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 |  It's who we are. It's what we stare at in the middle of the night. It's a bug zapper. |
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My friends, When we were young and newly hatched—also young and in love—my husband and I lived with our four young children on the Space Coast of Florida. The massive propulsion of rocket and shuttle launches from Cape Kennedy often rocked the windows and doors of our little love cottage. We were always properly respectful and impressed by the reach of mankind’s achievements. It was a point of pride to stop whatever we were doing (dishes, dinner, dancing, sleeping, fist fighting, etc.) to watch the eastern horizon—hands on hearts, tears in eyes—as the United States of America raced into the frontier of space. One deep, dark morning (about 2:00 am) I shook my husband awake to watch yet another triumph of human advancement. “Get up,” I mumbled to Sherwood, “the shuttle’s going up. We gotta’ watch.” Sherwood moaned, “The garbage is out all ready. Let me die.” He did not open his eyes. “Come on. We should watch. Night launches are amazing.” He dragged himself upright and clung to the window ledge behind our bed. We knelt, with our chins braced on the ledge, our bleary eyes fixed on a blazing light in the eastern sky. We watched. The light did not appear to move. We stared some more. The light remain fixed. We struggled to focus. The light blazed away. We waited for the light to fade into the blackness of space. It did not. We watched and watched and watched. The light stubbornly refused to move. At last, collapsing back into my pillow I said, “Honey, go back to sleep.” Sounding confused, miffed, and a little whiney Sherwood asked, “Why?” “Because for the last eight to ten minutes we’ve been staring at our next door neighbor’s bug zapper.” He went back to sleep. And I lived to worship at the altar of space exploration another day. This story pretty much sums up who we are, and how we got this way—excessive staring at bug zappers. And this is my blog, a space-age way of recording one’s thoughts, ideas, embarrassments, and foibles for the entire known world. Once upon a time, I would have made this record on papyrus, rolled it up, stuffed it into a ceramic jar, and asked to have the whole thing buried with me in my sarcophagus. I still might. Disclaimer: Some of the stuff you will read here is true. Some of it is not. Some of it is the result of wishful thinking. Some of it is the result of too much thinking, and some of it is the result of too little thinking. But all of it will be written with joy and laughter, because the alternative is despair and weeping, and isn’t there more than enough of that stuff out there? Thank you for your support, Linda (Zippity the Zapped) Zern |
| “Who the Bleep Did I Marry,” “ Evil Kin”, “Swamp Murders”, and the list goes on and on. They’re television shows that showcase true crimes. I love them. I learn so much. Sometimes I take notes. From the show, “Who the Bleep Did I Marry,” I’ve learned to be suspicious of slick talking guys who paw through my panty drawer looking for my bank statements. I don’t actually know any slick talking guys who paw through my panty drawer looking for my bank statements, but I remain suspicious of them. Watching “Evil Kin” keeps me on my toes. I have a checklist. Do the neighbors resemble zombies? Do the neighbors resemble people who resemble zombies? Do my evil kin resemble the neighbors? Check for fresh graves in the neighbor’s backyard. Don’t get caught. But it’s “Swamp Murder”s that has given me the biggest heads up. What I’ve learned from “Swamp Murder”s is that the body always floats—sooner or later it floats—always. This isn’t just true of dead bodies; this is also true of a lot of stuff you’d rather stayed down there in the muckity, muck bottom of the swamp . . . like sales receipts. Like sales receipts tucked away in the bottom of boxes, stacked in the garage, waiting for garbage day. Receipts for pointless, silly purchases that add little to no value to my life except that the purchase was pretty and I wanted it. Those sales receipts. They float. Like dead bodies thrown in a stinking swamp they bob right up to the top of the slimy water or the top of the box the hat came in. I love hats. I love fancy hats you can’t wear in public, because the public who wore these fancy hats are all dead Victorians—not swamp murder dead—but still dead. My husband does not appreciate my fancy hat problem. So I try not to stress him with my fancy hat problem. It’s better that way. Luckily, he’s an engineer so he rarely notices when I’ve added another hat to my fancy hat collection. He rarely notices that we have rugs or furniture or walls. Unless . . . he finds the stinking receipts. My husband’s voice boomed from the garage. “Hey, what’s this receipt for?” “What receipt?” “The receipt in this box, under these other boxes, under this stack of Goodwill stuff.” I had a sinking feeling that I knew which receipt had floated to the surface of my fancy hat swamp. “Receipt? What receipt?” Delay, deflect, deny—I watch modern day politics, I know how to stall the inevitable congressional hearing. “This receipt for a women’s white felt riding hat with lace veil.” “I’m sorry what was that?” His voice bounced and echoed a bit. “Linda!” Do you have any idea how many boxes were out in that garage? A stinking swamp’s worth, that’s how many, and just like on that show where people are always trying to dump the evidence in the middle of the dankest swamp that stupid receipt bobbed straight to the top of the cardboard heap. Busted. Linda (Hats Off) Zern |
| The smallest ones poop in their pants and stomp on the cat. They hate to get dressed. They pitch wild-eyed fits in public places. Often, they put rocks from the garden in their mouths and suck on them. They are immature, irresponsible, and self-centered. When they feel like dancing, they dance. When they feel like yelling, they yell. When they want to eat, they want to eat now. Their names are Leidy, Hero, Scout, Griffin, Reagan, and Zachary. They slightly older ones do all of the above, but they’re sneakier about it. They behave like spies ferreting out whacked out subversives, or they are subversives, ferreting out spies. We’ll see. They are Zoe, Emma, Conner, Kipling, and Sadie. When number one grandchild, Zoe, was newly created, she couldn’t make the g, r, n, or d, sounds; so she called me YaYa. One day, she toddled around a corner, threw her arms in the air, flashed a toothy smile like a sunburst, and yelled, “YaYa.” And that was that. It’s what Greek children call their grandmothers. I remember asking my daughter, “When did Zoe become Greek Orthodox?” Zoe turned my husband into a person I no longer recognize. My husband, the father of our four children, raised them on the following retorts: When the kids said, "Dad, we're thirsty." He said, "Swallow your spit." When the kids said, "Dad, buy us a toy." He said, "Play with sticks." When the kids said, "Dad, can we . . . . ?" He said, "No." Now we can't let him wander off at Disney World alone with Zoe or any of the other big-eyed babies, or they'll come back with enough stuffed animals to animate a feature film. They sit and eat Hershey Kisses until I worry about their blood sugar levels. He lets them play with machetes and debates whether he should take them away or not. I feel like shaking him and saying, "Just say no, man! Think of your legacy." I don't say it of course, because I'm right there with him. I understand. There's time now and a little money. Time to stop doing everything and other really important stuff and twirl around the living room to Shall We Dance from The King and I. There's time to sit in the grass and teach the grandchildren how to blow the seeds from a dandelion's face. There's money for the silly stuffed animals that don't do anything. And there's the wisdom to know that a few Hershey kisses won't kill anyone. It makes me a little sad that when we were parents we had to be so official and on duty all the time. But then I think, no, it worked out. It's a good system. Mommies and Daddies are for the hard stuff. And Grandmas and Grandpas are for the hard candy. It's a great balance. I loved being a mommy. And I adore being the YaYa. A couple of the younger ones still can't blow the dandelion seeds off. They just spit on them. But when I show them how to gently blow the seeds and we watch them drift away on the breeze, they clap their hands and laugh, and I get to see the whole big world for the first time—again. And for that, Heavenly Father, I am truly grateful. Linda (The YaYa) Zern |
| Words have power, not as much power as sticks and stones but still . . . When I was a little person and my brother would call me a stupid poo-poo head my mother always said, “Sticks and stones will break your bones, but words will never hurt you.” Which was my signal to pick up a stick or a stone and try to break my brother’s bones. The closest I ever came to actual fratricide was trying to stab my brother, the pest, was with a butter knife loaded with peanut butter. I missed. The peanut butter flew off. Shocked, we stopped fighting long enough to look for an errant glob of peanut butter. We failed. Six months later, our mom found the peanut butter—petrified and frozen to the open beamed ceiling of our kitchen. I believe she called us, “Stupid poo-poo heads.” My grandsons understand the punch words can have. Unfortunately, they don’t understand the concept of TOO MUCH. Rare is special. A dash is spicy. Occasionally can be funny. But too much is . . . “Poo-poo YaYa,” Griffin (age 3) told me. I’d said something hideous to him like no. “I will punch your poo-poo head.” I heard an anonymous someone mutter to another anonymous someone. “My eyes are burning poo-poo.” I don’t know who said that; who can keep track? It doesn’t even make sense. And on it goes. Until finally, you hear yourself yelling, “Okay, that’s it. The next person who uses the word poo-poo in a sentence is going to get time-out in the poo-poo poop chair of poo-poo pain.” TOO MUCH! Using the exact same word excessively is excessive. The words loose their punch. The message comes out muddled. People quit listening. Communication becomes a monotonous pile of . . . sameness. It’s how I feel about the F word and the phrase “the fact of the matter is” or “having said that” or “everyone does it” or “those conservatives are poo-poo heads or "liberals are poo-poo babies.” Time to elevate the conversation, folks, otherwise everyone sounds like a three-year old, or we can just go at each other with sticks and stones. Linda (Pithy Patter) Zern |
| We don’t buy toys for our grandchildren. We buy dirt. Once or twice a year, we call the dump truck man and have him bring his giant belching, clanking dump truck full of white sand to our back yard, where he dumps it—as high and as deep as he can make it. We call it the Mountain, and then we unleash the grandkids on it. “Go play on the Mountain,” we say. “Don’t dig in that nasty horse poop. Go dig up the Mountain,” we instruct. “Of course you can make a tiger pit on the Mountain,” we encourage. The Mountain is worth its weight in cash, check, or charge. The Mountain is a kid-friendly, adult-free zone. There is only one rule that governs the hill of white sand community. “Thou shalt not throw sand.” That’s it. We don’t tell them how deep to dig, or what size shovel they should use, or whether they should build a sand castle or a wombat nest. We don’t care if they cart sand around in buckets or build a sand fort or bury each other up to their neck bones. “Thou shalt not throw sand.” That single mountain commandment is specific and limited in scope. It is patterned after the Ten Commandments, “the [Mosaic] law has a modest function; the law is limited, and therefore the state is limited. The state, as the enforcing agency, is limited to dealing with evil, not controlling all men.” (Old Testament Student Manual; the page after 137; the part about rules we should all follow.) As the official representative of “the state” in our backyard, I like the whole setup. I can sit in the sun, read a book, drift off to sleep, dream about Aruba, and eat grilled cheese sandwiches—most of the time, until someone throws sand, until someone EVIL throws sand. Then the State steps in . . . It always starts with a grubby kid on The Mountain standing up straight as a stick, hands clenched to fists, eyes squeezed to sandy slits, and mouth open—howling. One hand slowly extends like a ghost newly crawled from an open grave, finger pointing, “He/She/They threw sand,” the howling mouth howls. Inherent in the howl is the demand for justice. Shading my eyes with my paperback, I say, “Wipe your eyes with your shirt tail.” The howler tries to comply. Sand is ground deeper into sockets. The howler screams, “Arrrrrrrrrrrrgggggg!” Denials fly. “I didn’t do it. He did it. The dog did it. Mavis the Goat did it. A chicken did it. No one did it. It just happened.” The howler, now the screamer, continues to wipe and wail. At this point, the State is forced to put down her lemonade, egg salad, paperback, bonbons, umbrella, and intervene. Evil is a pain in the eye sockets. It takes time and energy and attention to control “all men” also women. It costs money. It’s a drain on leisure activities. It’s depressing. It’s exhausting. The Ten Commandments have gotten a bad rap over the years. (I blame wicked people.) It’s too sad really; because they are not a bad deal. Thou shalt not steal. Doesn’t tell you how to spend your money or how to earn it or how to use it or donate it or squirrel it away—all it says is that you shouldn’t take my money or your neighbor’s money with the great looking ass (as in donkey.) That’s it. Thou. Shalt. Not. Not a single thou shalt. People want to tell you that the Ten Commandments are repressive. They are wrong and probably are all about coveting your ass (as in donkey.) Thou shalt pay income taxes to the federal government to be doled out by liars, cheaters, and thieves in a district hundreds of miles away from your front door or thou shalt go to big, fat jail; that’s repressive. Or as I like to say, “You let me know which one of those Ten Commandments you most object to, and I’ll know whether to hide my purse or my husband.” Other than that, here’s your sand pail; the Mountain is out back. Linda (Sand Storm) Zern |
| Words are our friends. Numbers are stupid, unless we use numbers to count words, then numbers are pretty okay. The following is a discussion of one of my favorite words: Monger. Not used enough, completely overlooked in the popular vernacular, I’m bringing monger back. 1. a person who is involved with something in a petty or contemptible way (usually used in combination): a gossipmonger. 2. Chiefly British. a dealer in or trader of a commodity (usually used in combination): fishmonger. verb (used with object) 3. to sell; hawk. Let’s face it; there is a lot of mongering already going on in the world today. My grandchildren are the biggest mongers I’ve ever met. They’re whine-mongers. Not wine. Whine. They can whine strong men under the table and educated women into hysterics. I’ve seen it. They’re like union members chanting endlessly around the capitol rotunda. The basic message being: Give us what we want or we will whine until you cry blood. When I was a young mother I put a stop to the whine-mongering by being . . . well . . . er . . . umm . . . a MOTHER. We weren’t rich. My husband worked full time and went to college part time (sometimes full time) while I raised and educated our four children. All year we would save up our pennies (literally pennies) to go to Disney World. We went once a year. Period. It was a very big deal. Traditionally and before we entered the magic kingdom for our yearly excursion, I would deliver my anti-whine speech. “We are going to Disney,” I said, pacing in front of the assembled thumb suckers, while slapping the side of my leg with a riding crop. “We will be there all day. We will eat at lunchtime. There will be one scheduled snack time. We will not be purchasing an endless amount of anything, up to and including: soda, frozen bananas, balloons shaped like a mouse, things that glow, or pointless stuffed stuff. When you get thirsty, drink water out of a water fountain or swallow your spit. There will be no crying, arguing, fussing, complaining, or whining. I hear one person whining, whimpering, or moaning and I will abort the whole, darn mission. Clear?” They would all nod, knowing I was something of a discipline-monger and an I’m-not-kidding-monger. And it worked; a little too well it turned out. One year we trudged, marched, skipped, hopped, and dragged our way all day—up, down, over, and around the most magical of magic kingdoms. As the day progressed Maren (probably four-ish) sucked harder and harder on her favorite sucking knuckle, but on and on she walked, no complaints, not one. Turned out when I took off her teeny-tiny little pink shoe before bedtime that night, she had a hole in her foot, because she’d picked up a tack in the sole of her teeny-tiny little pink shoe. I still feel bad about it! I mean what kind of place leaves tacks all over the place for little kids to step on and drag around all day. Which brings us to lawsuit-mongers. Anyway. Monger. It’s a great word. We should use it more. Linda (Double Time) Zern |
| When our daughter-in-law, Sarah, was dating our youngest son, Adam, she worried. Strangely, she felt that his grazing like a wildebeest on Doritos and cheese dip was insufficient to maintain bones that did not bend. I understood her concern. Adam was a famously picky eater. I remember raising him on pizza and multi-vitamins and his spine only got a little crooked. Anyway, Sarah worried, so she made Adam start taking vitamins. He did, on an empty stomach, which made him throw up in my pristine, brand new truck, which he was driving because his girlfriend’s mother had run into his car (which was really our car) and crushed in the door, trying not to run over Sarah’s dog Dodger, so it was in the shop—the car not the dog. So, Dodger the Dog made Adam throw up in my brand new truck. Adam cleaned the truck out, neglecting to tell me about the vitamin vomit incident. A terrible, lingering smell ratted him out—also the family. That was the Monday the temperature topped out at 98 degrees Fahrenheit. Tuesday, the high was 103 degrees and the faint smell of upchuck and Lysol swirled around my head like the Gulf Stream as I drove my lovely new truck to Dairy Queen. Adam the Up-chucker! I insisted that he scrub the carpet again. On Wednesday, the sickly sick smell got weirdly stronger as the heat threatened to suck the air out of my lungs. I accused Adam of being a poor carpet scrubber and a bad son. By Thursday, the smell had magnified itself into the size and shape of a small malignant mushroom cloud of stink. I called a car detailer and made an appointment, letting Adam know that he would owe me for stinking up my new truck for all time and all eternity. The state of Florida set a high temp record on Thursday. On our way to our granddaughter’s swim class Friday afternoon, my husband and I drove the truck to Saint Cloud community pool. The heat was stifling, and the smell inside the truck had started to resemble a poorly maintained landfill—gone really bad. The five-minute ride gave me a headache. I cursed Adam’s crooked spine. Jumping from the dump on wheels, I yelled, “What did that kid throw up—his internal organs, infected with Ebola?” My husband shook his head. “The smell is getting stronger and stronger. He cleaned up a smell that is growing? How is that possible?” People frowned and pinched their noses as they walked by. “People can smell us coming.” “And going,” I sniped. “Poor truck. I’m going to kill Adam.” He stuck his head back into the stench of the cab. “Babe, don’t do it. Save yourself.” I walked ten feet away for a fresh breath of air, next to the dumpster in the parking lot. “Let’s abandon the dump-mobile right here.” “Before we do that,” he said, as he pulled something from under the passenger seat of the truck, “maybe we should get rid of this.” He turned slowly—a noxious, oozing explosion of festering germs in a casserole dish in his hands. “It’s a dish with your left over casserole from dinner at the Chevrier’s, from a week ago, under the seat, all week, in the heat, all seven days long.” “Wow. That’s a casserole bomb,” I said. Flies began to circle, a vulture drifted high overhead. I took the mess from Sherwood, walked slowly to the dumpster, and tossed it. “What do we tell Adam?” “Nothing, absolutely nothing. We take this to our grave,” I paused, considering. “We never tell Adam we’ve been blaming him for the slowly festering dish of casserole bits under the front seat. Never. Ever.” And we did take it to our graves—sort of. Linda (New Car Smell) Zern |
| “YaYa mean!” Griffin Henry (age 2) relating his personal opinion of me. I sighed. “Don’t fall in the fire pit, little boy, with the fluffly, white hair and polyester shirt.” That was it; that’s what I had said to earn my grandson’s disdain. For that I was called names. I’m the YaYa. I’m the mean one. My husband (the Poppy) is the family celebrity. Of course, he’s the guy with endless supplies of Twix and Pepsi, the guy who lets the grandchildren run wild through our lives. I walked into the office to find a phalanx of children taping away at an endless line of computers. They were playing something called “Animal Jam” or “AJ” in the vernacular. Poppy sat in the middle of the tapping frenzy, tossing chocolate kisses to grandchildren like a walrus trainer at Sea World. Shoulders had started hunch, spines to curve. I shouted, “Okay, that’s it. Everybody outside. Get some vitamin D. Attempt to straighten your backbones. Go. Go.” “Poo-poo, YaYa!” Griffin Henry said. Poo-poo. It’s the worst word he knows—so far. Later, I discover the lot of them at the sand hill. They’d dug a giant hole, run a garden hose to it, and filled it to the brim with water. It was like a massive open strip mine. Kids blasted each other with water and mud. I estimated the cleanup would require two hours and a Shop Vac. “Who said you could turn that water on?” “Poppy!” they chorused. “Poo-poo, Poppy,” I muttered to myself. My husband is the celebrity. He never says no, agrees with every wild scheme, finances every whim, and bribes with goodies. He’s the president cutting the fool on Buzz Feed. Me? I’m the libertarian saying, “Sure. Sure. You refused to wear your shoes, stepped on stinging thistles that you were warned about, and now what are YOU going to do about that?” “YaYa mean!” Recently, our eleven grandchildren came pouring into our house saying, “Hi. Where’s Poppy?” Sighing, I pointed and said, “In the office. Throw away your candy wrappers.” They stampeded. I went to find the Shop Vac. Linda (Mean as a Snake) Zern |
| Last year, I was the Sunbeam teacher at my church. The Sunbeams are one of the classes in a kind of Sunday school deal that Mormons call Primary. Sunbeams are three-year olds. Sunbeams are barely civilized, highly entertaining, wildly affectionate, sweetly eager children who start out not being able to tell you their own names. By the end of that first year in Primary, they can stand and say a prayer by themselves. They pray for adorable things. “Please bless my brother not to bite me anymore.” “Please help me get a dog.” “We’re thankful for Sissa [Sister] Zern and snacks.” That’s me, Sissa Zern. I brought the snacks. One of my students was an adorable young man who struggled a bit. He said not a single word that I could understand. Sitting in a chair seemed a waste of his time. Being under the table was more interesting than coloring the picture on top of the table and so on . . . Stickers! He enjoyed stickers. Like so many in his age range, however, by the end of our time together, he could stand and say a simple prayer and sing a little song and tell me what he was thankful for. We had a really good year, even a miracle or two. Like most Primary teachers, I tried to prepare my little Sunbeams for a new year, a new class, and a new teacher. “Now, I won’t be your teacher next time you come to church,” I said. They ate their goldfish, nodded their heads, and had no clue. It’s always a bit traumatic. And on the first day of the new Primary year, I saw my little guy, sitting with his new class and his new teacher. He seemed shocked that I wouldn’t be sitting next to him. He reached out his hand to me and said three words. “I. Need. You.” And there it was, the reason I can’t be a golf course Christian. There just aren’t any sweet, little four-year-olds on the back nine, holding their hands out to me, inviting me to put my religion where my beliefs are. Besides, I don’t golf. Sister Linda (I’m Right Here) Zern |
| My husband is a would-be grifter. A grifter is a con artist who enjoys “shady dealings,” sometimes offering to pave your driveway with his “leftover” load of asphalt at a deep, deep discount. It’s not asphalt, Folks. It’s salt dough made of flour, salt, and water. My husband isn’t the fake asphalt selling kind of con artist. He’s the ‘let’s get free stuff from the timeshare people’ type of con man. Unfortunately, he sometimes likes to drag me into his pit of shady dealings. There was this once . . . well, it all began with a phone call from a Timeshare salesperson. “How about a romantic weekend?” Sherwood called out over his shoulder, while pausing in his over-the-phone dickering. “A romantic weekend? With whom?” “Me,” he said. “How far do I have to go?” More phone dickering ensued. “Right down the road at the Hilton Resort and Day Spa, right here in Orlando.” “No planes? Some romance but not too much? Reading by the pool? What’s the catch?” “No catch. It’s free.” “Hmmmmmmm! Sounds like a hookup, and you know how I feel about hookups. I believe that you should pay all the cash money, so that you can use all your vocal cords when you complain.” “Sign us up,” he said. The dickering ended and the hookup began. In the truck on the way to “the romantic weekend” he let me know that 1) the grandchildren would be joining us, and 2) the grandchildren would be staying the night along with their parents bringing the total number of people in our room to about three hundred, and 3) I had to attend an hour and a half timeshare presentation—at 8:00am the next morning—the hookup. “I am not attending a timeshare sales pitch. I hate those things. I won’t do it.” “You have to, or they’ll kick us out, and besides, I kind of fudged to get us a free weekend. Usually, they won’t let you stay in their resort if you live locally, but the nice man on the phone . . .” “You mean the other disgusting con artist?” “The nice man said that I could use my Marietta, Georgia business address, and that there will be a free breakfast and gift cards. “What are we homeless? Is this our new strategy to feed the family?” I went to the pitch. I was wearing a bathing suit, reading a book, and sporting a bad attitude. I continued to read my book through the entire video presentation that promised Nirvana and gift cards should we purchase a Hilton timeshare. The high-pressure sales lady looked at my husband, the crook, and said, “Your wife doesn’t seem to be too interested.” “Hee, ha, hee, well, she’s here under protest. Hee, hee, hee,” he said as sweat dripped from his criminal brow. “We’re not buying a timeshare,” I explained. “We live down the road. We’re here to eat your breakfast, sleep in your beds, use your toilets, swim in your pool, and collect our reward; besides my husband gets endless, free Marriot points from five star resorts. Can you beat free?” “Mind if I call in my manager?” she said. “Please. Call two,” I said, stuffing a bookmark into my book. “We’ll wait.” The manager was very nice but determined to get to the bottom of our “situation.” “Your phone salesman. The guy who contacted us suggested the work address scam. The guy who works for you. You know, the guy you hired to call us.” “Shady, very shady,” the manager said. “Excellent choice of words,” I said, glaring at my shady husband. As we left the presentation—early—my husband, the charlatan, turned, paused, and said to the nice manager, “I hate to be tacky but I understood there were gift cards involved.” In disgust, I left the further dickering to change my identity and forge a passport. Later, at the pool, as I watched the grandchildren frolic, I turned to my husband, Mack the Knife, and said, “Seems like a lot of trouble to swim in someone else’s swimming pool.” “But fun.” That’s how it starts—a life of crime and shady dealings. Linda (Law and Order) Zern |
| Reports of my imagined death are false—also incorrect. I’m not dead. To recap: I am not dead. I’m just concentrating really hard. Several years ago, my husband couldn’t instantly get a hold of me via my cell phone, because it was dead, the cell phone. NOT ME. When he couldn’t immediately contact me from Kuala Lumpur or Detroit or Walmart or wherever he was wandering around, to let me know he’d forgotten to take out the garbage or something equally informative, he panicked. So he called our daughter, Heather. Who called our daughter, Maren. Who told her friends at school that I’m a hermit and a nut. Who called my husband, her father. Who called our daughter, Heather, again. Who called each other, over and over, whipping each other into a jittery frenzy. Heather finally broke the cycle of hysteria by calling her friend, Maria, and saying, “I’m at work. Could you drive out to my parent’s house and check on my AGED mother?” Maria! Marie who lives in a whole other village, Marie, who got in her car, drove to our country home (also our city home) and finding all the doors, window, and portholes open assumed that I had been eaten by cats—also raccoons. I was in my office—working. Proving that what we’ve got here is a hefty case of the jitters. While it is true that I live alone a great deal of time, I am not a complete idiot. I try to wait until my husband is home to clean the chimney, re-organize the hayloft, chop down trees, or check the crawlspace for expired squirrels. And as far as being murdered in my sleep by criminal types, I believe that most criminal types are stupid people, the kind of people that get stuck in chimneys. And if I can’t outsmart some nimrod stuck in my chimney then shame on me. That’s why I sleep with the cat. Plan A is that I will throw the cat at the stupid intruder and make my escape out of the bathroom window. At which point I will run to the ditch out front and hide behind the enormous stump that the county hasn’t carted away from storm damage. It’s the main reason I haven’t called the county about the eyesore stump by the road. That stump is part of my master escape plan. I have a detailed schematic drawn up. Please note: That stump has been hauled off since I first reported on the above foolishness, thus changing plan A to plan B. Unfortunately, plan B has me hiding in my neighbor’s barn in my *scanties. So sometimes I sleep in my bathrobe with my cell phone in the pocket, except that my cell phone is quite often “dead,” thus kicking off jittery meltdowns in the first place. Go figure. Linda (Chimney Sweep) Zern *Scanties is a southern word for clothing you don’t want to be caught wearing while hiding in a ditch. |
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