Lessons in Optimism

“Aaah! Dad! Emergency! Emergency!”
This before-seven-AM “emergency” was nothing more than Crackers wedging herself behind a passel of wires on the crown of the basement air vent.
Also about this time, the smoke detector starting screaming.
“Is it legitimate?” the Bear inquired sleepily, emerging from the back rooms.
No. Just Puck’s toast well-done, as preferred.
Meanwhile, my dreams had improved — waiting it out at Walgreen’s with a vitamin purchase, stumbled across a library-copy Irish prayerbook, began leafing through to the end where folks had signed and dated, mostly elderly men and women, one having died in Holland in 1997, another born in 1913. Then discovered a forty-dollar bill wedged between the pages, a ten and twenty, then a withered envelope containing two connected rather ancient five dollar bills and an expired 100… Realizing this amazing good fortune, as the evening arrived in dark rain and snow, I noted the hour and saw that the bank had already been closed to appraise the bills. Then I woke up. Mild disappointment. So maybe… not-so-improved.
One thing had come true, though…
It had rained.
It was still raining.
The glories of summer on a cool gray morning in July.

Anyway…
Alarm – 6:30.
Departure – 7:40.
Rehearsal – 8:00.
Church – 9:00.
Sunday School – 10:30.
Departure – 11:45.

Morning gone.
Didn’t I say I would try more optimism? Honestly, though, I look forward to Sunday mornings. I’m supposed to, right? But I really do. Even if I duck out to the foyer about 47% of the time to escape the four-minute grip-and-grin halfway through the service. Anyway.
When I benched Puck during the morning rehearsal for tossing an empty water bottle into the air several times, he asked me to write a note to his un-benched friend still meandering the aisles – “I’m sorry. I can’t play with you. Send help”. “Then I’m going to throw it over to him,” he explained.
Thunder rattled like nine pins during the service. I was not expecting – somehow in my episode of notating things with my bunny-chewed Pilot G-2 07 – the public announcement that I have now officially adopted the label of “Church Librarian”. [It was only inevitable at some point in my life. I will now and forever-more be labeled “mousy-eye-glasses-and-sweater-sets”. Time to drag out the old Zambian head gear in protest. Not really. Meaning, I don’t own any Zambian head gear anyway; and if I did, I wouldn’t wear it. But I don’t wear sweater sets either. Nor glasses…]
It was also “Bluegrass Sunday”.
Day.
Made.
Man, I am just crushing this whole optimism idea today…
Ray Bolger [minus the bow tie] discussed world religions during class, which included two clattering thunderbolts followed by the echoing waterfalls of erupted children’s laughter across the hall.

So I heard that Francis competed against all the other YMCA life guard teams last night in gestures of life-saving rehearsals in pursuit of $200 Target gift cards. If I was a lifeguard paid seven dollars an hour to save the lives of little children, I would chase $200 too. Turns out, his team took second and snagged either the $100 or $25 category instead. Guess you take a big hit for being second-to-perfect.
Over dessert triangles of homemade cinnamon sugar crisps, Carrie described her Saturday morning working the bunny adoption center, which concluded with the Bear’s question, “How many bunnies do you rescue from magic shops?” And other than Puck smashing a glass on the floor with yet one more – “I’m sorry for breaking that!” – lunch was uneventful except for the usual comedy, which I can say for just about every Sunday afternoon.
And everyone got down to business – namely – computer games (launching porta potties, apparently; Puck was involved with that one), Cards games, and Olympics games, while I switched into a more comfortable arrangement of khaki shorts, Doctor Who t-shirt, and gray boots, which, according to Linnea, made me look like an anime character. The living room hosted the addition of Francis and his eight-month-something-or-other unofficial girlfriend, who I am told is a quarter Native American. Which is, I have to admit, pretty nifty. When Francis got bored with beach volleyball, he hosed Puck down in the backyard; half the time Puck hid in a “clean” trash can. They were out there doing that for… quite a while… And Dad crated in tacos.

Also, I think writing in third person is automatically more… happy-sounding?

Thought of the Day

I don’t know if die-hard playing for a certain country makes as much sense to me anymore. Just getting a check-in to the women’s beach volleyball US-Argentine match, I found myself not as interested in the US winning. Maybe it’s just lack of conventional patriotic spirit. [Once I figure out “what America means to me”, I’ll get back to myself on that.] Maybe I’m just more city-oriented than country-oriented. Maybe group-oriented. Maybe it’s more about the idea than the country. The person, than the nationality. The representation… blah blah yawn.

Ok. Tomorrow. Tomorrow I’ll really try.