Perception of Value
I woke up a lot during the night, pushed closer and closer to the edge of the bed until I had to sleep pencil-style at the precipice. That’s what I get for letting the cat tunnel under the covers at 10PM and slumber straight through the night. At my expense.
The morning was a fast episode of wedding-related research and Francis eliciting Puck’s eager help to clean out his room: dirty laundry, rotting chicken, etc. He was rewarded with prizes: Webelo ball cap and old leather belt. His toothless grin indicated that the trade had been well worth it. This led to Puck sitting around the Christmas tree for the second time to shake the wrapped presents and possibly discover their contents. Unfortunately, he has recently inherited his Aunt Rose’s trait of determining these festive guts without much effort.
“Uh oh! We’ve got a present shaker!” Mom announced.
Puck continued the knife-less surgery.
“Okay, I’m going to clean out the car!” Francis announced over his shoulder.
“Francis! Can I help!” Puck ran out behind him, tugging on his coat.
This series of unusual events allowed me to accompany Mom and Carrie-Bri on a brief set of errands.
“Don’t trash the house now,” Mom warned Francis, Linnea, and Puck before we left.
“Aw, Mom, that ruins all of our plans,” Francis grinned, now on Christmas break.
Anyway, Mom, Carrie, and I got an equal amount of work done quickly around town: the vet for Snuggles’ thyroid pills, UPS to ship Joe’s box back to Amazon, Dierbergs for organic beef and spinach, Nutrition Stop for magnesium oil, and Walgreen’s for the family Christmas photo.
Then Carrie and I spent our afternoon off Delmar for Chinese herbs while Mom joined Mrs. O for “a bite to eat” and other holiday activities.
Francis sent off Puck that evening with his fall semester English book filled with many notes from questionable film material presented during class …
“Fortunately for you, Francis, Puck can’t read your handwriting.”
That’s all it took.
“I can read this book, Mom. The … and … you …”
“Don’t read any more, bud.”
“It’s okay. I’ll just read the words I know.”