Pretzel Rolls Make up for Anything
Wednesday, January 18, 2012
Eighteen degrees.
“Earnest! Stop eating that! Ketseh! Don’t eat your bridge!”
Bunny Heaven had been completely completed. Including grass-green rug, floorlength mirror, dinosaur-sized grass in an equally monster glass vase, and soft lamplight, including the moon on the wall. The “bun-buns” were so pleased with their new environment that they were actually getting along.
Dad was on the phone with his old high school buddy, also his doctor. His most recent medical report was very good…
“He wants us to go bowling again,” said Dad. “Like when we were kids, where we used to go. He said, ‘Now that my kids are grown, I’m gonna have a lot of time on my hands. But someone else is going to have to drive. ‘Cause I can’t see too well.’”
There was a solitary brownie under the glass which read…
“Do not eat, or else!”
And with the boys out the door to work, Dad out for a run, and Mom beginning studies with Linnea, who was meant to identify trite expressions hidden inside a list…
“They’ll stick out like a sore thumb,” Mom said, laughing.
…Carrie gathered Puck (who had just received an old toss-and-catch Colonial game from Mom) on the counter to make clay out of dryer lint in a cooking pot…
“Are you using up all the flint?” Puck asked.
“Trying to.”
When Dad returned from his run, Puck had questions about the Propel that Dad was mixing.
“What’s that?”
“It’s reconstituted sweat.”
“You’re joking.”
“That’s basically what it is.”
“Who makes sweat?”
“God.”
“That’s right. God made all things.”
“Right. But did He make the drink?”
“Well, I made the drink.”
“How?”
And on it went…
Collette took a slice of Muenster cheese for breakfast and worked Linnea’s lengthening locks into the crown braid around her head, which always ended up reminding her of the twisted vanilla-chocolate donuts in the plastic case at the grocery store. Snuggles, whose tenant was currently once again a voracious tape worm, was snickering at the birds on the patio, wishing he had wings himself. Mom’s old radio station was puttering away in the kitchen; always sounded like there was a robot battle taking place in a miniature blizzard in the background, while Mom cut up old towels into rags for the rag bag. And Snuggles tried a lick of the clay.
Francis returned from life-guarding to join his sister in mathematical studies. Mom and Carrie bundled up Puck into Mom’s Fit for adventures in the great gray beyond of Costco. So everything was nine shades quieter for about an hour. Joe had returned from work to gorge on cheddar pretzels dipped in Greek yogurt…
“I wish I was Greek,” he said. “So I could start a business called My Big Fat Greek Yogurt…”
– He rummaged in the freezer. –
“Well, hello, beef strips. How are you doing today?”
Ensued a conversation between Joe and the microwave dinner, afterwhich he escaped to his cave. In the just-at freezing temperatures of the afternoon, Linnea looked up from her math.
“Five deer just ran by,” she said in nonchalance.
Joe emerged from the basement for a packed bowl of real vanilla ice cream laced in double chocolate and caramel…
“Collette? I think I want to be a ballerina.”
For the evening, Carrie prepared a delicious chicken salad with honey and basil on soft pretzel rolls. She and Joe were departing for a storm spotters’ class at one of the local high schools at seven o’clock. Francis had to work another shift. And Collette escorted her son to church.
The sunset was glowing violet and rose through the windows as the fourteen gathered in the little children’s choir room. And from Daisy-Jean, they learned about pink snow and jelly-fish raining from the skies.
Pick-up time came at seven as usual. An hour and a half of little-people-monitoring never did go by so quickly as when there were stacks of them to be supervised at once.
Puck ended his evening with a banana in his Toy Story footies and some sage words…
“Well, Mama. You’ve gotta do what you’ve gotta do.”