Category: Life

This morning as I was leaving to go to work, I heard the sounds of a fiery vortex annihilating the world coming from my living room. It was pretty early for this to be normal, so naturally, I went to investigate and see what all the shouts of terror and desperation were about.

Turns out Marni was sitting in her red full length, non-skid closed feet, zip up from the front, flannel pajamas watching the movie Antz. It was the scene with the magnifying glass.

She was so engrossed in the movie that she didn’t notice me enter the room. I thought I’d keep it that way and leaned over and softly kissed the top of her head and started to leave the room to head to work unnoticed. Or so I thought.

Marni turned, looked up, smiled, and said “Oh, hi!” And as I waved bye-bye she said, “No..! Zudha!” Which, as any Lemony Snicket fan knows, means “Hey, you forgot a to take a drink to work. Let me get one for you.”

Marni slid off the couch and went over to the little refridge and, completely unprompted mind you, grabbed two gold Cokes for me to take. We placed them in a little white plastic bag, and I said thank you, and she nodded her head with great satisfaction, adding confirmation “Zudhas. Yes.”

Thinking my Jedi training was done, I got another “wait!” from her as I was putting on my jacket.

Marni reached down to her own hand, slid off a little shinny plastic ring with a green plastic gem, handed it to me, and said clear as a bell, “pinky.” She then pointed to her pinky, then to me, just in case I didn’t get the message.

She wanted me to put on her green ring and go to work with it.

Marni obtained her Green Lantern status from church. The ring has recently been her most prized possession, and she won’t let her brothers touch it, much less look at it. For her to part with such a treasure… well, I doubt it’s possible to put into words.

I slid the small ring onto the first knuckle of my pinky. Marni smiled, then she got the front door for me and gave me a hug and a kiss, waving goodbye as I left.

I can’t help but think there’s so much to left learn about relationships from actions of a three year old.

We all seem to seek some kind of moral compass from time to time, one that directs our actions and provides us validation and comfort. However, what I need is a physical compass it seems.

Anyone who knows me recognizes that I have a horrific sense of direction. It’s for this reason I don’t venture into D.C. all that often, I avoid major cities, and I carry a plum bob with me so I can tell which direction is down.

I’ve tried to figure out why I experience this disorientation, and have limited it down to at least three good candidates.

One, my attention usually gets focused on details about what’s happening around me. At any given time I’m fairly good at knowing the relationship of objects near me; how they orient to the global baffles me. I rarely think in terms of a fixed environment.

Two, I over generalize turns in roads; for instance, I know that *I* made left, a right, and another left… however when the road starts doing little bends and subtle curves, I neglect to take them into account.

Three, that gland in your brian that is responsible for maintaining direction hasn’t developed nearly as well, perhaps giving way to other attributes like charm, good looks, and modesty. I’ve heard that people with fantastic senses of direction actually do have some part of their brain a little larger than average. I must make up the compensating half of the population.

I wish I could say for certain that one, or even any combination of those things, accounted for my inability to know which was is North.

It astonishes me that people like Danny point through a thicket of trees and say “it’s this way” and several miles later, there we are.

I view one-way streets as fowl play in cities. As such, when I went to Chicago, I did most of my travel by foot. You’d think that would have helped, but it didn’t.

A friend of mine pointed out “it’s a big grid, you can’t get lost!” (Oh how I proved HIM wrong.) “See,” he says, “this way it’s numbers, and this way it’s letters, and here’s the origin.” “Great,” I’m thinking, “so when I’m standing at M and 27th there’s actually FOUR places with the same name.” To which he tells me just walk one way or the other to see which direction to go. Okay, think about that. Fine, now I know how to get back to the origin, but at that point I have NO point of reference. Like the man who built his home on the north pole and all walls face south. Thanks. I’m just supposed to magically know what quadrant I’m in? “Hmm, am I bleeding and my wallet missing? Guess I can rule out South-East.”

Perhaps I’m just lacking some boy scout trick. I know the sun rises in the east, and sets in the west. A lot of good THAT does for me when I have no idea which direction I need to be going. I don’t seem to need clouds to hamper me. At night time, I look up to find the North star, but aiming for the brightest point of light, I follow the moon like a month drawn to flame. I have no idea where that star is.

Maybe I get lost in too many details. For instance, when I pull out a compass, I get anxious over the little things. “Hey, magnetic north is not true north!” and will this affect me? Or, “magnetic north wanders” and I can’t follow a moving target. And of course, there’s the big worry, “has the Earth’s magnetic poles flipped again and am I now heading south when I should be going north?” The anxiety is too much to bear.

Don’t even get me started on highway signs. I can’t count the number of times when I’m trying to head to some place and the sign simply says “Winchester” … like I’m supposed to know if _my_ destination is before, after, or some turn from this arbitrary place. I want a sign that says, “Yo! Moron! You’re heading North on I-81 at mile marker 320, the next place to pee and ask directions is in 14 miles, look for the big yellow M.”

So, how do you guys do it? Are there little signs by the side of the road I’m missing? Do even numbered roads go one way and odd another? If so, why do maps show squiggly lines? Am I supposed to put a stick in the ground and make a sun dial, and does this work at night with a flash light (my shadow never moves).

Seriously, how do people like Rob, Alan, and Danny just “know” where they are at any given moment and which way is the escape route?

I feel it only fair to recount some more post-Christmas experiences.

Personally, I discovered that while it’s better to give than to receive (a lesson sometimes forced on you by circumstance) that it’s even more rewarding to watch a child open Christmas presents.

Mind you, on the Eve of Christmas, my brother and law and I were in the attic above his daughter’s room, stomping on her ceiling, yelling Ho Ho Ho and ringing bells. Meanwhile downstairs Santa was adding to the booty.

Madison, when questioned the next morning, stated she heard nothing which disturbed her from her sugar plumb dreams. It’s statements like this which make me wonder I’m instructed to “pee as silently as possible” in the middle of the night, or why the television’s volume is set to negative four. Anyhow, I’m sure there’s good reason, but on with the story.

Somewhere under the pile of presents the tip of a nine foot Christmas tree was trying to peek out. Madison kept walking past the presents, and it was unclear to us if she knew what to do with them. However, once mom dropped the green flag, she turned into a child sized woodchipper.

Quite the expert at unwrapping, not only was she able to unwrap her presents, but those she delivered to us, and a few that weren’t. Admittedly, none of us seemed to mind.

Slowly, but surely, the west wall of the house became obscured, and in it’s place a toy department looked like it was starting to open. Eventually the sight became so overwhelming that Madison just got a dazed look on her face. Could it be that she was truly probing the depths of infinity by exploring the pile surrounding the tree?

I have to say, I took more joy in watching her go through her stuff than I did with my own gifts. Her face brightened with wonder and amazement at each pulled ribbon or torn box.

Finally, when all was said and done, we went to eat. However, Connie pulled me aside to witness something amazing. There, in the living room, with brand new wonders all solely for her enjoyment and pleasure, Madison sat instead at the candy jar. Not eating the little Hershey kisses, but playing with each foiled kiss as if it were a doll.

Funny how that 5.1 Dolby Stereo and wide screen digital TV was so close in our grasps, if only we all had the sense to buy a $1.79 bag of chocolate instead of huge hunks of plastic labeled Playskool.

Every once in a while, the sequence of events turns unexpected and delivers a message from the universe that you weren’t expecting.

Such was this Christmas.

Madison, my three year old niece, approaches me with a small red squishy present. So, like many of the others, I start opening it while in the middle of conversation with those around me.

My conversation stopped as my mouth dropped open.

Inside was a baby outfit.

A blue and white top, with dark blue pants. It was tiny.

Tamara just sat there smiling at me, as if she was clueless.

I turned the package over to see if I had gotten the right gift. Across the bright red package were written the words: “To Walt, Love Red. Part III”

I pulled out the baby clothes and they were so tiny! I said to Connie, who was passing out gifts from under the tree, “I think I was supposed to get parts ‘I’ and ‘II’ first.”

The news hit me like a bomb shell.

Connie started rummaging, and I looked over at Tamara torn between surprise and excitement.

That’s when my mom calls across the room, “what do you got there son?”

I grinned. “Baby clothes!”

Tamara looks at me and the innocent look on her face is still there, only now it’s mixed with confusion.

“Those are Erich’s,” my mom adds. “Why did you open them?”

I looked down at the wrapping paper in my lap. “Well, one, Madison handed it to me. Two, it had my name on it. Tamara?”

Tamara gives me this “don’t look at me” expression, and turns to Paul, my dad.

He takes the wrapping paper and flips it over. “See, it says Erich.”

Apparently, my parents collected the wrapping paper from *last* year’s Christmas, and wrapped gifts with it this year, not checking to see if the paper was already addressed.

Well, I immediately forfeited the gift to baby Erich. However, the emotional aftermath stuck around for a while.

While Tamara and I aren’t expecting kids, I now know the feeling I’ll experience should she ever decide to surprise me in similar manner.

I always liked to know if God has a sense of humor, and this was the best Christmas “gotcha!” I could have ever asked for.

You know, in the grand scheme of things, I don’t mind the horse pills at all.

‘Why?’ might you ask.

The answer is that I have to have special eye drops to clear up this acute case of pink eye. Two drops, each eye, three times a day.

Now, let the record stand that when it comes to eye drops, I’m just a plain old sissy. Yes, if you’ve ever put in contacts you’re a bigger man than I. Even if you’re a woman.

For some reason, whenever my eye even gets the remotest inkling that something’s about to enter it, it shuts. I’ve tried it with everything from drops to my finger. And let me tell you, the latter hurt.

Even if I know it’s good for me. Even if I know it’s just liquid. Even if I’ve done it dozens of times before, it doesn’t matter. I go into super squint mode and can’t get the drops in.

Oh sure, I’ve tried to trick the eye. Super speed or even volume. No dice. Squirt something at it, and it all gets stuck in those super thick lashes of mine.

Since Tamara’s asleep trying to recover from the plague I just foisted on her as a present for driving me to the doctor, I opted to let her sleep and have Michele H. do it instead.

First the was the approach. The kids have been pissing her off something feirce today. I thought it was just my illness, but all of them have been trying people’s nerves for the last two days. I suppose it’s nature’s way of saying Thanksgiving Hell is almost upon us. If this were a Buffy episode, it’d be entitled “From the dinner table, it devours.”

Michele was just more than eager to go fiddling (good enough f word as another, I guess) with someone’s eyes at this point. Her near-zero resistance to the idea should have immediately put me at bay.

However, 5:00pm and and I needed drops.

I sat back in a little metal folding chair and scenes from Clockwork Orange flushed over me. Now I know she worked in a doctor’s office, but she didn’t have to be enjoying this so much.

I informed her of my little optical phobia and she knew just the trick.

Gently she inserted her claws prying my eyes open, while skillfully with the other hand unleashing a tide of burning fluid.

Well, that’s what the eye thought. I’m sure the actual even was quite peaceful and involved a cooling sensation at the end of it somewhere.

Anyhow, when I came to, and the laughing and pointing stopped, Michele handed me back the bottle and went back to dealing with minors.

Marni, once again, came up to inform me that I looked no better off than Godzilla himself. My beat red eyes were just a thing of fasination with her.

The only problem was, if mom was allowed to play with Walt’s eyes… why wasn’t she?

I can’t help but think I now have to start watching my back, especially when I sleep. Come to think of it, that’s good advice handed off to me by Chris long, long ago. Right after he burned my house down with plastic-wrap.

Until Danny produces a news clipping stating otherwise, I’m going to have to put the biological warefare theory on the back burner for a bit.

Last Thursday night I started getting slightly more congested than normal. And as the evening pressed on, it got worse and worse. Eventually it got so bad, I could barely sleep.

I woke up with what felt like a cold. One so severe that it might make better economical sense to simply package a small rainforest in a tissue box.

I did something I rarely do. I stayed home from work. I felt evil. I felt dirty. Here were all of my coworkers making useful contributions to society, and as for myself, I was simply contributing to the global warming problem with my newest addition: a fever.

Somehow, I made it through that day in a big blur, when the weekend came. At this point there was nothing the doctor could do… rest and warm soup time.

Now, as any good cold should know, when you don’t have to go to work, the ailment is supposed to go into remission so you can have some fun.

Well, mine didn’t. Instead, it got worse. I haven’t seen Harry Potter. I haven’t seen Bond. And it’s likely by the time the cold subsides, I’ll already have them on DVD. It’s just not fair.

The illness seems to bring out the goodness in people all around me. My wife demonstrates her love by showing me it’s possible for me to survie on a totally bland and liquid diet. But the cutest demonstration came from Marni.

As I was lying there in front of the fireplace trying to figure out how to claw my way in to get even more heat, each time I let out a small cough, she’d stop playing in the other room, run in, gently stroke me on the temple, and run back out again. It was the best “there-there” I think I had ever experienced.

And don’t think for a minute I didn’t start to take advantage of it, either. I’d see how quietly I could cough and get her to come running. I’d see if one right as she was leaving would stop her retreat.

Naturally, she never gave up, and I ended up feeling bad for toying with her.

Monday rolls around, and I’ve got about 3 full days out of the way. How much more could be ahead?

Oh, you guessed it. That’s when I started getting a sore throat. I don’t think I’ve had one this bad before. I barely can talk without choking or going into coughing fits.

And what can I say about back adjustments? I’ve thrown my neck and back out, and no sooner than Mike gets it in alignment, one good wheeze and I’m Mr. Pretzel again.

But, I’m still chipper.

That is until Monday night… that’s when the pink eye sets in. Yes, I finally managed to catch it, I think from the kids.

That night I woke up understanding a little better what Saul on the road to Damascuss must have gone through. My eyes were booger-glued shut. Sorry, there was no other way to describe it.

When I managed to pry them open, it looked like a scene from Alien. My eyes were red and bloodshot.

One of the kids drew a picture of me. And when it looked horrific enough, they changed their mind that it was a deamon (and not me afterall). Yeah. Right.

Tuesday morning, I had quite enough. Tamara took me to the doctors, and I got more slips of paper from him than a third grader with a weak bladder has hall passes.

Not counting the doctor visit, we spent nearly $200 in anti-biotics alone for me. Generic.

I can only wonder what work thinks. “Ow, my face hurts. Ow, my throat hurts. Ow, my eyes hurt.” Sadly, if you saw a picture of me, all doubt would be shed from your mind. Mike actually suggested taking a picture, but like I really want THAT floating around the corporate website.

Now I’ve got these horse pills and no horse. So, I suppose I’m to fill in for the rear of one and take ’em.

I’ve already talked with my sister, Thanksgiving at her place is canceled.

Jim, however, raised the offer of doing something together, if I was unable to drive (or move). He’s the greatest. Though, now there may be other plans that get in the way of that. Sigh. Now my hopes are crushed.

Anyhow, I awake from downstairs in front of the fireplace, and Tamara’s no where to be found. Turns out she’s been upstairs asleep for many hours.

When I wake her, I found out …she’s got the same fever, chills, headache, sore throat, and sinus issues I did. Let’s just compound my guilt.

I suppose I’ll have to wait for her to fall back to sleep before I slip her the pink eye and finish off her holiday to boot.

The kids and I have a new ritual since Halloween. All that spare makeup I have is being put to good use.

When bath night rolls around, I’m permitted to decorate the faces of Mike’s kids, transforming them into rabbits, cats, puppies, and even glow-in-the-dark Tyco Brahe clones.

Last night I was painting Marni’s face as a puppy dog. She had big black eyes, long ears, a white chin, and a brownish orange face with red lips.

Now, I might make an observation here. And that is that young children don’t realize makeup can be smeared off.

I might make another observation here, too. It didn’t cross my mind either.

When Marni was getting ready to head upstairs to do her bath, she wished me a good night and came over to give me a hug. Instead of a hug, she gave me a little peck right on my chin, just under my lower lip.

I didn’t know anything was wrong until she pointed at my face, said “uh-oh,” and then pointed at her own lips as an indicator as what had happened.

Now, normally you wouldn’t think this was a big deal. You would, however, if you knew that your wife was about to walk in the door any second and you had what looked like lipstick on your face.

Thank goodness the child spoke up and didn’t leave me there to face a red-head who would be more than willing to give me a hard time, even if she did suspect innocence.

I got up and went to the sink, grabbed a paper towel, and started wiping away.

That’s when the real trouble began.

Sweet Marni said in the cutest voice imaginable, “sorrieeez…” and while I was distracted at the sink by getting more water, she snuck up in the same instant and gave me a huge apologetic hug for the fake-lipstick incident.

Crotch high.

Now there was blush AND lipstick colored makeup right in the middle of my crotch. And I don’t mean a little dab. I’m talking about a smear about 5 inches long and 3 inches high. It looked like Tammy Faye Baker had taken a nap in my lap.

Did I mention Tamara was about to walk in the door any minute?

Because I know I’ve yet to mention that Mike “My Daughter Doesn’t Date Until She’s 40” Henderson was upstairs, probably reading a hunting magazine about effective techniques for skinning an animal after it’s been shot.

Should you be one of those people that believes that history will be unfolded for all to see at the Second Coming, be sure to get a good look at the panic stricken expression that lingers on my face at the exact moment I’m doing damage assessment. It alone is worth obtaining salvation for, if not just to get a gander at.

Immediately, I switch from face to crotch, hoping to that very same God that Mike isn’t walking down the stairs and I have to explain to him why me and my portable date are having a grand old time in front of his 3 year old.

Marni, ever the helpful, decides she’s going to help out. I told her not to touch anything (with my mind more thinking about me as the direct object to that imperative) and she backs away from her third approach.

She looked up and me and said, and I kid you not, “Water… duh!”

And you know, for a moment, I almost bought into it. I swear, my head turned to the sink. However, fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.

There was no way in the world I was going to saturate my lower extremities for her amusement and innocent delight. It was either going to look like I had succeeded in what it already looked like I was doing, or that I had wet myself.

Both Tamara and Mike would give me a load of grief, even if I could talk my way out of that. The only positive side to the story is that Jim wasn’t there to witness it first hand.

As luck would have it, the make up came off with about 30 seconds of vigorous abrasion, which to be honest, felt like an eternity (and pretty good if I do say so myself).

The youngster was shuttled upstairs with no concept of my turmoil, and as she hit the top of the stairs, my wife walked in with dinner.

That sigh of relief alone was more precious than you can ever imagine.