One Hundred Twenty
“Look, Mom!”
That tiny rubber duck floated on the surface of Puck’s breakfast milk. I guess he hadn’t forgotten about that trinket again yet. So the duck floated on the milk and The Bear induced screaming giggles with a morning tickle. He was working from home today. Then the paintbrush went in Puck’s mouth like a lollipop…
“Puck. What?”
“It makes it more smoother. What do you expect?”
We were off to a great start.
Ten little fingers tickled my shoulder blades while I washed dishes. Puck was busy administering “hand massages”.
“Mom, I’ll give you a free hand massage. If you have any money.”
He was already distracted roping a box of my fat paperclips into necklaces for Crackers. He shoved one band around his arm to his shoulder…
“It goes all the way up to my WRIST!”
He showed off a power pump muscle. Then roped the same one up my arm…
“It goes all the way to your WAIST!”
Then he dunked it on his head…
“I’m an ANGEL!”
What the kid’ll do with just a box of paper clips…
Francis heaved in a heavy solid wood bunk bed before noon. The Bear paused for ten minutes to help. Good thing, because it would have probably been too heavy even for me to hold up while Francis socket-wrenched all the bolts into the heavy bars.
“Ok, Puck, let’s finish math while Uncle Francis works.”
“But. Mom! I’m the screw holder,” he held up a fistful of bolts and screws. “And, Mom… I think I might have to hold somethin’ else… too…”
Anything to get out of “school”.
Francis was happy for a glass of ice water and a renegade ice cream sandwich as payment. But he declined my veggie burrito bake. The Bear, on the other hand, took a second helping.
Criky, it was warm.
As Puck and I made our way in a loop around town, the evidence of summer was looming. Although I had to admit that those heavy garlands of draping yellow-green in blue sky and ruffling wind are appealing more than usual this year. We hit the ATM, then Dress Barn – which Google Maps had marked incorrectly, by the way – for Mom.
Puck watched me solemnly, wedged between peg boards of fat heavy necklaces in salmon, lime green, and turquoise, as we waited in line. He held the tiny rubber duck, probably wishing he wasn’t there. Of course the three-tiered mirror was intriguing as we walked by the dressing rooms. I couldn’t blame him though. Fortunately our stay was probably somewhere under six minutes.
And the library – National Geographic best road trips, Anne of Green Gables on CD for Puck during next weekend’s road trip, an old Disney cartoon about a dragon, the long DVD version of “Sense & Sensibility” and, of course, more Garfield…
“Haven’t you read all of those already?” the librarian asked him.
“Not yet,” Puck answered seriously, scooting forward in his already-too-small flip-flops to grab the book stack. “There’s about one hundred Garfields.”
We had a game. Finally.
Puck was thrilled to have another spend-the-night, this time at Mom’s and Dad’s. The Bear got his double cheeseburgers. And we stopped in at Trader Joe’s for the usual. You could always tell The Bear’s selection from mine, apples to oranges.
We walked the four flights of stairs before The Bear’s knee gave out. And with a sort of hazy night inching down from the mid-80s, you could just see Matt Holliday cranking up for the home run to win a short game on a Tuesday. Losing streak cut. Applause and fireworks as we dusted peanut shells off our shoulders from the row above us. People shouting stuff about the Blues winning down the street as we walked out of the stadium. St. Louis is a connected city; what can I say.
