Sunday, June 29, 2014

Memories to Have and to Hold

I sat in the church and took in the purplish blue hue that graced the back drop of the stage.  Last week I  had done the same in a different setting for a different couple. My weekends for the month of June have been a parade of celebrations and parties, coupled with congratulatory hugs and well wishes. We've had birthdays, sprinkled with holidays, showers and weddings, now all just memories tucked into a deep pocket of my heart where I lock up my treasures. The boys that once ran ruckus through my house, with tousled hair and bare feet, stood before family and friends promising... "To have and to hold until death do us part." A part of me wanted to object (because they used to give guest that option), but instead I sat and wondered.... "How did they grow up so fast?" You blink your eye and they're gone, moved on without you, living adult lives when in my heart I still see them as barefoot kids, or teenagers who are up to their eyeballs in mischief. They were and are a fun bunch and I couldn't be more proud than if I had given birth to each and every one of them.  The lives of these boys wove together into a practical sort of fabric where every thread crossed and recrossed through school, work and marriage, embroidering connections impossible to ignore and creating a tapestry of great beauty and endless worth.

Monday, June 23, 2014

Head Banging Good Time

This month has been the fun stuff of life, weddings, showers, births and birthdays. This weekend I went to my Red Aunt’s 90th birthday party. At 90, she is still as spunky as her legs allow her to be. I was sitting at the end of the table eating birthday cake with her…. “How did you talk them into letting you leave the assisted living home for several hours today Auntie?”  I asked. She waved a dismissive hand, shrugged and said… “Oh,they’ve gotten where they pretty much let me comeand go as I please.”  I laughed and then I took the opening and walked right on in. “Yeah, that’s what I hear.”  I said with my eyebrows cocked and a big grin on my face….  She gave me that big ole shocked look she has, slapped at my hand and laughed….  “You heard that about did you?”  Seems like my 90-year-old aunt, who insisted her legs were too tired to walk to the dining area to eat with the other
She looks like an angel here
residents, took it upon herself in a moment of sudden spryness to make a break for it, striking out across the pasture which backs up to the facility. Half way through the pasture they called out to her… “Doris, is that you?” She looked over her shoulder than picked up speed. When they got her back to her room she acted like nothing had happened when my cousin arrived to investigate. She’s a sly one for sure.  We had a head banging good day… The good part was intentional, the head banging was not.

Tuesday, June 10, 2014

Choo Choo That's Who

(disclaimer.... Multiple grammar errors, run-on sentences can be expected)
You know how guitar players have that ugly guitar face that in some circles might be considered cool looking, but to everyone else it just looks like a face you would never want to be seen in public? Lucky for me, I have an ugly golf face that is seldom seen because I rarely play golf. Well, I take that back, I play at least once a year whether I need to or not and that is during the annual company golf scramble. I know!! Lucky, lucky team that gets stuck with me and my ugly golf face which only gets used when I actually do something right and that rarely happens to me in general and especially not on the golf course, but apparently it happened once this year and yea me the photographer just happened to catch it in all its glory. Also amazing is…. The girl who never wins anything (that would be me)
My lucky, lucky team
won the title “closest to the hole” for the women. I have no idea how that happened…
Professional golf shoes
Must have been my golf shoes. The golf scramble is the one time a year when all of the people in the office are co-mingled with the guys in the field. It’s a nice chance to put faces to the names you hear and see all the time. Working in
Marge -n- Me
the office, we miss out on all of the shenanigans that goes on in the field. We hear stories, but things in the office are very uneventful. I try to mix things up as much as possible, but in a department full of Engineers, it’s like… Well, there really isn’t a good way to explain it, except things are very reserved in a… Well… A snooze-fest kind of way.  Not because they are boring, just because we are so busy (that’s my story and I’m sticking to it). Who has time for practical jokes and shenanigans and such? BUT if there are shenanigans going on, you bet I want to be right in the middle of them which is why I was so disappointed that I didn’t get included in a pre-golf shenanigan aimed at one of our foreman (who I’ve shenaniganed with before) and who is famous for digging himself holes he can't seem to crawl out of. In fact I believe people have gifted him a shovel or two because he keeps wearing his out. A few days before the scramble he was presented with a gold plastic golf set (child size). Oh man!!! Why hadn’t I thought of that. The benevolent being who gifted him the golden set was anonymous and unbeknownst to me as to why, he suspected I had done the honors (if only I had). All would have been fine and dandy if he had left it atthat, but later in the day, I received a rambling email addressed to me and several others where he actually…. Well, I’m not sure exactly what he was trying to say (we had several try to decipher the ramblings), but its safe to say “The trash talking” had officially began, it included me (specifically), and much like Isoroku Yamamoto’s quote regarding Japan attacking Pearl Harbor, all he did was “awaken the sleeping giant”… So let the shenanigans begin.  I was able to obtain some “insider” information, which got the wheels a rollin.  All I had to go on was he had a
Choo Choo's big rig

favorite saying “As all of you know it is hard to build a railroad when some individuals are hollering whoa!!”, which had earned him the new nick name of “Choo Choo”. The deciding factor was… He wasn’t happy about how sticky the new nick name was. It seemed the name “Choo Choo” had taken off like a steamroller on steroids. Now, all of the guys in the field were calling him “Choo Choo”. How convenient for me. He rolled out of his truck at the scramble to find his very own “Choo Choo” as well as multiple different signs at several
tee boxes with train jokes and other silly things. He even had his very own Thomas the Train riding toy on his first hole, that I noticed he carried around in his cart all day long. An added bonus was all of the Choo Choo hoots and hollers that were heard throughout the day (yes I believe someone had a train whistle). In his rambling email he instructed….


Jackie if you notice the dog is on the front porch and like we always say if you can’t run with the big dog’s stay on the porch. (that goes for golf also)”

To which I respond….

Thursday, June 5, 2014

Prepare Yourself to be Annoyed


Wednesday was a long day. A little after 4 a co-worker happened into my office asking about the anticipated birth of my first grandchild. She asked if I had heard from my son and daughter-in-law who were having a ultra-sound and would hopefully be able to tell if it was going to be a Baby PitterPatter or Baby PitterPatty. I told her I hadn’t heard and I was trying not to be pushy, so I hadn’t texted them. As if by magic, my cell phone rang and the caller ID showed it was my son. I answered the phone as natch as possible… “Stay cool, just stay cool” I told myself. My son knows his momma well. This is how the conversation went….

Me:
“Hey”

Him:
“Hey, what are you doing?”

Me:
“Oh, just working… Kind of…”

Him:
“Yeah? So you’re working?” (As if that should somehow be shocking to him.)

Me:
“Yeah, I really am. So, what did you do today?”

Him:
(Laugh) “You know what I did today… Don’t try to be coy with me.”

Me:
“I’m not being coy! I’m being subdued…. This is what subdued looks like on me….. So?”

Him:
“We had our appointment today. The baby will be here October 19th (also my youngest son’s birthday), They measured everything and it’s all just perfect… He was really moving around.”

Me:
“You slipped!!! You said he!”

Him:
“I didn’t slip. We’re having a little boy.”

From that moment forward, my voice became squeaky because I was TOTALLY suppressing my urge to freak completely out!!!!! I have tried so hard to maintain my excitement and be all “Cool, this is not big deal” but this is TOTALLY a big deal and the excitement is just so hard to control. When I got off the phone with him I texted everyone to let them know because… Hello, this should be on FOX NEWS. Then I went and annoyed the crap out of my co-workers because that’s what a Lolli should do! We annoy the crap out of people who haven’t gotten to the Lolli stage yet, and we amuse those who have been there. Fair warning…. If you haven’t been there, prepare yourself to be annoyed.