What are you Wearing?

Remember the good old days when you could pick up the phone and call anyone you wanted to . . . anonymously? Before caller ID? (What a bad day that was, huh? The first time you prank called someone and they called you right back - oh, the end of an era, that. At least I was past the calling-boys-and-hanging-up-if-they-answered-the-phone stage.) AND, remember when anyone could call YOU. . . anonymously and ask if your refrigerator was running, or just breathe heavily into the phone and say "what are you wearing"? (Now, only your husband would pull something like that, and you're really not fooled even if he calls from a work phone.)

My little brother played a really funny YouTube clip for us the other night that made me laugh at myself and my usual choice of comfy pjs. (It made Tyler laugh at me even harder.) Inexplicably, it also made me think about the random heavy-breathing prankster of yesteryear and I imagined the conversation we might have now . . . if caller ID didn't exist.

Me- Hello?
Heavy Breather- (Heavy Breathing)
Me- He-llo?
HB- (Heavier Breathing)
Me- Okay, then. Thanks for playing.
HB- What (Pant) are you (Pant, pant) wearing?
Me- Um, really!
HB- Oh, yeah, reeeeally.
Me- Pajama Pants and a sweater. Excited?
HB- It's four in the afternoon.
Me- Your point?
HB- Okay. . . Mmm, hot. Is that all you're wearing?
Me- Not even close.
HB- Tell me (pant) more.
Me- I'm omitting the undie-details, but, wool socks, tights, long underwear, a turtleneck, and an apron.
HB- Are you (Pant) outside?
Me- Right. Without my ridiculous eskimo-ish coat, fur-lined boots, beanie, scarf, insulated gloves and hand warmers? Nice try.
HB- What's wrong with you?
Me- I have warmth issues.
HB-
Me- Hello?
HB-
Me- Pervert.

So, what are you wearing?

I'm a Junkie.

The signs - you know you should stop, maybe make dinner or put the kids to bed. So you put it off and then when you get around to doing all the things you should be doing all you can think about is when you can get back to your little addiction. How much longer? Can you take it? Your sleeping suffers because you stay up feeding your craving almost until it's time to wake up. Then when you finally turn off the light to get an hour or two of sleep your mind is too busy to let you rest. At last you see it affecting your family. "What are you doing, Mom?. . .Oh, never mind." And your husband comes home from work wearing vampire fangs just to get your attention. (And does he ever - get your attention, I mean.)



So, I stubbornly refused to touch any of the Twilight books for, hmm, years, I guess. I felt it must be a Buffy rip-off and I was far too loyal a fan of the Buffy / Angel love story (and Joss Whedon) to fall for another lesser vampire storyline. I did the same thing with the Harry Potter mania - Scoffed at the fanatics waiting in droves for their pre-ordered copies of the latest wizarding installment, and then I completely sold out. (Not that that had anything to do with Buffy. ) I read LITERATURE, not pulp-fiction. Sheesh. What a faker I am. As much as I love plod slowly through a multi-layered piece of 'serious ' literature, have I ever been so engrossed that I would literally fly through thousands of pages within a few days because I could-not-put-it-down? (I can stop anytime I want, I swear.) I don't think so. (Well, at least not when a grade hasn't been attached to the reading in some way.)

Bottom line - you can count me among one of the Twilight groupies now. (Dang-it.) Edward's team, of course. Now that the reading frenzy is over though, I'm a little lost. I went through the entire series in a week - Thanksgiving week at that. Now I have that strange feeling of surreal loss that you get when you close the last chapter of the world you've been escaping to and you're just not quite ready to let it go. Whatever shall I do, Wherever shall I go? To the laundry room, I guess.

Reading the Signs

When things are hard or keep going wrong at what point do you stop and say probably wasn't meant to be and let it go, and at what point do you show perseverance? If you always push forward no matter what, when do you have time to read the signs, take a minute, and mark it up as a bad idea or bad timing or bad juju? When we took the boat out, for instance, and it wouldn't start (which might have something to do with the little monkeys who like to play in the boat while it sits in the garage.) should we have thrown the towel in then? Or (after jump-starting the boat in the harbor) how about when I was swinging around to pick Tyler and Max up for another run and saw Grey inexplicably paddling alongside the boat? ('But, I wanted to swim') How about when Nick leaned too far over the edge trying to fill his water-streamer gun and toppled in? No? Keep on keeping on? Endure to the end? When we left the radio on while the bilge was filling and the battery wasn't fully charged yet and had to be towed in to the harbor by some little twerp? Certainly then we should have wrapped things up and called it day. But no, the water was turning glassy and so were Tyler's eyes watching it. We jump started again and off we went into the sunset. To be fair, the last runs of the day were beautiful and mishap free. . . so was it a lesson in never giving up or should I have recognized a doomed day at the lake from the the first fruitless turn of the ignition? One way or another, boating always makes for good pictures and we had my 'little' brother, Josh, with us who left to fly back to work in Russia today. (We'll miss you Josh!)




Tyler and Nick



Greybug



Maxer



'Uncle' Josh



Grey and Max



Tyler boarding with Grey



Tyler boarding with Max



Tyler ignoring me while we're towed in. I said ' This reminds me of the first time I went skiing and had to get taken down the hill in a toboggan. I was so embarrassed'. Tyler answered 'You know what's different? No one was pointing a camera at you telling you to smile while it was happening'.



Max and Nick watching the tow boat



Last swim of the day