Short story – Page 4 – Nourish-n-Cherish

From Divine Mermaids To Almighty Dashed Cars

I have written about the pace of life in the nourish-n-cherish household before and I shall do so again. Never a dull moment about sums it up. Now, of course, there are folks who have more kids than we do, and more pets than we do (did), and yet manage their time more efficiently than we do. One can either sigh and wonder where the time went, or simply muddle along and try to throw in a lazy afternoon or two if possible and make the best of things. That is what we do.

The daughter’s school had put up a truly marvelous play. The children were fabulous in their roles and it was heartening to see how the props were changed, the lines memorized and the whole play was worthy of the standing ovation it received.

To my mind, with out her (the daughter), it seemed the play could never have gone on. I mean, she played a half dozen roles in the same play. There were a dozen sailors on the stage, and sure enough, there she was: The sailor with the curly hair, which was hard to spot as the daughter has straight hair. The next minute, it was a school of fish (the orange one with black stripes for the critics). There a sea-gull, here a sous-chef, elsewhere an unfortunate soul. The play was titled ‘The Little Mermaid’ and of course enthusiasm for the production ran high in the daughter’s mind. She has always liked the mermaids.

drama

In fact the Mermaids may once have saved us – read on in this thrilling tale:

https://nourishncherish.wordpress.com/2010/07/17/the-white-tiger-stops-at-gray-part-1/

https://nourishncherish.wordpress.com/2010/07/23/the-white-tiger-stops-at-gray-%E2%80%93-part-2/

There were rehearsals to attend, costumes to try on, back stage friends to rib, camaraderie between scenes, forgotten cues, not yet perfected dialogues, and much more excitement. I was really happy that she had an experience like this, for performances form a bond forged of nervous anticipation that is difficult to simulate elsewhere.

I quizzed her about how she came to play this many roles later, and she said that when she joined the Drama club, she had auditioned for various parts. She was selected as only a sea-gull at first. However, the Drama Club had not quite expected a steady stream of folks to leave over the following months, and she was given more and more roles to fill. I had no idea the Theatrical industry worked so much on Corporate lines.

Between Drama productions, Science Fairs, Basketball games lost, tied and won, life has been a series of waves. The past Saturday was probably the first one this year where we did not have anywhere to rush off to, and the son lay belly down on the mat blissfully arranging and re-arranging his cars, while his mouth was set to ignition-on. The fond grandparents looked at him playing with his cars on the floor, and gingerly picked their way through the pile lest they take a spin like Lightning McQueen in the Cactus patch.

Vroom! Vroom!

Looks like it is a ‘No’ on the tires for Lightning McQueen again

Vroom!

Every-time the ignition sounds died from him, a running commentary started up telling us all about that blasted tire of Lightning McQueen that burst during his final lap in the Piston Cup race.

Cars_2006

I yearned for an afternoon nap that Saturday. How delicious it is when there is no plan other than to take a walk and read? The mother, a relentless cook, was already thinking of the evening meal, but I shushed her with a smart, “We’ve just had lunch – relax!” and went upstairs singing to bed.

In case you have missed the narrative thus far in the blog, the son is somewhat singularly focused in his interests. He plays with Lightning McQueen or Dusty Crophopper loyally ever since he knew how to hold a toy:

https://nourishncherish.wordpress.com/2013/02/28/lightning-in-the-butterfly-grove/

https://nourishncherish.wordpress.com/2014/02/21/the-car-test-of-colors/

https://nourishncherish.wordpress.com/2013/10/18/the-car-chase/

When one comes up to bed yearning for a nap, one wants to take a nap, does one not? Does one want to spend time clearing the bed to make it look less like a freeway and more like a bed? One does not. After the fifteenth car was removed from under the blanket, I felt justified in swearing: “I swear to the Almighty Car Lord that I shall kick Lightning McQueen if I find him in my bed again. ” Even if it stubs my toe, and I have to hop around holding my big right toe in my left hand for a few minutes.

P.S: Please catch a good nap when you can folks. It is wonderful.

Nose in Books & Feet in Socks

As an immigrant to the United States, there are things I will always cherish. Lovable quirks such as “Water no ice please” or “Aww..”. Things like different reading fare is marvelous. Growing up in the misty mountain valleys of South India, we had access to good children’s books, and I relished every moment spent with my nose in books and my feet in socks.

Enid Blyton lifted all of us children into clouds above The Magic Faraway Tree or whisked us away on the Wishing Chair. Tinkle comics & Champak took us for a spin (I am trying to remember some of the characters without the aid of the Internet – a cheap thrill in the current times – Kalia, Chamataka, Doob-Doob, Tantri the Mantri, Suppandi, Naseeruddin Hodja, Vikram & Betal and of course, that vague huntsman who should be the mascot for gun control laws, Shikari Shambu).

tinkle-collage

Later, Nancy Drew, Bobbsey Twins, R.K.Narayan, and Alexander Pushkin were the in-things to read.

As more serious fare gradually replaced this wonderful array, I never expected to be revisit that wondrous feeling of picking up a children’s book where you know not what magical world opens up to you, and when. But that is exactly what happened when I had children here, and we journeyed into these marvelous worlds together. I had never read the Thomas Train series or the Curious George series or the Beranstein Bear series or any of the books by Dr. Seuss as a child and I got to experience all of this with them for the first time. Oh! The simple pleasures of reading a book like any of these for the first time is gift enough, but to be blessed to be able to read it for the first time as an adult is surreal. It was like growing up all over again. To that, I am eternally grateful.

Walking into the children’s section of books is such a treat. Dr Seuss’s birthday gave rise to a number of excellent articles and I relished them almost as much as the books.

What Pet Should I Get?

Seuss-isms

Just as Dr Seuss promised, the nonsense woke up the brain cells that were sluggish due to lack of use and life became an adventure again.

dr seuss

It even makes me think nothing of making a fool of myself publicly and putting out things like:

Do you want to be a Sailor?
Or do you want to be a Tailor?
Maybe we need to be a Failor
Before we become a Winnor.

Love on Mars?

I am reading a book that is futuristic in outlook. Trees on Mars By Hal Niedzviecki. Sitting on our commuter train, I look around to see that there is only one other person in the whole packed compartment reading a book. The book itself is a somewhat distressing outlook on our obsession with the future and futuristic trends. How Artificial Intelligence will and is taking on more and more of how the Internet World functions. How the waves of the future are affecting the educational system. How it could affect our entertainment choices, art and the study of humanities. We all know that is happening and is inevitable and all the rest of it, but I put the bleak thing away to ponder on some things that cannot be done away with.

As I stepped out of the train station that evening, I saw a vendor hawking red roses with a lopsided grin on his face. As though mocking and daring folks to stop and buy his roses. I have seen these vendors every year, during the week leading up to Valentines Day. On Valentine’s Day, you see a bunch of folks you would never have chalked down as the romantic type when observing them on the train, doling the cash out for a few roses for their beloved. The AI systems could take a while figuring out which ones have that streak of romanticism in them, I thought victoriously, but of course I might be wrong.

With Valentines Day approaching, the son’s preschool environs are a-quiver with excitement. Pink and red hearts plaster the walls. The daughter drew a card with a large heart and a bunch of surrounding hearts for our Anniversary. The son asked if he can take the card the daughter made for our anniversary to his school to put it up on the notice-board. “No!” I squealed. Before any egos could be bruised, I assured the children that the card was beautiful but it was meant for Appa and Amma alone. I am not sure I am quite ready for that to be bandied about on a school notice board. Not to mention the questions surrounding marriages, weddings or society’s inevitable curiosity around arranged marriages.

I am also reading The Wild Swan a book by Michael Cunningham, a clever take on fairy tales with a dose of the worldly adult interpretations. Each tale is short with a slightly different view to the tale. But, I cannot deny that I like the children’s versions better. The children’s versions are common tales but manage to spin magic about them.

Pretty much how the children manage to spin magic around Valentines Day.

I miss the years of Elementary school valentine’s day preparations with the daughter. She would arduously draw hearts and flowers on every card for every child and teacher in the class. I knew those cards were to join the recycle pile in their own homes by the end of the day just as the pile she came home with did, but it was a wonderful concept and kept her happily occupied for a few hours.

Love on Mars

I really like how the younger children get to see love in its more wholesome form. They love their parents, grandparents, uncles, aunts, teachers, friends, siblings, caregivers and pets. It all gets a bit wearying when they want to make cards for them all, but I prefer that to the more narrow interpretation leading to conjugal harmony( or not) one day.

As long as we know how to retain this curious ability to love and be loved, the future can march on to the beat of generated bytes and streaming bits.

Happy Valentine’s Day !

To Infinity & Beyond!

Remember the sermon about Serendipity? Don’t go by it. Take it and toss it to Tinker Bell, the fairy, when she flies over you. Because none of that works at Disneyland. Strategy, planning, timing and speed are the keys to a successful visit.

On regular days, you may not see the husband and I dancing a jig together in the middle of the road to catchy music, but in Disneyland, we do. I buy the hot cocoa for the kids, while he dashes to Adventure Land for that Fast Pass. He gets in line for the food, and I tackle the task of getting us seats to eat in. One gets the space to watch the Parade or the fireworks, the other takes the children to the restroom. Hectic? Maybe. Pleasurable? Mostly. Tiring? A little. Together? Not always. Magical? Of course!

You know how they tell you no two children are the same? Well we always knew the son and daughter have quite the dissimilarities. But never was it more apparent than at Disneyland. This is the first real visit to Dis . for the son where he did not blindly follow everything his sister does. Previously, each time, when we meandered into Tomorrow Land, we found ourselves washed out again towards Fantasy Land or Adventure Land within minutes.

This time, however, we spent more time in TomorrowLand than in any other land. Given the recent Star Wars movie release, the whole place was Star Wars themed. There were rides and museums catered to Star Wars fans. Jedi warriors marched up and down holding their parents hands on one hand and a light saber on the other. We found ourselves posing with Storm Trooper and Fire Trooper and Yet-Another-Helmet-Wearer. (They all looked the same to me and wore helmets. ) When I mentioned this aloud to the husband, he shushed me swiftly and hissed, “You are in Star War Geek territory. I mean, that could start off a serious fracas.” he said half-amused.

Boys! I tell you. The son has not even seen Star Wars, yet Tomorrow Land fascinated him enormously.

Which brings me to the question of why we are as a species so intent on knowing what the future holds for us. It is because the past is immutable and what we know doesn’t really interest us anymore?

I recently read a beautiful book, An Acceptable Time, by Madeline L’Engle in which a time portal opens up and the protagonist is able to step back in time by almost 3000 years. It was a fascinating read with time tesseracts and inter lapping time circles.

It got me thinking that if we are here now from the future, what would we change? Global Warming, industrialization, population control, disease control or some other thing that is trivial enough now, but avalanches into something bigger?

Butterfly or Humming bird effect. (https://www.brainpickings.org/2014/10/20/how-we-got-to-know-steven-johnson-hummingbird-effect-time/)

In the meanwhile, we have no idea what the future holds and whether we are making the right choices. Time alone will tell. To Infinity & Beyond – let’s find out.

Healthy Snacks? Yes! NO!

You may have heard this tone with particularly effervescent kindergarten teachers. “I am going to pick up the toys, who wants to help me? ” The voice is enthusiastic, slightly sing-song and most suggestive of acquiescence. At the end of this sentence, there is a scuttle among the noble children, all aiming to please. Miraculously, those who were moving to the red side of the margin see a chance to redeem themselves and everybody is happy to be helping with the toys. The classroom bursts into song: “Everybody clean up! All the children do your share!”

I confess it was something like this response I was expecting when I announced that I was leaving for the grocery store. “I am going to the grocery store! Who wants to come with me? I am going to pick up splendid snacks for our trip!”

There was no scuttling to please me, no daughter trying to get back into my good books after deploringly questioning me at the mall the previous day whether I had crossed items off my list, as I made to wander off to look at some pretty and shockingly expensive clothes in a forlorn store. None of the repentance one likes to see. The children looked (a) uninterested in going to the grocery store and (b) they practically held my hand and stopped me from buying any snacks for them.

I was going to make a quick stop at Traders Joe, that splendid store of organic fruits, vegetables, beautiful flowers, eggs from happy hens, milk from peaceful cows, yogurts using contented bacteria and p cows milk, fragrant soaps and hand-washes never tested on animals: this is the kind of shopping the husband likes. Most snacks the children like, can be traced back to this store, and yet there weren’t ready to come. I was confused and muddled.

Trader_Joes

It must’ve shown on my face for the daughter, forthright as always, said, “The thing is: you will buy healthy snacks.” She emphasized ‘healthy’ in a rather distasteful tone of voice and continued, “Then, you’ll get mad at us when we stop somewhere to buy something we can eat. Of course, you won’t eat it too because though it is healthy, it is still a snack right? Then you’ll tell us all about starving children and how they would love to have healthy snacks and then we all feel guilty and can’t completely enjoy the stuff we buy with Appa on the way. So, just don’t buy snacks okay? We’ll go with Appa tomorrow to Traders Joe and buy something for ourselves.”

I was aghast and turned to the husband for support only to catch him casting admiring looks at her. “Wow! I wish I was that brave!” he tried not to say.

The husband can be relied upon to be convinced by the children. “But Appa…it is organic. See?” they say as they show him chips, cakes and ice-creams, and he melts, along with that chocolate mousse they are handing him. As soon as they get home, the children disappear upstairs, secure in their knowledge that their father blessed their choice, while I gasp at the contents.

Well, say what you will: I am going to take that packet of baby carrots for myself.

The Curious Garden

I have always loved reading Children’s books. There is something charming, and uplifting about them, a shining hope that we sometimes fumble with as we grow older. Even when the books deal with hard topics, even when they deal with hard concepts. Every time I feel jaded, there is nothing like a lovely children’s book to help me uncover the magic again.

One beautiful day in November, I dragged the children along on a walk. The fall season, and the recent rains had given way to unruly gardens, crisp fallen leaves for us to feel the crunch as we walked on, and little birds frequenting the place once more. On the road side, was a hedge trimmed to the shape of an oblong mushroom and the toddler son stopped in front of it and said, “Like the Curious Garden book right? This is how it was in Amma’s garden when she was a little girl.”

The daughter looked dubious. “How do you know it was like that in Amma’s garden when she was a little girl. You weren’t there remember?” The son looked hurt. It is true that he is often confused with time and does not understand why there were periods in our life before he was born, when he always remembered having her with him.

What is Time is a favorite question of his.

“I know! But Amma told me when she read the book, right Amma?”

“That’s right!” I said somewhat taken aback that he remembered what I had said in passing while looking at the pictures in the book a few days ago. It has since become a favorite book for both of us. We love cuddling up with the Curious Garden.

It is a heart warming story about a little boy named Liam who looks after some plants on a forgotten railroad track only to have the curious garden spread its influence all over the forgotten places in the city. The Curious Garden also inspires many amateur gardeners and the last page shows the transformation of a bleak, smog-laden city to a beautiful one with creepers and trees and hidden nooks of gardens by the time the boy grows to a man.

One on gardens in Brain Pickings:

https://www.brainpickings.org/2015/08/10/the-little-gardener-emily-hughes/

During Thanksgiving, the pre-school that the son goes to had an exercise asking the children what they are most thankful for. The notes were shaped like feathers and they were all posted on the notice board together in the shape of a turkey. I stopped to see what the children were thankful about. I must say it was all wonderful. Very few had capitalistic tones, which definitely warmed my heart.

The son’s feather-shaped note said he was thankful for Mom cuddling up with him and reading Curious Garden.

The Efficient Baxter Takes a Break

One morning, when the husband was away, the daughter sighed wistfully, as we piled into the car to get to her school on time, and said, “I miss Appa. I miss the action before going to school.”

“What do you mean?” I asked guardedly. This is the sort of conversation that will lead to promises involving television time, chocolates or extended bed-times, and drama about broken promises for things that should not have been promises at all in the first place.

“Well…you know how you get things ready the previous night and then we come in the morning and take everything and leave?”
“Yes…”
“Well..we’d never do that if Appa was around would we? We’d run, and you’d run and there is more, I don’t know, FUN!” said the daughter.

I could not deny this allegation.

School-going time is one packed with drama, hilarity, perplexity, action and yawns. Feathers ruffled at this time smoothen themselves out before we get to our various institutions and good humor and charm overtake the retelling of it in the evenings and the family hums along with its customary cheer once more.

We also have strange customs and rules such as ‘Check the rear-view mirror till the car gets to the main road.’ I have run after the car on several occasions looking like a windmill flailing my arms, waving the latest piece of homework, or some paper that is required to be handed in. It is very hard to do that. Windmills function beautifully because they don’t run.

windmill

One time, I was charging behind the snorting car, looking like a pumped up rhinoceres because the daughter forgot her shoes. Her SHOES! I ask you. She explained that she likes to relax in the car and put on her shoes, so she can chill at home. When I told my friends this, they didn’t bat an eyelid. They said they always have an extra pair of shoes in the car for just such emergencies.

One time, I had to take her shoes into school because she wore two left shoes to school. (https://nourishncherish.wordpress.com/2013/12/19/miss-goodie-two-shoes/)

The time when the check-rear-view mirror became a rule was on a particularly cold day in the Winter. The temperature gauge was mercilessly pointing at sub-zero and the daughter forgot her lunch-box. The house inside was toasty and warm, and I had forgotten how cold Californian winters could get. I charged after the car barefoot, running a sprint, with a lunch bag in my hand. My athletic coaches in high school always thought I performed best when I had a dog chasing me causing my heart to pump like it was powered by an industrial pump, but I wish to tell them that I perform pretty well when barefoot on sub-zero roads as well. The car, already late, was doing its best to keep the distance between us level. I was running and creating such a ruckus, some geese stopped their flight mid-air to see who the dickens was rivaling their squawking.

Luckily, the car’s merge into the main road was somewhat delayed because of the traffic and I managed to bang the car from behind and cause the husband to turn around. The sheepish daughter took her lunch box, had the sense to thank me for the food later that evening, and all was laughed at, but it is now a rule. Everyone has to look at the rear view mirror before going ANYwhere.

When the husband travels, I throw my lackadaisical side aside and step into the role of The Efficient Baxter. Since I am rarely the Efficient-Person, I do a sincere job at it when I do step up, and I cannot deny, it snuffs the joy out of the process.

With the husband back, The Efficient Baxter has taken a break again, and we scrambled most satisfactorily this morning. I threw a well-aimed jacket through the open car window as it left, and received a beaming smile and a Thumbs-Up from the occupants.

What Keeps You Up – Part 1

I still remember how I felt the first time I read a novel by Leon Uris. I was 12 or 13. Mine was a sheltered life. A safe, small community where everybody knew everybody else and my parents were respected enough. So, we freely roamed the hillsides, nibbling on berries and swinging on trees. With the advent of Television, some gruesome images had penetrated my mind, it is true, but most of my knowledge of worldly-bad and evil came from the spirited conversations we had with family, teachers, friends, and from the daily newspapers. So, it was probably right to say that I had no clue or exposure to the horrific depths to which humanity could sink.

Our history textbook gave us statistical information about unrest, wars and the number of lives claimed etc, and I had been properly horrified then. But, there is something about reading a Novel, that brings home the truth to you in a manner that no amount of statistics can. These are people you begin to know through the narrative and to even care about. To see them thrown in the throes of the Second World War is just shocking.

http://mic.com/articles/104702/science-shows-something-surprising-about-people-who-love-reading-fiction

http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/oct/28/president-obama-says-novels-taught-him-citizen-marilynne-robinson

I still remember shaking with fury in the night. The temperature outside was sub-zero, and it was raining noisily, but I was hot, helpless and angry. I finished reading at 1 a.m. and when at 3 a.m. my mother came to see why my lights were still on, she found me weeping incoherently and writing furiously at my desk. I had filled papers and papers with my rant and my heart felt hollow, my eyes swollen.

My poor mother. I had school holidays, but she still had to go to work the next day. I am sure she wanted to just get back in bed and snuggle into her sheets. Who wants to have their sleep disturbed by teenagers reading novels? But she listened to me and in her matter of fact way, told me to think of how in the end Good triumphed over Evil and to say the 3 slokas she taught me when I was 5, over and over again so I could fall asleep. “But there is no God! If something like this can be allowed to happen, there is no God!” I said.
“That may be so. But saying these slokas over and over again, will make you concentrate on something else and let you sleep.” she said.

I must have fallen asleep at some point that night for when I woke the sun had managed to rise without my knowledge, and was peeking through the clouds whenever it could, to turn a watery sun upon us. I am sure she told my father about it, for when I got up the next day, there was a quizzical gleam in his eyes as he surveyed me, like his little daughter had suddenly grown up.

Ever since, every time I read anything about the World Wars, I blanch and brace myself for impact. Which is why, I was angry at myself for clicking on that link the day I had taken off to enjoy Diwali with the children at home. My heart lurched and the food I had eaten 3 hours ago threatened to leave if I continued reading it.

I clamped the laptop shut and resolved to celebrate Diwali. After all, wasn’t the point of Diwali to signify that Love triumphs over Evil? That light always triumphs over darkness.

“Happiness can be found even in the darkest times if one only remembers to turn on the light. ” Albus Dumbledore in Prisoner of Azkaban

That evening, as we drew a crooked rangoli in front of the house, colored it in, and set tiny tea lamps on them, I managed to fill my heart with hope that things will be okay. That in the bleakest of times, there is always light, if we dip deep into ourselves for hope.

There are always terrors anew in this world. Terror attacks, refugee crisis, civil unrest, wars. The same sword that kills also protects – humanity has that which is loathsome and hopeful in them. There is love and hope in this world, and that alone will help us face Evil.

For the Love of ( Halloween & the Environment) – Part 2

In Part 1 of the Halloween post, I had written about deciding on an Environment themed costume for Halloween for myself. I settled upon a Tree. We had a whole hour ahead of us to plan, execute and pull it off. I don’t know whether you have tried impersonating trees, it is very easy. You send your husband to buy something, say a car or some green cloth for the tree depending on your mood, get out a piece of cardboard and some green paint. You then set your children to cut and paint a tree-top and you sit back and you wonder how to pull off looking like a tree trunk and you are set. Ask some creative friend of yours to finish up the costume, stand back and project the spirituality of stolid trees. Like Booker. T. Washington said, “There is no power on Earth that can neutralize the influence of a high, simple and useful life.”

There is no power on Earth that can neutralize the influence of a high, simple and useful life. - Booker. T. Washington — There is no power on Earth that can neutralize the influence of a high, simple and useful life. – Booker. T. Washington

https://www.brainpickings.org/2015/06/11/the-spiritual-uses-of-fruit-trees-ralph-austen/

https://www.brainpickings.org/2014/07/17/the-book-of-trees-manuel-lima/

Trees are wonderful and soothing. Their stoic presence, their sturdy silence and their useful practical lives should say it all. Setting aside the fact I cannot produce oxygen, or hold a sturdy silence, or be stoic, or useful, I could be a Tree. I need to stand rooted and sway a bit in the breeze. How hard can it be? I just have to be out and about for people on candy-highs on Halloween night to flock to me for some calm.

The Silent Spectator.

That went well. I only spent the whole evening explaining to all and sundry who I was. Have you tried impersonating a Tree? It is a spiritual experience in and of itself. It is not easy. For one. I don’t see Tree Costumes, so you cannot pick one up and pull it on. For another, it is dashed hard to hoist the top of a tree on a hat. It flops back and forth and does not stay sturdy. I am sure that plenty of people on Pinterest will tell you how to do it, but I can tell you how not to do it. Especially, if you try to work with a cowboy hat.

So, with some excellent suggestions from my friends and children, we morphed it into a Tree Nymph whose express aim was to Save Trees. I tied the painted tree around my torso, wore brown pants so my legs would serve as the trunk and then wrapped my head with flowers to look like a Tree Nymph. I don’t know how Tree Nymphs look, but neither does the majority of the populace, so now they know. They look like me.

I must say I rather enjoyed myself. The son was Spiderman and the pair of us went around telling everyone that “Amma saves trees, and Son saves Humans”. When else could I have sported that Green nail polish the daughter and I picked up so we could have Rainbow themed nails?

Is this a Tree Nymph? If you haven't seen one, then yes. — Is this a Tree Nymph? If you haven’t seen one, then yes.

Say what you will about the rains that washed the Sun-dried California after Halloween, a small irrational part of me was happy. As a Tree-Nymph, had I invited the clouds over? It was certainly part of my original theme. The husband had even suggested I walk around with a large water droplet. But we did not have time to cut and color the water droplet. I sat relishing the sounds of the fresh patter of the rain, smelling the parched Earth drinking in the moisture, and enjoying a hot cup of tea in my hands.

“Next year, let’s all go environment themed. Maybe that will end the drought. If a Tree Nymph can bring rains, ….”, I crowed, and stepped out of my door to see an uprooted tree.

I hope you all had a Happy Halloween. I did.

The Decorative Bug – Part 2

Every year as I walk by homes where the residents have gone to great pains to celebrate and decorate their house for the Holidays or Halloween, two things happen.

One: I take a tiny hammer to the brain and give it a rap – right there on the skull where it ought to remind you to say “Ouch!”

Two: I convince myself that I should indeed decorate the house and I get started like a damp fire cracker. I make a lot of noise, sizzle about a bit, generate a lot of smoke and then die out without doing anything brilliant.

The Brilliant Firecrackers hobnob with the Wet One

Year after year, I tell myself that the next year I shall be the dry fire cracker, and shall delight all around me with my brilliant sparks and I try. Only, I have never been the creative do-it-yourself-er. The maximum brilliance my pumpkin carving has reached was posted on the blog five years ago. (https://nourishncherish.wordpress.com/2010/11/01/pumpkins-and-shotputs/) The eyes were gouged out with great difficulty and the smile was anything but.

I’d call it a childish attempt, if I had not seen the attempts made by children and how vastly superior they were to my own. Not only that, for a week after that brave attempt, I was sore in muscles I did not know existed and I cheesed the pumpkin-carving after that. Only pumpkin craving remains now. My neighbors put me to shame with attempts like this:

The Neighbor's Pumpkins — The Neighbor’s Pumpkins

Last year, I steamed out of the house like a tank engine and came back with Halloween decorations that will make my house dazzle and not just that, uplift the whole neighborhood. I know my faults, so I went in for foam stickers with a bit of sparkle on them. We stuck spiders on the garage door and some foam stickers on the door. It looked beautiful and frightful enough. We even had a few children come and coo.

For the whole year after that we have had partial Halloween decorations – the foam stickers refuse to come off and the spiders stuck on the door remain there (well, some of them fell off on their own, the others remain, joined at times by their live brethren). The cobwebs are entirely natural and add to the aura of the place.

If you ask me what I did for Christmas, I will gallantly point you to the lights hanging outside. They have simply not been taken down ever since and we have blue and white icicle lights twinkling all year through. They light up the space for the spiders well enough should they need a little help. The thing is, I was so proud of our lights that I refused to take them down in January. Then, by the time February rolled around, my enthusiasm for Spring took over and the lights were forgotten.

The last time we had put up lights, I almost died of heart failure for one, and the husband almost fell off a six-foot ladder for another, so I was not going to take this brilliant easy lighting system down in a hurry (I notice I haven’t written about it yet, and probably should. A thrilling tale and I wish to do it justice. )

What horrors do you wish to inflict this time? You ask. I am thinking and rubbing that soft spot in the skull for ideas. I may go in for the tablecloth decoration once again. I bought one of those Halloween themed disposable tablecloths and stuck them on the door. I was so pleased with myself with that one.

I tell myself every year to buck up one of these years and try my hand at decorating something nice for Halloween or Christmas. How I admire people who have that creative bent of mind? Sigh.

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