cherie’s remix

A few days ago, Tom and I were in the car, and I was not happy. 

 

I can’t remember exactly why.  Probably something about how he has been prattling on and on about hunting (and nothing else) for the past 4 months and how I’m so sick of it.  And wouldn’t it be nice to have a husband who gave a crap about this or that so that it wouldn’t ALWAYS be MY responsibility to ALWAYS do this or that because HE NEVER does it???

 

How obvious can it be?  I think.  All my frustrations are HIS fault.  If he would only do…this and that…just how I like it…everything in MY LIFE would suck less and…and…and…and blah blah blah ad infinitum.

 

I was having an attitude…that didn’t look very pretty on me.

 

Anyway.

 

Probably 90% of this crap was going on strictly in my head (and now in this blog)…but that 10%…when it came out of my mouth?  Not helpful.

 

In the middle of my little pissy fit, I’m hearing the words Blame Game…just underneath that scratchy broken record.  (The one in my brain that sorta got stuck in the same groove, playing that same bitchy song over and over and over.)

 

Blame Game.

 

A friend once told me that she was raised in a family where everything had to be somebody’s fault.  That when things went wrong or somebody got an attitude or had a conflict, assigning blame was the primary order of business…everyone started pointing fingers at everyone else.  So, all the family’s resources were spent trying to place blame, rather than trying to solve the problem. 

 

I thought,  Boy, that’s a pretty sick way to operate.  I could never fall into that kind of thinking.

 

But our society, our families, our selves – most of us are full of this kind of thinking.  The kind that always points the finger.  Tries to make the case that it’s somebody else’s fault.  And someone else’s responsibility to fix it to our liking.

 

Who’s to blame?  Who’s fault is this?  Who screwed up and made more work for me?  Why can’t I have this or that like somebody else?  How come so and so has a better life than I do?  What moron is standing between me and my happiness???

 

My friend went on to say that what she had learned about life is that when we point a finger at someone, we have 3 fingers pointing back at ourselves (if you make your hand like you’re pointing a gun).  Our concern, more than that 1 finger pointing outward, should be those 3 pointing back at ourselves.

 

I’m pretty sure there are no real winners when we play the Blame Game.  So, why do we play?

 

Maybe it’s that we’re not always willing to take responsibility for our decisions…good and bad.  Decisions…right or wrong…take work and commitment to follow through.  Maybe sometimes we want to make decisions and then blame someone else when we don’t take responsibility for the work involved.  Or when we do do the follow through and our plan doesn’t turn out to our liking?  It’s just easier to blame someone or something else.

 

Or maybe it’s because we want to blame someone else when we’re too scared to let go when we should.  Letting go means facing the unknown.  Facing the unknown is scary, even when letting go is the healthier thing to do.   It’s a whole lot easier to stay stuck in an unhealthy relationship or situation when we’re blaming someone else and hell bent on trying to get them to see the error of their ways.  Especially if we manage to convince ourselves in the process that we are St. Greatly Put Upon, the Martyr, in doing so.

 

The truth is that we may have influence, but we have no real control over anyone (after the kids are grown    ) except ourselves.  The more we try to exert control over others, the less energy and focus we have left for the job of monitoring (thoughts and behavior) and controlling ourselves.  And most of us need all the strength we can get for that.

 

If we want to stop playing the Blame Game, we have to be willing to change…and to accept, first and foremost, the challenge of adjusting our attitudes AND improving our behavior. 

 

Sometimes that means developing the spiritual disciplines of patience and thanksgiving.  Never a bad thing.

 

Sometimes it means recognizing the truth of what is and either accepting the way things are or having the courage to walk away from a relationship or situation that, in all reality, we can’t fix.  Never an easy thing.

 

I used to laughingly tell the kids that they could blame me and Tom for their screwed up lives until they were 30 years old.  What the heck?  I think we should all get to blame our parents until we’re 30.  After that, though, it’s time to get a clue that our problems are more about our attitudes and choices than bad raising or unfortunate circumstances.  Pretty much everybody can lay claim to some bad raising and/or unfortunate circumstances. 

 

But how long we stay stuck in the mess? 

 

Depends on how long we keep playing the Blame Game.

 

 

 

 

We did it!  Set a goal.  Made a plan. Followed through.  Finished the race.

 

Well, actually I set the goal and made the plan, and Tom…for the most part…followed me through… 

 

Me AND Tom. Turkey trotting together on Thanksgiving Day, 2008.  Better than mashed potatoes and gravy.  Even better than dressing.

 

Gorgeous day.  Sun shining.  Cold.

 

We left early.  Had to be at Kate and Kris’ by 8 so we could leave by 8:15.  We left their house at 8:30, and arrived at the fairgrounds with plenty of time to spare.  But I guess we needed that extra time to get our packets (a green T-shirt in a manila envelope) and warm up for the race (which we did by sitting in the car with the heater running).  Caleb met us there. 

 

Maybe you don’t know this.  The Des Moines Turkey Trot is the oldest road race in Iowa.  It’s held every year at the Iowa State Fairgrounds on Thanksgiving morning at 9:30.  This year the course was a 1-mile rectangle, which started out with a little hill up and a little hill down…about a ½ mile’s worth.  Flat for the rest.  The plan was for Tom and me to walk it twice.  Kate and Kris were running it twice.  Five times running for Caleb.

 

The prizes are pumpkin pies for the first 3 finishers in each age category.  Everybody else gets the green T-shirt and a really cool bronze Participant Medal.  Everybody’s a winner.  Just like T-Ball. 

 

Tom, who had been pretty quiet about everything for the days leading up (which I took as a sign of stoic resignation to the fact that I wasn’t going to let up on this thing), starts taking an interest.

 

 

Caleb:  “Uh oh.  Lots of tight shiny pants here.  Looks like it’s gonna be a race.”

 

Tom:  “Huh?  Tight shiny pants?”

 

He starts staring at how all the other Trotters are dressed.  Some of the hard core runners have on their friction resistant, super duper spandex.  Shiny.  Most of us, though, are dressed in wind pants and sweatshirts, hats, scarves, mittens. 

 

 

Tom:  “Well, hell.  I should have worn my long underwear instead of jeans.  I would have fit right in.”

 

Cherie:  “Yeah.  But I’m not really seeing much camouflage. Or blue jeans and flannel, for that matter.”

 

The kids are laughing and rolling their eyes.

 

Later, we’re lining up…or at least I think we are.  Turkey Trotters are a pretty informal bunch.  Lots of strollers and little kids with skinny parents.  People with dogs on leashes.  Families and friends.  Laughing and jostling.  Except for 4 serious-looking, bald guys in those black shiny pants, naked from the waist up, hoppy jogging through the crowd.  Blotchy red torsos in 24 degrees.  A murmur goes through the group.  Somebody says “swimmers.”   

 

“Five minutes!” the skinny old runner guy announces.

 

Nobody, except Kris, who studied the route map and assures us we have to head north, seems to know which way to start.

 

I’m holding onto Tom’s arm.  We’re right at the front of the crowd if we take off to the north.  On the right side and way back if we start to the west. 

 

It’s getting exciting.  We’re really going to do this thing!  Together!

 

Tom is getting excited too.  He looks over my head, sizing up the crowd and says,  “Do you really want me to stay with you for the whole race?  Because I think I can win this thing.”

 

I put on my stony face. Tom’s “training” for this event has amounted to trying on two different pairs of shoes so he could decide which ones to walk in. “I told you, Tom.  This time is just for me.  For me.  Next year you can leave me in the dust if you want to.  But this year I want you to walk with me and keep me company.  Besides, I didn’t bring my i-Pod.”

 

That gives him something to think about.

 

i-Pod.  i-Pod.  What the heck is an i-Pod?

 

Tom:  “Well, don’t you want to win?”

 

Me:  “Um…no.  I told you…my goal is to finish and not injure myself.  Finish and not injure myself.  Finish and not injure myself.  If I can finish in 38 minutes and not injure myself, I’ll be happy.”

 

Sports injuries…like blisters and pulled muscles…are at the very top of my Not To Do List.

 

He gives me a how-pathetic-is-that look.

 

Pow!  The starting gun sounds.

 

We’re going north.  Runners are streaming around us.  I seem to have stiffened up or something.  Because I feel like I’m walking all jerky and weird…like a middle-aged marionette…and slow.  Really slow.  I almost feel like I’m going backwards with all those runners moving around and away from us so fast.  Grandma Gump with Grandpa Grump at her side.

 

“Let’s try to get over to the side,” I yell at Tom.  By the time we’ve made it to the edge of the crowd, the surge is over and we’re left looking at the disappearing backsides of a few hundred runners and walkers.  It’s a little daunting. 

 

When we get around the first turn, we can see runners rounding the second.  A full quarter mile ahead of us…and those are just the ones we can see.  I’m afraid to look behind us.  Afraid that there’s no one there.

 

“I thought the kids said there were no hills on this course,” I puff to Tom.

 

No reply.  Tom is uncharacteristically quiet on the hills.

 

We’re about ¾ of a mile in when I notice that there are several pre-schoolers jogging ahead of us.

 

Caleb laps us the first time.  We Woo Hoo! him.  He gives us the V sign.

 

There’s a digital timer at the start/finish line so you can mark your own time.  Nothing official, just in case you want to time your laps and your finish. 

 

As we finish our first mile, the timer reads 17:00.

 

I try to walk and do the math at the same time. 

 

“Tom!  We just did a 17-minute mile.  If we keep up this pace, we should finish in 34 minutes!”

 

Tom grunts something.  We’re starting back up the hill.

 

Meanwhile, Caleb, who is running to beat last year’s time, is having Turkey Trot ishoos.

 

Ahead of him, he sees a kid…about 10 years old or so…start jogging backwards.  He’s looking over his shoulder at Caleb…zeroing in…weaving and adjusting his course to intercept him.  He grabs Caleb’s arm and starts to run along side him.

 

“Let go of me,” Caleb says and pushes his hand off.

 

Caleb can hear the kid’s mom behind him.  “Oh, my goodness.  What’s he doing now?” she says.

 

The kid grabs him again, dragging along for the ride.  “Get your hand off me, kid.” Caleb warns and shoves his hand off again.

 

Then Caleb yells back at the mom, “Hey!  Keep your stinkin’ kid off me!”

 

Nice.

 

“You wanna jog down the hill this time?” Tom asks hopefully.

 

“My back.  My knee.” I puff.  “I’m not going to get injured just to jog down the hill. I told you, I just want to finish and NOT get injured.”

 

But that 17 minute thing has me wanting to pick up the pace so we can finish in 34.  That would be shaving a whole 4 minutes off my 2-mile treadmill time.  I wish I could jog.  I would…if…well…you know.

 

Our group of walkers…the ones we seem to be keeping pace with…are a casual bunch.  Talking on their cell phones.  Walking their dogs (which Tom loudly protests to everyone around is an unfair advantage since the dog can pull them up the hill).   I, on the other hand, am at my top speed walking pace.

 

We hear one skinny guy in shiny black pants tell his kids (one in a stroller, two more hanging onto the stroller handle with him) that Daddy has won a pie and Hey! Look up ahead!  There’s Mom with big brother.  Apparently, he whipped out a couple of miles, won a pie, and then came back to walk with Mom and the kids. 

 

At last, we’re in the final stretch.  People are shedding clothes, leaving them in piles along the route. 

 

Kate and Kris must have lapped us a long time ago, but neither Tom nor I has seen them since the race started. 

 

I see the timer up ahead.  This time it’s the finish line for us.  Kate and Kris spot us.  (they finished running their 2 miles over 10 minutes ago).  They give us the Woo Hoo! and start walking toward us, to finish the last leg with us.  They’re following behind when I see that the timer says 33:05.  I have no idea how long it will take us to walk the distance that’s left, but I know for a fact that I want to make it before 34:00 

 

I HAVE to make it before 34:00.

 

“Let’s run!” I say to Tom.

 

And…we’re jogging.  Well, I think it’s jogging.  It actually feels like what it looks like when a toddler jogs.  Tiny bouncy steps.  Little arms pumping.  Looking straight ahead.  About as much vertical distance as forward momentum. Swish/swish.  Swish/swish.  Swish/swish.

 

I don’t care.  I’m gonna beat that clock.

 

Seconds tick. 

 

Bouncy bouncy bouncy.  Grunt/swish.  Grunt/swish. Grunt/swish.

 

We cross the line. 

 

33:30!!

 

“Old people run funny,”  Kate says to Kris.

 

Girls line up to the left.  Guys to the right.  I’m humbled and honored (and looking for a microphone) when they award me my beautiful bronze Participant medal and tell me I placed 9^th among the 50 – 59 year old women walkers. 

 

When I find Tom, he’s carrying a pumpkin pie and talking on his cell phone.

 

“I came in 3^rd!”  He chortles.  “Next year I’m gonna take 1^st!”

 

Maybe it was the look on my face.  Tom says, “You want to carry my pie?”

 

“Uh huh” I nod.  And I march proudly (if stiffly) to the car, pretending that I’m the one who won The Pie.

 

 

Here are a few pix Kate took later at her house.  Didn’t get any of Caleb since he hadn’t gotten to Kate and Kris’ yet.  He came in 9^th for the 5-mile race in his age group.

 

And the winner is…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

                                                  

 

Tom’s running shoes…

   

 

 

Kris - 9th in his category

 

 

                                                      

                                                             Kate – 10th in her category

 

 

Tom and Cherie – Two Big Weiners…er… Winners

 

 

 

In just a few hours and the Bell/Laufers will be out Turkey Trotting in 27 degree weather. 

 

Two miles (except for Caleb, who’s running 5 miles) of no holds barred, crazy and crazier, young and old…racing to the finish line for free pumpkin pie.   

 

Which is why I baked the pumpkin pies yesterday.   

 

I figure, if all our parts are working right, Tom and I should come dancing across the finish line in, oh, somewhere between 45 minutes to an hour.  That’s what we call race walking in Tom and Cherie World.   

  

I like doing something different along with a lot of the same.   Makes me feel less oldish, like there’s still new stuff to do.  Like I’m not quite as old as my driver’s license says I am. 

 

Like there’s still a lot of shakin’ it up left to do.

 

As for now, I’m off to stuff celery and make out yeast rolls to raise.  (You can always tell it’s Thanksgiving when you see real butter and full fat cream cheese in my fridge.  I become very cavalier about the condition of my coronary arteries.)

 

Happy Artery Plugging!

 

 

I love Thanksgiving. 

 

I love it even more since we moved closer to the kids and Kate and Kris are hosting it at their house. 

 

Because of that, I have the luxury of sitting here on my couch in my pajamas the day before, drinking coffee and writing a few words.

 

It’s a good thing.

 

I’m only in charge of mashed potatoes and gravy, cornbread dressing, homemade rolls, marinated carrots, and stuffed celery.  And I’m baking Caleb’s pies (Sarah Lee – 2 pumpkin, 1 Dutch apple) for him.  I know Kate would like for him to do his own baking, but let’s get real.  We actually want to eat those pies, right?

 

The carrots are done.  The cornbread made.   I can cook a little today and a little more tomorrow, still do my hair and nails and the Turkey Trot, and have time left over for just farting around if I want.

 

Maybe I’ll have Tom bring up the Christmas tree from the basement.  That would be a first.

 

The mantle is being passed. 

 

I actually have time to think thankful this year.

 

 

Thank you, God for:

 

My family.  Not just any family…MY family.  

 

My friends.  Not just any friends…MY friends.

 

Peace in my home and heart…you know, sometimes.

 

Kitty and Tom (not necessarily in that order).

 

Blessings behind.  Blessings to come.

 

Challenges behind.  Challenges to come.

 

Paying attention to us.

 

My many thousands and thousands of cherie’s remix readers all over the world. 

 

Showers.

 

Happy 4^th Birthday, Mia!  (Grandma Cherie sucks.)

 

 

 

 

 

I have to kill the cat. 

 

That or go shopping online for a Kitty Taser.  A little surprise to keep under my pillow for those special occasions when she has walked across my face for the 11^th time while I’m trying to sleep.

 

Kitty vs Cherie:  Monday Night Smackdown.

 

Kitty – purr, rub, meow, purr, rub, meow, purr, rub, meow.  Cherie – pop Kitty on the head. 

 

Kitty – stroll across the pillow.  Stumble over Cherie’s head.  Cold wet nose in Cherie’s ear.  Cherie –  says a vulgar word.

 

Kitty – run to the end of the bed and pounce on Cherie’s foot.  Hop…hop…hop. Purr, rub, meow.   Cherie – swat the air.  No contact.

 

Kitty – purr, rub, meow.  Kiss Cherie on the lips.  Cherie – send Kitty flying across the room. 

 

Kitty – sneaky hop back on the bed.  Tippy toe back up the length of Cherie’s body.  Plop herfatself in the middle of Cherie’s chest and start purring at 85 decibels, causing permanent and irreversible hearing loss.

 

Cherie – looks at watch.  Thinks it’s five o’clock and gets up. 

 

It’s really 4.

 

Now, an hour later, Kitty’s dead to the world, draped down my arm like my grandma’s fox fur, snoring and sighing and grunting like the biggest piggy in the litter.

 

KO – Kitty wins.

 

This doesn’t happen when Tom is gone.  I close the bedroom door when I go to bed. 

 

  

A young lawyer and a senior citizen are sitting next to each other on a long flight. The young lawyer is thinking that seniors are so dumb that he could get one over on them easy…

 

So the lawyer asks if the senior would like to play a fun game.  The senior is tired and just wants to take a nap, so he politely declines and tries to catch a few winks.

 

The young lawyer persists, and says that the game is a lot of fun. I ask you a question, and if you don’t know the answer, you pay me only $5; you ask me one, and if I don’t know the answer, I will pay you $500, he says. This catches the senior’s attention and to keep the young lawyer quiet, he agrees to play the game.

 

The young lawyer asks the first question. ‘What’s the distance from the Earth to the Moon?’ The senior doesn’t say a word, reaches in his pocket pulls out a five-dollar bill, and hands it to the young lawyer.

 

Now, it’s the senior’s turn. He asks the young lawyer, ‘What goes up a hill with three legs, and comes down with four?’

 

The young lawyer uses his laptop and searches all references he could find on the Net. He sends e-mails to all the smart friends he knows, all to no avail.  

 

After one hour of searching he finally gives up. He wakes up the senior and hands him $500. The senior pockets the $500 and goes right back to sleep.

 

The young lawyer is going nuts not knowing the answer. He wakes the senior up and asks, ‘Well, so what goes up a hill with three legs and comes down with four?’

 

  

I had the worst nightmare I’ve had in years.

 

I dreamt that Tom and I were in the process of moving, and all of a sudden people start milling around and gathering in our backyard in Lowden.  Then, out of thin air, stadium bleachers appear, and people start seating themselves.

 

I’m watching this and thinking:  We must be having a party. Are we having a party?  Did I forget we’re having a party?  Who invited all these people?  Did I invite all these people?  Who are these people?  Because there isn’t a familiar face in the crowd.

 

It’s summer and hot. I worry.  What is everybody going to drink?  Do we have any soda? Ice? Am I supposed to be serving snacks? 

 

Aren’t we supposed to be moving now?

 

I’m fretting.  I mean hugely fretting.  Major performance anxiety ishoos.

 

Then…all of a sudden, I hear a band start to play.  I turn around to see that a stage has magically appeared and there’s like this 7-piece rock and roll band…6 men and 1 woman tuning up to play. 

 

And they’re all totally naked.

 

I double-take back to the crowd to see if anybody is noticing, but I seem to be the only one who sees them.

 

So, since I’m obviously in charge of the entertainment, and I’m pretty sure it’s only a matter of time before the crowd notices 7 naked people on stage, I walk over and try to explain in my best hostess voice that they have to put on some clothes.  Unfortunately, they don’t speak English.  They’re Dutch or Belgian or something like that and they can’t understand from my gestures (cupping my hands in front of my private parts) that I want them to cover up. 

 

This goes on for some time…me pretending to cover various body parts and going wide-eyed and putting my hand in front of my O-shaped mouth like I’m shocked.

 

Finally, when I’m just about dead from overexertion and hypertension (this is how people die in their sleep), they figure out what all my gesturing is about and the men walk over to their instrument cases and pull out something.  The next thing I know, they’re all wearing these little G-string codpiece things (like they had over their tights in Romeo and Juliet) with tassles hanging down. 

 

I wake up in a cold sweat and I think:  God!  Why is it always ME who has to deal with the naked Dutch rock and rollers? 

 

Like I need one more thing to worry about.

 

 

 

 

 

Life – like writing – to do it well – needs skillful editing.  What we get rid of is every bit as important as what we keep.  More so, really.

 

So much that we hold onto dilutes us…our message…our purpose.

 

The longer we wait – to empty ourselves out – to edit out the extra – the longer we wait for clarity.

 

Which is fine, I guess, as long as we don’t mind waiting.

 

We start editing, not knowing what will be left when we’re done. 

 

That’s the pinch.

 

Chipping away we begin to know – discover – what our lives are really about.  Chip, chip, chip. 

 

It’s painful to accept what is.  Who we really are.  

 

And it hurts to let go of what we think we deserve.  What we were expecting to happen.  Who we were expecting to be.

 

What’s important?  The pure.  The true.  Fierce and unconditional love for God and others and ourselves.  Keep those.

 

What’s not important?  Our plans.  The ones based in pride…selfishness…ego…greed…self righteousness…resentment…fear.  Chip…chip…chip.

 

This is how we grow up.  It’s how we learn to be more like Him.  We become worthy servants.

 

And then we’re happy.

 

Or not.

I did the big girl thing and got up to write again this morning, even though I really, really wanted to sleep just a little bit longer.  Took out the trash and the recycle.  Cleaned the cat box.  Even remembered to pull out all the moldy fridge stuff I froze when we hit the road a couple of weeks ago.

 

I’ve been praying and asking God to help me with focus (again).  And it came to me (again) that getting up at 5:30 is something that helps level out my crazy bumps. 

 

Crazy bumps are all those crazy up and down thoughts and not thoughts that keep me bouncing wildly and working with equal diligence between tasks that are VITALLY IMPORTANT/INCREDIBLY TIMELY to those that are virtually meaningless/totally stupid.  My obsession with the job is undifferentiated…equal in tone and tenor regardless of where that job falls on the Important/Meaningless continuum. 

 

Crazy.  I know that.

 

Crazy bumps are pretty much how I ride these days.  Up and down.  Flying through the air.  Landing with a thud. The emotional equivalent of being thrown around the cab of your uncle’s old GMC pickup going 40 miles an hour down that washed out dirt and rock road through Bull Creek Holler; getting knocked out and waking up a day or two later in your Geo breezing south on Interstate 35.   

 

Travelling metaphors.   

 

It’s wearing me out.  All this travelling.

 

I’m not saying I’m done…but I’m really, really ready not to do this for awhile.  I can’t get in the car these days without puckering up and whining.  Besides the obvious work I’m always heading toward and away from, I’m finding it harder and harder to settle in at my destinations.  I have to admit that I’m not at my best as the only woman sharing  bathrooms and towels with 4 sweaty deer hunters.  Or in a double bed with Tom Bell.  Too much touchy touchy and goose jerky breath in my face. 

 

You’d think that all that travelling would make me more organized and adept at departures and arrivals.  Not so.  Just the opposite, in fact.  The more we go, the more I don’t want to go.  The harder and harder to stay on task.  The more I procrastinate.

 

The lists.  The packing.  The unpacking.  The minutiae of detail.  Getting the house ready for my imminent death on the road (it has to be CLEAN before I leave…).  Taking Kitty and her crap to Kate and Kris’.  Fretting for hours in my overstuffed closet to come up with 3 outfits that I will actually wear in public.  Re-stopping the mail and the newspaper.  Returning home with a butt load of crap to put away, not to mention a couple hundred emails and so much snail mail the postman has to put it all in a big box in a special compartment.

 

The devil’s in the details…

 

Who said that?  I think it must have been St. Paul or Moses because it is TOTALLY TRUE.

 

The details are killing me.  My brain is just not working right.  I make lists.  I can’t find my lists.  I find my lists.  My lists make no sense.  I used to make beautiful lists.  (audible sigh here) People could weep from reading my lists.  You could frame those lists and hang them in an art gallery.  Logical.  Balanced.  Nicely appointed.  Well-reasoned.  Asterisk bullet points and capital letters for main headings.  Dashed lines and lower case for subheadings.  All done in my very best penmanship on fresh, clean paper.  

 

Now my lists are hastily drawn on scraps of paper like crumpled MidAmerican envelopes I find in the trash.  All scribbles and scratches and with cross references between “Phone Calls to Make Before Leaving”  and “Cooler Food.”  “Bills to Pay Online Before Leaving” is littered with items that should be written on “Dry Goods to Take.”  Small cartoon pictures for when I can’t think of the right word.  One cryptic list had only this:  “coffee in micro.”

 

The closer it gets to time to leave, the worse it is.

 

Crazy bumps.

 

By the time we get home, all I want to do is flop on the couch and watch Top Chef reruns and eat Chinese carryout.

 

Which I did.

 

For 2 days.

 

God, help us all.  That’s a life you don’t want.  Day One isn’t so bad…it’s sorta pleasant, actually.  Dozing in front of meaningless television with a crab rangoon in one hand and the latest issue of People in the other.  But Day Two?  Waking up to soy bloat and garlic chicken burps…you can pretty much only kill the guilt with more duck sauce and deep fried.

 

So, toward the end of Day Two (I was running out of moo shu), I put the television on Mute and prayed one of my more articulate prayers:  GOD!! PLEASE!  HELP ME!!!

 

And there it was.  The voice in and among the chorus scrabbling around in my head…the one that is at the same time softer and louder than all the rest.

 

“Cherie.  You need to get up in the morning.”

 

Burp.  “Huh?”

 

“You need to be up by 5:30.”

 

“Oh.  That.  Right.”

 

Ok.  But…God, IF this is you (again) and you really DO (still) want me to get up that early, I’ll do it.  But…if this is really real…you need to wake me up…you know…so I’ll know it’s really you and not just me pretending it’s you.

 

So…next morning…yesterday…my eyes flew open at 4:30.

 

4:30 A.M.

 

Bleary-eyed, I squinted at the clock.  “This is a joke, right?  You said FIVE thirty!  So…if this is still really you…you need to give me another wake up call in an hour.”

 

5:00.

 

“What the crap???  I closed my eyes again, squenching them shut.  But it was too late.  I was awake.  I was awake before 5:30. 

 

I threw back the covers, stumbled into the kitchen to make coffee and sat down to blog about boogers.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I feel like I need to blow my nose…metaphorically speaking.

 

That’s how it feels when I don’t write for a long time.  Like a really, really, really bad head cold.  A totally stuffed up nose and cloudy brain.  I might get a little trickle here and there, but nothing helps except a big old honkin’. 

 

And when you start to honk, you never know WHAT’S gonna come out.

 

So.  Let’s see…

 

Since I wrote last here, lots has happened in the world.

 

New president.  New congress.  New lame duck.  New lows in the stock market.  More dorky-looking economists joining the Gloom and Doom Chorus. 

 

Whatever.

 

The Holidays are coming and I have 35-year-old tinsel and about a hundred tangled strings of C-9 lights that will take me happily through February 14th. 

 

That said…to everyone I know and love and on whom I have lavished cheap gifts in the past…prolly not this year.  Love y’all just the same…maybe even more…just rolling out my new Bi-partisan War on Recession and Anti-Overspending Bill (Bi-partisan = Cherie + Tom…that’s what I say). 

 

The bill is in the house…but so far hasn’t passed in Tom’s Hunting and Pretend Farming Committee.

 

We’re having Thanksgiving at Kate and Kris’ this year.  I’m making the carbs…homemade rolls, mashed potatoes, cornbread dressing.  Doing what I do best. Kate’s doing the turkey, sweet potatoes, cranberry something or other (new recipe), company green beans, and a jello salad for Tom.  Caleb said he’d buy the pies. 

 

The BIG news is that I’ve signed us up for the Turkey Trot on Thanksgiving morning.  It’s a 2-mile run or walk at the Fairgrounds (the application says “Run or Race Walk”  that’s funny).  The kids are going to run.  I signed up both me and Tom to walk, even though technically he never gave me his official OK. 

 

I figure he owes me.  I just busted my behind working for a whole week in MN doing the “Let’s pretend it’s 200 years ago and Cherie is the Cheerful House Slave who lives to cook and deify men” gig.  Back to back w/another 3 days in Missouri doing more of the same.  Unplugged from television, internet, AND phone (mostly).  I come home and I don’t even know who I freakin’ am anymore. 

 

Tom can suspend his Utter and Abject Disapproval of Exercise for one day and walk with his lovely wife for a half hour or so on Thanksgiving morning.

 

That’s what I say.

 

Whew!  That’s better.  One big fat booger down and about 20 to go.