat homemade breadsticks.
“They kind of look like mummies,” Collette observed.
“Yeah… well, I was getting a little bored. So I just sort of threw them on there…”
Accompanying the soft-baked breadsticks was a large salad. And an even larger bag of puppy chow snack for dessert. Puck was very eager to serve everyone their breadsticks, both of his hands protected in oven mitts.
“Hey,” said Rose – slightly less tactful – as she took the breadstick from Puck. “This sort of looks like a dead guy.”
The record player crackled from the living room…
“I wish Snuggs would jump on there and create a remix,” said Joe.
Carrie was busy pinching Linnea’s “chubby cheeks”…
“Ow!”
Puck was interested in everyone standing together to form the letter “Q” out of people.
Joe was busy with his April Fool’s joke…
“So I accidentally kicked Earnest across the room today…”
Nap hour was spent with everyone crowded in the living room circle as OLeif departed to meet with Evrain Orange to discuss Graphic Design and to briefly meet Justus as he dropped into the coffee shop.
“You can eat Jell-O with chopsticks,” Rose had been saying. “I tried it on New Year’s, and it worked.”
She then joined Joe in taking her little Fiat to the car wash.
“Puck,” said Carrie, “tell me a story.”
Puck say beside her on the couch…
“Once, there was a spider. And he ate a big snake.”
“Well, what was the spider’s name?”
“Quando.”
“Hmmm… What does Quando mean?”
Puck looked at her seriously…
“It means… the name of the Lord.”
When Mom got up, she busied herself planting two very pink knock-out roses in the backyard.
“I brought you guys some soup,” Rose was telling her. “’Cause it made me sick.”
Joe showed Puck how to boomerang his “rolly-hoop”, which impressed him very much.
They began dispatching by 4:15 back to church for the Palm Sunday dinner. OLeif was on violin and mandolin, and Francis on sound. Collette read to Puck in the newly organized children’s library as they waited for five o’clock to arrive.
Their table included Grandpa and Grandma Hobcoggin, who spoke further of the news of Wally and Lolli expecting their first child in November, near the October date in which Eve and Othniel Avonlea were also expecting their first.
A playdough trolley was coming around following desserts of thick peanut butter frosting cakes from Grandma Hobcoggin, little round brownies from Mom, peanut butter bars from the Vanderheidis, etc. – packs of bright green and yellow homemade playdough, giraffe cookie cutters… to keep the kids accompanied during Henri’s homily.
Afterwhich… an elderly gentleman sitting at the table behind Puck, handed him an airplane folded out of his pink-striped placemat. Puck’s eyes lit up as he soared the high-flyer across the sanctuary.
“Thanks!” he grinned.
He remained fully occupied for the next fifteen minutes as the chairs and tables were stacked and rolled away.
It was going to be a warm week…