Happy Father's Day

I dashed into Casey's this afternoon for a big 'ol fountain soda, and when I came out, there was a car parked next to mine with a cute little kid strapped into the passenger seat. His father wasn't far off, just grabbing a newspaper. 

Said cute little kid--and I mean freaking adorable; TV cute--gave me a wide-eyed look as I turned to open my car door. Just as I began to hop in, his sweet little voice called out "Happy Father's Day!" I turned around to see him leaning toward his window with a beaming smile. I smiled back and said "Thank you! You too!"

My speaking to his child brought the father running, and I could see a look of concern on his face. I knew that look. I could see his thoughts: "What did you just say to my kid?"

I got into my car and paused for a few seconds to settle my soda and put my seat belt on, giving him a second to speak to his son. When I figured I'd given them enough time to straighten it out, I turned to look at them. The father had his forehead on the steering wheel, laughing so hard, and when he turned to make eye contact with me, we both just burst into another round of laughter.

It has been a good day, even though Clint worked all day. I delivered gifts to him from myself and from his daughter. I left a bottle of bubbles at my father-in-law's grave. I was proud proud proud when I found out that my son called Clint to tell him Happy Father's Day. I had a jolly laugh with complete strangers, and witnessed another father in love with his funny kid.

Really, I had a great Father's Day.

Water, Roots, Deep Conversation with a Jalapeno Plant, and Unsolicited Relationship Advise to a Loved One

I've spent a good part of the weekend trying to get a grip on my garden, which has gotten away from me. Sigh. I know. Already.

A couple of weeks ago I purchased more plants, and life got a little chaotic, so they sat, in their flats.  The plants were larger, and the roots sat confined in those little plastic packages. They'd become so compacted and dried that the water I'd sprinkled over the them just sat on top, and would not soak in. 

Yesterday I sat and analyzed them, and came to terms with the fact that I was probably out $40 and had killed 2 flats of marigolds and a couple of jalapeno plants.

I decided I had nothing to lose by trying though, so started the day by pulling the plants out of their tight pants--I mean, their tight plastic containers--and sat them right down into tubs of water. I let them soak their feet for a day. I knew full well I might end with a couple of buckets of mud with dead plants in them, but I gave it a shot.

Here are the peppers, yesterday:

And here they are now, my coffee companions this morning:

I slept in this morning, and now on my second cup of coffee, I sit contemplating how important water is, and how it has the same effects on our human bodies as it does on those little plants, and how I wish someone would bring me some scrambled eggs.

Putting off scrambling my own eggs, then, I sat thinking about the roots of those plants. All squished in in there, taking on the shape of the container they were stuck in, growing and growing into a tight knot, and getting sicker. And once released from it, beginning to reach out and expand, and absorb what it needed to thrive again. 

We really do have a lot in common with a plant, don't we?

I spoke this week with a friend that has just ended a relationship. A relationship with a "partner" that belittled her and made her feel bad about herself, and made her second guess her own good instincts. A "partner" that would turn the tables on her and trip her up and make her feel a little crazy. When you're in that relationship with someone--and look, most of us have been in that relationship with someone--that stuff trickles over, outside of the relationship--into your self-esteem, into your personal life, your job, your hobbies, your dreams, your friends, your family.

Now, entertain me, and let's say we're all plants.

My friend's ex-boyfriend--and this is not a man-bashing exercise, the situation is gender-reversible--is that shitty piece of plastic that those plants came in. That sheath that kept her from expanding her roots and reaching out and absorbing what she needs to thrive. I was there once, 30 years ago, a story for another day, but I still remember how that shitty plastic sheath can actually come to feel like home--you're planted in it, for God's Sake. You come to think you actually need it to survive--it has you convinced that it is the only thing holding you together, and you cannot live without it. You see what it does there, right? It's very sneaky plastic; that plastic is a real sonofabitch.

Note to my darling friend:

You've stepped out of the plastic flat. Be one with my jalapeno plant: Drink lots and lots of water now, and grow and grow and grow. Your reach can be endless. And the next time a piece of plastic asks you out for dinner, run for your life. You don't have to be polite to plastic; you can be downright rude. It really doesn't matter if it thinks you're a bitch, ok? 

If you don't believe me, just ask my marigolds. Marigolds don't lie.

Legacy

Last night we went to dinner with Clint's Uncle John and Aunt Judy. John turned 79 today, and he and Judy are real pistols. I fretted over choosing a restaurant they'd like--they're "older," I thought, so nothing too spicy, nothing too boozy, etc. We settled on a great old bar-restaurant called Crane Alley. The minute we walked in, Judy said "I want a beer!" and John followed suit by ordering a smoked chipotle beer for himself, and told us how much he loved big, loud places. He can't hear well in them, he said, but he loooooooves watching people have fun.

They told us about their wedding in Las Vegas (not the first for either of them), in which they met "the cousins"--an annual gathering of 8. They intended to sneak off after lunch one day, and then return at dinner time and announce they'd gotten married. It was one disaster after another: their intended witness took off before they could whisper their secret plans; Judy's name was misspelled on the license application, then they argued whether she should put that she was divorced or widowed (she was both—divorced once, then widowed from her 2nd husband), and the license had to be redone 3 times, to the chagrin of a grouchy clerk. The courthouse couldn't then dig up a legal witness, so they gave up and ran into a cheesy chapel. They finally got the job done and were then forced to sit through a sales pitch to purchase a video of their wedding. When the movie was put into the VCR player, nothing played: the staff had forgotten to turn on the camera.

John told us also of a story about going to a one-room schoolhouse when he was a young boy, and knocking the two front teeth out of a classmate, when he threw a block at him. He lived, he said, with the guilt of knocking that kid's teeth out, but upon seeing him again when they were adults, the guy had teeth! All of his teeth, and they didn't appear to be dentures! He said he wanted to ask how it could be, but on the other hand, didn't want to bring it up.

I noted, "Maybe you knocked out his baby teeth, that he was going to lose anyway." Uncle John gave me a blank stare, and finally said, "You know. I never thought of that." I'm not sure why we all found that so funny, but we ended up howling, laughing. John could finally let go of knocking someone's front teeth out, after 75 years. What a relief.

***

This was just one evening that we shared with family, in the last 10 days or so. Clint's father, Alan Weidert, passed away in his sleep on May 23. He'd been declining from Parkinson's disease for some time.

We have been busy and stressed, and grieving for him and for each other, but what has been at the forefront of the last 10 days or so is the close circle of friends and family that gathered to hold one another up, and celebrate Alan's life. While we have cried, we have also laughed and laughed and laughed, and that is his legacy.

I want to tell all of the stories I heard, in the last 10 days, and all that we did with the time spent with family and friends that gathered. As I said, we laughed, we cried. We ate, we drank. We went to a few garage sales, and even to an acupuncture clinic together. I may circle back and show the photos and tell the stories, or life, as it is wont to do, may move forward faster than I can write about it.

Time will tell, I guess. I know that if I don't get around to it, I still have another angel keeping track, and laughing along.