Tornado Winter
Friday, December 31, 2010
A last day of a year.
The skies were still that sort of gray one would find on an early spring morning.
Breakfast began with Honeycrisp apples for Collette, after Puck had done a much more appreciated 6:53 wake-up call, after having felt the need to ask permission to use the bathroom, as was his new morning habit.
“Do you want me to close the door a little so the light doesn’t shine in your eyes, Mama?” he whispered softly.
The little fellow knew the drill.
It was a lazy morning.
OLeif showed Puck how to watch Kipper the Dog on a borrowed iPad.
And more cleaning and organization. A lot of that.
Meanwhile…
Mom was taking Francis and Linnea ice skating with the O family.
And Puck had been busy ‘buying hamburgers’ for everyone out of the Yellow Pages, which had been delivered to their door the previous afternoon.
“I just threw out the old one this morning, and look what they left on our porch just now,” said OLeif, holding up the bag with the book. “I think they’re watching us.”
As the morning continued, the rain fell lightly under banded skies of gold and silver. The windows were open to temperatures so mild, one would think it was April. And, not surprisingly, the entire Saint Louis area and beyond, was in a tornado watch until three o’clock in the afternoon.
Sure enough, right before eleven, the sirens came on.
“Grab your boots, Puck,” Collette told him. “Leave a window open so the house doesn’t explode.”
Down to the basement. The usual drill. Calls split out to Carrie, Joe, and Rose at home, Carrie called Mom and the kids at the rink, Collette called Dad at work… The television on. Possibility of rain-wrapped tornadoes. Several houses had already been destroyed somewhere in Rolla.
Puck came over to Collette and put a hand on her shoulder and said seriously, “We don’t want our house to ‘splode.”
Collette loved to listen to meteorologists. They were always so charged when tornados arrived. In particular, at least three or four already. It was like the apocalypse of weather. And they just could hardly stand the excitement. The narrative was endless. They simply could not stop talking about the tornadoes. Not to mention the fact that their dialogue had to be curbed to accommodate morons…
“Do not wait to see or hear the tornado…”
It was all spellbinding, really. Never was there a Snicketts child not fascinated with severe weather.
The wind was still up at nearing one o’clock. But the tornadoes had passed, into the city, surprisingly.
And there was another scrappy lunch of steak omelets, quesadillas, and peanut butter sandwiches.
Then Collette hit a line of Persian kings in the family tree…
The sun briefly emerged before two, and then re-submerged again, into the gray afternoon, the way Collette preferred it, as OLeif and Puck went off biking together around the neighborhood.
Evening plans…
Dinner.
“Let’s start a New Year’s tradition and get fun food,” said OLeif.
A reflection, no doubt, on Collette’s wildly spontaneous and unconventional nature… what a laugh.
And so the three gathered themselves into the car and headed out for an OLeif-infused hour of gathering foods. Chicken parmesan Penn Station subs, a bottle of orange Fanta, fresh Penn Station potato fries, a large Penn Station chocolate chip cookie, a box of 20 chicken McNuggets, barbecue sauce, and sweet and sour sauce later… they were back home.
And once again for a past New Year’s Eve recap:
2000 — Silverspoon’s
2001 — Home? (midnight? yes)
2002 — Home?
2003 — Pretzel’s house (yes)
2004 — Mom’s and Dad’s with the kids (no)
2005 — Watching the youth at the Saint’s (yes)
2006 — Home at the apartment (no)
2007 — Nazareth (no)
2008 — Mom’s and Dad’s, half-supervising all the kids (yes)
2009 — Kitts’ and Carrie’s Blue Moon party (yes)
2010 — Home (no)
Collette came to that wonderfully predictable conclusion that she was, indeed, not born half-party animal.
Meanwhile…
The kids were home with Mom and Dad, sodas, snacks, and movies.
Rose was off to church for the New Year’s Eve prayer service with Carrie, and then to party in the new year with old co-workers, including Jimmy Dean and Alfonso.
Joe attended various gigs around the city with his pals.
OLeif, after an episode of An Idiot Abroad: Mexico with Collette, spent the later part of his evening out at Old Blue’s and Cashmere’s.
And Puck first, and then Collette, hit the feathers early to make up for having gone to bed after midnight the previous evening. O, to be a kid again…
And that was that.