2nd Wind, March 2004
"Remember that not getting what you want is sometimes a wonderful stroke of luck."
-Dalai Lama-"You know you are getting old when everything either dries up or leaks."
- Will Rogers-Cats regard people as warm-blooded furniture.
How many times are YOU able to stand three feet from a wild animal, face to face, and watch him eat? I can. However, there is glass between us. Just outside the back door is a chest freezer. Last night, soon after sundown, I heard the arrival of the raccoon pair on the back porch. As usual they managed to stumble over something or knock something down, signaling their arrival. These two definitely have not taken ballet lessons from Baryshnikov. I flipped on the light and there was Mr. Raccoon on the freezer, staring into my face as he sat back on his haunches and continued eating the few grains of cat food my feline freeloaders had left. He is so relaxed it is difficult to realize he is really a wild animal. And I think, "What a privilege to be able to get this close and watch." Beats television...especially the Grammys.
Beth and Ed spent Valentine's Day weekend at their favorite hostel...a former Coast Guard station near the Golden Gate Bridge, across from San Francisco. For those of you not familiar with hostels, they cost less than half the price of a motel room. There are private rooms, and beds with blankets, but you bring your own sheets and towels (or pay extra rent to use theirs). The rest rooms and kitchen/ dining areas are communal. Beth and Ed enjoy not only the economy but the interesting people they meet. On this weekend there were two moms with several children. The moms had spontaneously decided to treat the kids to a weekend and were lucky there was a vacancy. They had packed some food and clothes and picked the kids up to go direct from school. That evening, when Beth went to the rest room she saw a homemade valentine on the mirror, "Happy Valentine's Day from Room B." At bedtime there were valentines on their beds and some heart candies...also from Room B. In the morning Ed and Beth asked the kids if the valentines were from them and they beamingly acknowledged they were. Beth overheard one of the moms say, "We forgot about lunch. We have bread, butter and some apples. Can we make apple slice sandwiches?" So Beth and Ed left a jar of peanut butter and a bag of raisins on the table with "Happy Valentine's Day from Room C. Help yourself." No way could you have that kind of fun at the Sheraton.
I have to confess my mind often wanders...at lectures, watching TV, or in group conversations where one person is being boringly dominant (unless that person is me). However, this condition has not been brought on by senility. No, indeedy. It comes from society's current excuse of the moment...childhood abuse. The abuse wasn't physical or sexual. It was oratorical. I've mentioned (probably too often) that my father was a Methodist minister. In the early 1900's, a small town minister often had a circuit, serving more than one church. Outstanding in my memory are the years Dad preached in Jackson at 11:00 A.M. Sunday morning, in Amador City at 3:00 P.M. and in Sutter Creek at 7:00 that evening. Add to that the Wednesday night service at Pine Grove. He had to wrestle with four small congregations and attempt to coordinate bazaars, weddings, memorials, etc. Mama and I, however, had to listen to the same sermon four times. And, although Dad spoke from notes rather than a prepared text, it was definitely repetitive. By the time we'd moved to Jackson I was in my teens and had developed a sense of when to laugh or when to look sympathetic, while gamboling off in my own mental meadows. As a very small girl, I escaped by burrowing in behind my mother's shoulder and sucking my thumb. It was very comforting, but couldn't last forever.
My mother was an outstanding cook, having, at the age of sixteen, been the cook for a family of sixteen (her parents, 12 brothers and sisters and my Dad, who was the delivery boy for her father's butcher shop). I was told, in the days of no refrigeration, she had a very difficult time as a newlywed, adapting to cooking for two. My father's hobbies were gardening and baking. I attribute my lack of cooking finesse to the fact that two in the kitchen were enough, and they got there first. Dad was particularly proud of his angel food cakes which added to many a bake sale. On the rare occasion when the angel cake "fell," he called it his Lucifer cake, explaining that Lucifer was the fallen angel.
On a recent Sunday I was feeling a bit under the weather and didn't attend church...an occasion where Lucifer was alive and well. Before the service even started, a man who had been ill collapsed on the steps leading from the parking lot. He was unhurt and appreciated the men who carried him back to his car. At some point in the morning, an octogenarian looked around quickly, lost her balance, but was deftly caught by the man behind her. Two Lucifers! Enough? Read on. The choir now sits in two rows. The chairs for the front row are on the floor. The second row is on a riser, perhaps a foot higher, there was a third riser which backed up the middle one, but we weren't using that one so it was removed. That left the second one as a shelf wide enough for a chair and room to stand in front of it...no backing. On the Sunday I missed, the Choir had just finished the anthem and the pastor had called the children forward for the children's sermon. Vivian, who was sitting on one end of the second row, miscalculated her "sit-down" and she and the chair plummeted backward, pulling Janie and her chair with her. The chairs were hooked together, but miraculously the whole row didn't go down. The pastor said the first thing that went through her head was "Will we have to call 911?" The children were looking at her in astonishment, wondering if this was a visual part of the children's sermon. Rescuers surged forward. There were no injuries, but in the midst of all the confusion, a risen Vivian was heard to say, "Guess that's what happens when you live too close to the edge."
At my stage of life, walking across the room can be living close to the edge. But I do it anyway. I have no intention of sitting around waiting for Gabriel to call. He can run me down when it's time, or he may have to send me an Email to get my attention. Hang in there.
Blessings, Darlys,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,
(In honor of St. Patrick's Day I'll start out with some Irish jokes. I lived with a non-drinking Irishman for 63 years, so I'm not stereotyping the Irish...just passing along a laugh or two.)
A man stumbled up to the only patron in a bar and asked if he could buy him a drink. "Why, of course," came the reply. Then the first man asked, "Where are you from?" The man at the bar replied, "I'm from Ireland." The first man responded in delight, "You don't say. I'm from Ireland, too. Let's have a round to Ireland." "Of course," said the bar stool occupant. Curious, the newcomer asked, "Where in Ireland?" "Dublin," was the reply. "I can't believe it. Me, too! That calls for a round of drinks for Dublin." "Of course." The second man, curiosity now aroused, asked, "What school did you attend?" The first man replied, "St. Mary's. I graduated in '60." "This is unbelievable!" they say in unison. As they were enjoying a round of drinks to St. Mary's one of the regulars came in and sat down at the bar. "What's up?" he asked the bartender. "Nothing much, was the reply. "The O'Malley twins are drunk again."
An Irish priest was driving down to New York and got stopped for speeding in Connecticut. The state trooper smelled alcohol on the priest's breath and saw an empty wine bottle on the floor of the car. He said, "Sir, have you been drinking?" "Just water," the priest replied. The trooper asked, "Then why do I smell wine?" The priest picked up the bottle, took a sniff, and exclaimed, "Good Lord, He's done it again!"
Paddy and Mike were lifelong friends. They were also baseball fans. In fact, they'd played professional baseball in their younger days. One day Paddy said, "I wonder if they have baseball in heaven." Mike added, "That would be wonderful, wouldn't it?" Then Paddy died, and one day Mike, feeling Paddy's presence, looked skyward and called, "Are you there, Paddy?" The answer came..."Yes, Mike, it's me. I have some good news and some bad news. Which do you want to hear first?" Mike said, "I want the good news first." Paddy said, "The good news is that they do play baseball in Heaven. The bad news is that you're up to bat next Friday."
A man had two 50-yard-line tickets for the Super Bowl. As he sat alone, another man came down and asked if anyone was sitting in the seat next to him. "No," was the reply, "The seat will be empty." "This is incredible," said the new man. "Who, in their right mind, would have a seat like this for the Super Bowl, the biggest sporting event in the country, and not use it?" The ticket owner explained, "Well, actually, the seat belongs to me. My wife and I planned to come together, but she passed away. This will be the first Super Bowl we haven't been together since we got married in 1967." "Oh, I'm sorry to hear that. That's terrible. But couldn't you find someone else...a friend or a relative, or even a neighbor, to use the seat?" The man sadly shook his head, "No, they're all at the funeral."
My neighbor was bitten by a stray rabid dog. I went to see how he was and found him writing frantically. I told him rabies could be cured and he didn't have to worry about writing a will. He said, "Will? What will? I'm making a list of the people I want to bite."
Just before the funeral services the undertaker came up to the elderly widow and asked, "How old was your husband?" "98," she replied, "Two years older than me." "So you're 96," the undertaker commented. She added, "Hardly worth going home, is it?"
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