Story Time Tuesday - Writing Fiction

If you missed where this story started just click here to read it or simply click on the Story-Time Tuesday link at the top of my blog to take you to previous chapters.

Writing Fiction - Chapter 13

Here's where Chapter 12 left you...

“C’mon Edgar, let’s take care of some business!” I told him.

And we did.

It was kind of fun actually having a companion to walk out and get the newspaper with me. As he did his doggie business, I looked away and gave him privacy. I talked to him while I made coffee. He slurped down his milk and bread while I ate my toast in a much neater, quieter way. I looked up the number for a vet and made an appointment for later in the morning.

I washed my face and brushed my teeth while Edgar had watched. I tried making the bed while he tried jumping in it. He tugged on the pillows and made growling noises.

I found myself laughing more than I had in a long time.

And I didn’t think it was even a bit crazy to be talking to a dog. He was such a good listener and never once told me I should be over my grief and moving on with my life.

In fact, I think I began falling in love with Edgar just a tiny bit in only a few hours.

And now the story continues...
Later in the morning, I told Edgar it was time to go to the vet. I’d never been to a vet and wasn’t quite sure how it would work. When the kids had been small, they’d always begged us to let them have a dog and I’d always used the age old excuses: A dog is a lot of work. Who’s going to feed it? Who’s going to clean up after it? Who’s going to take it for walks? And then I’d distracted them by letting them get a goldfish or a turtle or something. When each little scaly or shelled friend had ‘gone to the great pet shop in the sky’ I’d felt vindicated. It had hardly seemed worth the work and the pain to get attached to a furry friend and then have it … ummm…. ‘go away’.

Protecting my children from loss (and keeping extra chores to a minimum) had seemed like such a high priority, but in the short time since Edgar had invaded my life, I wondered if that had been the right decision. My husband and I’d endlessly argued the pros and cons of getting a dog. I’m sure you can figure out which side I’d been on, because in the end my stubbornness had won the battle. In retrospect, I wonder if the battle lost had actually been that of not letting our children learn the care and compassion that comes from having a four-legged friend.

But that was all water over the dam now. My life was so heaped with regrets from back then; adding a dog to the list of mistakes seemed redundant.

I’d shaken off those thoughts and, when I headed out to the car with Edgar, I saw my nosy neighbor at her window. I waved gaily to her, watched her mouth open into a perfect little ‘O’ of astonishment, and then opened the front passenger seat for my adorable little mutt.

He sat calmly on the front seat for a moment and then jumped up to place his paws on the door frame so he could see out the window. I told you he was a short little fella.

The vet’s office seemed very much like a pediatrician’s office, although the receptionist immediately handed me a leash and told me curtly to put my dog on it. I laughed to myself, thinking leashes might have been a good option for when my kids had been small and reluctant to go to the place they associated with getting shots.

I was thinking about kid’s shots and watching a very ugly cat hiss at its owner, when the receptionist called out Edgar’s name. For a mutt, he did a great job walking on the leash to the scale…11.5 pounds, thank you very much…and then over to the examination table.

The doggie doctor looked like he was about sixteen years old. I’d been noticing that for a few years now…medical people must be graduating at the age of 12 or something, because they just kept getting younger and younger. The doctor seemed to genuinely admire Edgar and he talked about confirmation and pedigrees and other doggie things.

I interrupted to tell him that I didn’t have the faintest idea what he was talking about. I then informed him I’d found little, lost Edgar just the night before. He looked up with a funny expression on his face and inquired, “Edgar is a stray?” When I nodded, he immediately said, “We need to check for a microchip. A dog like this…” Then he interrupted himself and grabbed a small device off a shelf and kind of waved it around the back of Edgar’s neck. Edgar and I must have both looked puzzled, because he went on to explain many dog owners microchip dogs, especially purebreds. He said a little computer chip is inserted between the dog’s shoulder blades with a needle and a special syringe. I must have looked horrified, because he quickly added that most dogs don’t even feel it being implanted. Once the microchip is inserted the dog is registered and can be traced back to the owner by using radio waves to read the chip.

Huh? All this talk totally confused me and made me hunch my shoulders together in imagined sympathy. I just can’t imagine that a syringe between the shoulder blades would be painless. Shudder. . Eventually, the vet finished waving the small device around and informed me it didn’t look as if Edgar had been microchipped, which seemed odd since Edgar appeared to be show dog caliber.

“Show dog? Purebred? Huh?” I thought.

Sometimes I think I’m just processing things inside my head, but obviously I say them out loud because the vet answered almost immediately, “You know Edgar is a Cairn Terrier, right?”

Edgar? My previously mangy, scroungy, dirty, ugly, smelly little dog a purebred?

We finished up the exam with Edgar disdainfully ignoring the vet as he was poked and prodded in all of his little doggy orifices. I carefully looked away while Edgar endured his humiliation. I disdainfully ignored the vet’s advice about how to search for Edgar’s owner…OKAY. I didn’t show that I was ignoring the advice, and even made copious notes so it would appear I was paying attention, but I figured that anyone who’d just abandoned Edgar like that wasn’t even worth hunting down.

When the exam was done, I was silently shocked by the size of the check I’d to write for the vet’s services. Who knew taking a dog to the vet would be so expensive? Edgar and I graciously accepted our dog food samples and coupons and got back in the car so we could head to the big box pet store the vet’s office had directed us to.

I’ll admit, taking my new companion shopping was a lot of fun. He sat proudly in the shopping cart and we wandered around buying dog food and snacks. With Edgar’s help, I selected a dog collar and leash in jaunty, bright blue. He basked in the praise and compliments heaped on his scruffy looking little head. It appeared that everyone in the world knew that Edgar was a Cairn Terrier but me! And I’m pretty certain that I remember talking to just about everyone in the store. Having Edgar with me took all the focus off me. No one looked at me in curiosity as the complete failure I was. None of them seemed able to tell I’d completely missed the mark when it came to all things related to grief and loss. It almost felt like having a dog along somehow camouflaged me. I liked it.

We hung out at the store for a long time…me, enjoying the feeling of anonymity a small furry companion offered, and him, enjoying the little treats and pats lavished upon him by animal lovers shopping there. We debated for some time over dog bowls and finally settled on a bright red set that looked quite handsome with his creamy gold fur.

The sticker shock I’d felt at the vet’s office wasn’thing compared to the dismay I felt when the smiling girl at the checkout told me the total of my purchases. I couldn’t believe buying things for a dog cost as much as they did for people!

On the drive back home, I talked Edgar’s perky triangle ears off! His bright, chocolate brown eyes stared at me in fascination as I told him how inexpensive things used to be. We wondered together how people even afforded to eat with the cost of things in the world today.

When I admitted to him I was sometimes afraid about surviving in the world without my husband, he laid his head gently onto my leg and sighed. I’m certain he totally understood what I was talking about.
I felt convinced he was probably one of the smartest dogs I’d ever known. Okay,I hadn’treally known many dogs, but he was, without a doubt, one of the best listeners I’d ever met.

By the time we’d arrived back at the house, not only had he eased my loneliness quite a bit, he’d also helped me come up with the idea of making my blog about him. My daughter had made me re-think ‘Mylifeinsideanoyster’ as a blog name when she told me that I, Pearl, was the irritant I’d be writing about. I still didn’t really get what she’d meant by that.

I spent a few minutes washing and drying the dog bowls and then pounding a nail into the wall by the kitchen door to hold Edgar’s leash and the package of adorable dog poo pick-up bags that were decorated in paw prints. I found a shelf to put all the food and treats on, muscled the dog bed (printed ironically with pictures of kittens) into the corner, and Edgar and I were in business.

I made us both a quick lunch and then Edgar retired to his new doggie bed in exhaustion. Oddly enough, I wasn’t the least bit tired.

I fired up the laptop, prepared to work on my blog and found myself right back at my struggle with alliteration, frustrated.

‘Eager Edgar’ sounded a bit like a porn name to me. Not that I knew much about stuff like that. Really. I’m not just saying that. Finally I settled on ‘Everything Edgar’, registered it, and set out to find a new background more appropriate for my little doggie friend.


To be continued, Tuesday, December 7th.

(c) 2010 Jennifer R. Matlock
This publication is the exclusive property of Jennifer R. Matlock and is protected
under the US Copyright Act of 1976 and all other applicable international, federal, state and local laws. The contents of this post/story may not be reproduced as a whole or in part, by any means whatsoever, without consent of the author, Jennifer R. Matlock. All rights reserved.

Anger management for the geographically challenged...

So...

I've been a little challenged with stress lately. And sometimes when I'm stressed out I get hot-headed and my language gets ... ummm... a little bit ... ummm... salty. I think it's a throwback to my sailor days. Or something.


I hate when I do that, though.

I hate when my frustration and anger takes over my tongue and I blurt four letter words. Not around the Grands or anything. But definitely around Mr. Jenny. And sometimes just around me!

However...

I developed a new technique to deal with this problem.

I decided to come up with an obscure word and make myself mutter it 10 times or so before I allow a swear word to pass my lips.

After great deliberation I came up with the word "Mozambique".

Obscure enough that I have to make myself concentrate on remembering it, and a cool word to say over and over again, too! AND IT'S TOTALLY WORKING!

For over a week now, my swearing has been reduced to only one single, itty bitty time...but that involved... well...never mind. It doesn't really matter what it involved, but I only slipped once...and then immediately gathered my self-restraint by chanting Mozambique about 39 times in a row.

It was pretty zen.

However...

...last night, Mr. Jenny really put my little word to the ultimate test with this conversation:

Mr. Jenny: The Mozambique thing really seems to be working.
Me: Yup. It's silly but it's definitely helping...and I feel a lot less stressed out, too.
Mr. Jenny: That's great. You do know what Mozambique is, don't you?
Me: Of course.
Mr. Jenny: Well? What?
Me: Well, what what?
Mr. Jenny: Well, what is it?
Me: Sigh, it's an ummm.... city?
Mr. Jenny: Ummm.... no. Close.
Me: It's a country? Right? I meant to say country.
Mr. Jenny: Yup. It's a country. Do you know where it is?
Me: Yea. Of course. It's on the earth, d'oh.
Mr. Jenny: Ummm.... how about being just a little bit more specific?
Me: Why?
Mr. Jenny: Why what?
Me: Why do you want me to tell you? Don't you know where it is?
Mr. Jenny: I know where it is, but do you?
Me: Sigh. Of course, I do. It's ummm.... ummm.... really close to India right?
Mr. Jenny: Ummm.... no...guess again.
Me: No. Leave me alone. You are a geography bully.
Mr. Jenny: No, I'm not. It's just important to know these things.
Me: (starting to lose my temper) Mozambique, Mozambique, Mozambique, Mozamb...
Mr. Jenny: Maybe you should know where it is, if you're going to say it.
Me: Mozambique, Mozambique, Mozam...
Mr. Jenny: It's in Southeastern Africa. Right between the Indian Ocean and Zimbabwe.


Me: Mozambique, Mozam...
Mr. Jenny: And, of course, it is South of Tanzania and right by...
Me: Shut up. I don't care.
Mr. Jenny: Of course you care...Zambia is...
Me: Shut up. I really, really don't care. Go away.
Mr. Jenny: Of course you care...Malawi is...
Me: Mr. Jenny? Seriously. Stop. You are ticking me off.
Mr. Jenny: And Swaziland is...
Me: Mr. Jenny? Mozambique off!
Mr. Jenny: What? What did you say to me?
Me: You heard me. Mozambique off! Leave me and my anger management technique alone. Yea! You heard me! Mozambique off!

See?

See how it works out really well?

My only suggestion is if you pick a word that is a place, you should know where it is.

Especially if you live with a geography bully.

And you know what else?

Even though I have a very Mozambiqued-up life sometimes...

...at least I have my anger issues kinda/sorta under control now.

Sigh...

Sundays with Steve - Unfinished Business

Since I’ve started writing “Sundays with Steve”, I’ve been thinking about vignettes of my life growing up in North Idaho. I realize the town where I grew up and the life I lived with my family is really a classic, all-American story. Perhaps you will recognize some of your childhood in these writings. And perhaps you will recognize the town you grew up in along with some of the characters you knew. Mrs. Steve has encouraged me to write these attempts of “creative writing” as opposed to the more factual journalistic style I was trained in and practiced in my early career many years ago. So my apologies if I stumble a bit here and there trying to blend the two styles together.

Unfinished Business

Thank you for asking. My first ever win in our annual Turkey cook-off was gratifying. It took ten years, a lot verbal pummeling of the voters, tours of the cooking sites, bribes of beer, wine and homemade eggnog, but finally, a win for the most deserving bird at the Matlock house.

You recall the situation from last week’s whine, I’m sure: In ten years of turkey cook-off competition between Mrs. Steve (Mrs. Jenny) and me, Mrs. Steve’s boring perfectly oven-roasted turkey always won over my delectable bird that had been slow cooked on a rotisserie over a charcoal and cherry wood fire to absolute perfection.

I have to admit the contest this year was closer than ever before: Mrs. Steve had loosely stuffed some fresh herbs from the garden and lemons we picked from the tree out front that morning, into the cavity. She then produced what she said was a magical cheese cloth, soaked it in melted butter, then covered her bird as it went into the oven. I will admit, but never publicly of course, that her oven-roasted bird was one of the best Mrs. Jenny had ever cooked.

I pulled out all stops; I had to after confessing my frustrations of the contest in last week’s story. First I soaked my bird (we went with just a turkey breast for the grill this year) in a salt and sugar brine all night, then I carefully mounted it on the rotisserie for a two and a half hour grilling over the hot charcoals and the cherry wood chips. I had soaked the cherry wood in water over night, so that the smoke flavor would be strongest on the surface of the bird, but then getting lighter as you dug deeper into the sweet and juicy meat. It came out very well.


While I was outside tending to the bird, Mrs. Steve prepared a surprise treat of home-made eggnog for our guests. I think it was a bribe for the upcoming vote on best bird.

To counter those tactics, I had to make sure the judges -- our 25 or so Thanksgiving guests -- understood the seriousness of their decision on the vote for the best bird immediately following dinner, so I entertained them during their meal by reading my story from last week, the one of my whining not only about the unfairness of the ten years of turkey cook-offs, but also described Aunt Eugenia and family friend Coxie from Thanksgivings past. After our meal I thought it was a bit strange that not one person said anything about the story I read to them. I think my entertainment may have been a flop -- it must have been suitably boring, just like the oven-cooked bird. Maybe it was an indicator of why my obviously superior bird had never won in the past ten years, or maybe (this was probably it) Mrs. Steve’s overwhelmingly good eggnog and the rest of the enourmous meal was just too good to over-come.

Photo below: oven roasted on the left, BBQ roasted on the right.


But in the end, I bribed and shamed the judges into voting correctly this year, a first, and a resounding win at 13-7. Three or four guests missed the vote, I think they were out in the kitchen with Mrs. Steve, sampling those amazing pies that were up next.

Next year we are going to ramp it up a notch or two, I think, and I’m sure it will take another year-long planning effort to topple the amazing Mrs. Steve’s cooking, once again.

(c) 2010 Stephen J. Matlock
This publication is the exclusive property of Stephen J. Matlock and is protected
under the US Copyright Act of 1976 and all other applicable international, federal, state and local laws. The contents of this post/story may not be reproduced as a whole or in part, by any means whatsoever, without consent of the author, Stephen J. Matlock. All rights reserved.

Saturday Centus - Week 30

Welcome to week thirty of Saturday Centus.

STOP! If you didn't read the end SC's from last week, please take a moment to do so. Just work backwards until you find out where you left off. I feel really bad that the people at the end don't get read.

Thanks!

Now on to regular SC biz...In case you've forgotten...

This is a themed writing meme. You can use UP to 100 words to tell your story. The prompt does not count for your 100 words AND it must be left intact in the body of your story. No illustrations are permitted. Your story can be fact or fiction, just keep it PG, please!

You have the entire week to link your work to the meme and you can link more than one story if you like.

Please display link button or just a hyper-link back to Saturday Centus. Be careful to link your SC URL to the Linky and not just link to your main blog.

I would suggest that since these are so short, if you can't think of a title just use your blog name as the title in the Linky.

Try to visit each one because there are some amazing writers participating in this meme. Since the links are so short they are also a fun and quick read.

Please e-mail me directly with ???'s or ask your question in a comment and I will do my best to get back to you as soon as possible.

This weeks we have a unique prompt supplied by Clearspace...a regular contributor to SC. Here are the instructions for this week:

This weeks prompt writing will be one with a twist. You know those horoscopes in newspapers? One of those will be your new prompt. Pick one randomly from a paper or a website and write a story <100 words about the kind of day that horoscope "predicts".

Thanks Clearspace for making us think this week!

Link anytime between now and next Saturday morning.

I am absolute certain Thanksgiving gremlins came to my house...

...and left my sink piled high with dirty dishes...

...and my laundry room piled high with dirty linens...

...and my refrigerator stuffed full of leftovers in 12,000 containers...

...and my countertops stacked high with the 'good dishes' that need to be put away...

There is absolutely, totally, completely no way this could be the aftermath of my perfect Normal Rockwell Thanksgiving yesterday.


Hope you're shovelling out where you are!

And that you just finished washing up the last dirty pan...


...so you can, please, please, please come help me.

...

Please.

I have leftover pie!!!

No wonder they call this black Friday.

Sigh...

PS. Hope your Thanksgiving was great!

Thanksgiving Morning

It was early morning. It was that tingly cold that makes you put on your warmest slippers and flannel robe. As I headed downstairs I cursed my attraction to century-old farmhouses. Although we had tried mightily to seal old glass windows and run heating vents through almost petrified wood beams, the upstairs was always chilly, and even more so in late November with an early cold spell bringing snow and wind to upstate Ohio.

On the way to the kitchen I turned up the thermostat several notches. I turned on the kitchen light and the golden tones of the wooden cabinets and floors glowed. The double window over the kitchen sink reflected a light glittering of snow dusted pink, rose and gold from the first rays of the Eastern sun. The gnarled ancient apple tree branches silhouetted against the pale lavender morning sky cast their charm over me as they always did.


The pilot light on my old, white enamel stove was out again, but I struck a match and the burner glowed warmly in the still chilly kitchen. I checked that the oven pilot light was working and turned that on as well. In deference to the early hour I had left my cast iron skillet, biggest roasting pan and a basket of onions out on the counter the night before.


The refrigerator supplied the butter, celery and a fat turkey ready to be stuffed. Very soon chopped onion and celery were simmering away in butter and their savory scents perfumed the kitchen air. This was the smell of every Thanksgiving past in our family. It was the same scent I anticipated each year when my parent rose at dawn to begin the preparation of our childhood feasts. I can remember laying in my cozy bed and smelling Thanksgiving as it drifted through the house. I hoped my children were having those same feelings on this day.

My huge yellow-ware bowl, used only for preparing food in massive quantities, easily held all my bread crumbs, bread cubes and spices - pungent sage and black pepper, the coarse glisten of kosher salt, the soft, enticing smell of the marjoram. All of the scents combined in that big yellow bowl…ahhh, the fragrance of memories. Soon the onions and celery were tender and the chicken broth warmed and the dressing became moist and aromatic with their addition.

The kitchen had become warm and wonderful and soon the stuffed turkey was in for its long roasting time. The extra stuffing was in its buttered casserole with a scoop saved out inside my little pink stoneware bowl. Now it was time to make some coffee and then start the dinner roll dough rising, time to make the pie crust so it could chill for several hours, time to start chopping vegetables…

But first… a fresh cup of coffee and cream and a small pink bowl filled with stuffing needed to be eaten in front of the big windows overlooking the stark sculpture of winter apple trees and the rosy morning glow of the sky. The house was quiet, the wooly throw was warm on my lap, my children were safely asleep upstairs.

Later the house would fill with relatives and laughter and teasing and conversation. Pies, mashed potatoes, the magnificent turkey, flavorful stuffing, yeasty warm dinner rolls, and homemade jellies glistening like jewels would fill the table.


But for now, my coffee was perfect, the stuffing was savory, memories of all the Thanksgivings that had come before warmed my mind. This moment and this magic was my Thanksgiving.


When I count my blessings this Thanksgiving, I have to count all of you, too. You have given me so much encouragement with my writing. Blog friends are real friends. I am so happy to count you as mine. Hope your holiday is filled with peace and joy and a nap by the fire after too much pumpkin pie.

This post is linked to Alphabe-Thursday's Thanksgiving break linky. To see other Thanksgiving posts, just click here.

Alphabe-Thursday Thanksgiving Break

Good morning class. I want to wish each of you a lovely holiday from school this week. For those that would still enjoy linking, please feel free to share a Thanksgiving story, memory, joke, recipe or anything that comes to mind or to simply share something you are thankful for.


We will resume regularly scheduled programming with the Letter J next week.

Keep up the great work on blog visits! This is sooooo much better!

Please link directly to your Alphabe-Thursday URL (if you don't know how to do this let me know!) and please continue to visit the five links before and after your link and leave a comment. Minimum of 10 links visited please. You can visit more if you like, of course.

I also want to let you know that each week I visit every blog. If it appears I haven't visited your blog by Wednesday morning, please let me know, because it is important to me to make sure you know I've visited you! This will avoid you trying to skip out on doing your assignment as well.

If you have any difficulties with your link, please make sure to include the number of the link when you e-mail me. It is really difficult for me to find you easily otherwise.

If you have any questions about Alphabe-Thursday or problems doing your link just post it in a comment or send me an e-mail. I'll do my best to help you as quickly as I can.

The McLinkey will be live from 1:00 pm MST time Wednesday afternoon in an effort to assist our lovely "friends across the pond" and continue through 10:00 am MST time Friday morning!

And remember.... link back to this post, you need to be registered as a follower of my blog, PG posts only, and try to visit the 5 students before and after your post at minimum. The links will stay live after the final post deadline has passed so you can even wait and visit over the weekend or whenever you have more time.

Please feel free to enter your Thanksgiving posts now. Class is dismissed.

Please don't tell my Mom I told you this...

...but even though she's never come right out and told me, I'm pretty sure she kinda/sorta had a fling with Kirk Douglas.

I'm not sure how the geography and age difference thing came into play, but somehow those two overcame a lot of obstacles to ... ummm.... conceive sweet little me.

The reason I'm fairly certain of this fact is this:


Do you see that massive dimple in his chin.

I have one, too. And no-one else in my family does.

See? I told you. Disturbing isn't it?

I've tried very hard not to think of this for years, but earlier this week at our Granddaughter's Thanksgiving feast I was painfully reminded of the question of my paternity.

Prepare yourself.

This is not one of those happy, little feel good Thanksgiving stories that will make you go 'awwwwwwww' and get teary eyed.

This is a tawdry tale of genetics gone wild. Do not be fooled by the cute little pictures of four year old Pilgrims.

Ahemmmm....

So...

There I was at our Granddaughters Thanksgiving Feast. Little kids were dressed up in construction paper costumes of Pilgrims and Indians. It was really, really sweet. The cutest one, the blonde in the brown polka-dotted dress is mine, of course.




Part way through the Feast part of the little program...



...one of the young mothers there started struggling a bit with one of her children. She was trying to hold her baby and help the other child and seemed to be getting frustrated. Then she looked at me and said, "Could you hold the baby for a second?" Could I? Could I? Babies? Heck, yea.

When I took the baby from her I almost gasped...the little kid had a huge dimple in his chin. Seriously huge.

Before I could start making funny noises and squishing the baby, though, our Grand pulled herself away from her oreo turkey and stomped over to me. She climbed up on my lap and started glaring at the baby.

And then she stopped...

And really, really looked at the baby.

She looked at me.

She looked at the baby.

She did this several times and then her eyes filled up with tears and she said in a hurt little voice, "Gwamma? Is this your baby?"

I told her no, but she persisted.

"Gwamma? Is this your Grandbaby?"

I told her no again.

She continued to look back and forth between the baby and me and finally blurted out, "Then why does the baby have a dimple?"

Right about then the Mom came back to retrieve the baby. I saw that she didn't have a dimple, so I asked her if her husband did. She smiled and said, "Yes! And I see your parents must have had one, too!"

...

...

See?

A few seconds after our Grand had finished staking her claim on her Gwamma with sticky, red-frosted oreo fingers, she started to climb down, but before she did she asked me, "Gwamma? Does your Mom and Dad have a dimple, too?"

My eyes grew moist.

The years of shame and sorrow welled up inside me threatening to burst forth in a torrent of fear and abandonment.

I almost spilled my guts. Right there. Right then. Surrounded by paper clad Pilgrims and Indians.

But it was almost Thanksgiving.

And she was only four years old. And I didn't want to alarm her at how ugly the world could really be.

So instead I told her I wasn't sure. That I would have to look next time I saw them.

...

It's lonely not being able to share this family secret, you know?

Perhaps I can talk to my Grand about this upsetting subject next year when she is five. Maybe I can get her to ask my Mom to tell her the truth. And then she can tell me.

In the meantime, though, I'm just going to soldier on and try to have Happy Thanksgiving regardless of my Mother's indiscretions.

Sigh...

And listen, if you feel cheated by this depressing pre-Thanksgiving post you can always visit this one from last year. It is more in keeping with the joyous spirit of this day of gratitude.

Story-Time Tuesday - Writing Fiction

If you missed where this story started just click here to read it or simply click on the Story-Time Tuesday link at the top of my blog to take you to previous chapters.

Writing Fiction - Chapter 12

Here's where Chapter 11 left you...

I’d gathered him into a fluffy towel and dried him. I thought about cleaning his ears, but I wasn’t sure if dogs liked Q-tips. Then I tried brushing him with an old hair brush, but his fur was kind of wiry so that didn’t work very well.

The bathroom was filled with steam and a wonderful vanilla cookie scent; I decided to take a quick shower too. Opening the door to let out some of the steam, I turned the shower water on, very hot, and proceeded to use the vanilla cookie shampoo all over. As the hot water poured over my drenched head, I realized I hadn’t thought of my husband for at least an hour.

I dried myself off, put on cookie scented lotion and realized I was alone in the bathroom. Completely. There hadn’t been any ghosts in the room telling me I wasn’t washing the little dog right and, since we’d never had a dog, there were no memories casting their sepia melancholy over the evening’s canine adventure. And there was no canine in the bathroom with me. When I walked into the bedroom, though, there he was, doing a wonderful impersonation of a capital letter “C”, curled up right on top of my husband’s pillow.

AND HERE'S CHAPTER 12!

I fell asleep, dreaming of visiting a bakery filled with vanilla scented cookies, but, at some point during the night, I drifted back to my elementary school days. In sixth grade, there’d been a school-wide contest to memorize the works of famous poets. My mother, God rest her soul, thought it would be a good idea to force twelve-year-old me to memorize “The Raven”, by Edgar Allan Poe. I’d argued and argued with her because I was afraid of that poem, but my Mother, God rest her soul, had said, “Pearl, that imagination of yours is going to get you into trouble one day. Just learn the words and leave the scary stuff out of your head.” That hadn’t worked so well all those years ago and those spooky words had not entered my thoughts in a long, long time.

While dreaming, the words came back to me so clearly:

“Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore,”

My dream continued with me in front of the same packed auditorium I‘d stood in front of the day of the contest. You could have heard a pin drop in the room. The principal’s face morphed into my ‘late’ husband’s and suddenly the stage was filled with ravens.

While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
As of someone gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.
" 'Tis some visitor," I muttered, "tapping at my chamber door;
Only this, and nothing more."
The rapping and the tapping seemed to grow louder and louder in my dream…

Ah, distinctly I remember, it was in the bleak December,
And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost upon the floor.
Eagerly I wished the morrow; vainly I had sought to borrow…

I had frantically shaken myself awake and when I sat up in bed, anxious to escape the dark imaginings of Edgar Allan Poe, I realized that the room was indeed full of rapping and tapping, but not from a raven.

It was the little cookie-scented dog’s tail beating frantically against the wall right beside my head.

“Awwww,” I thought to myself, “He is kind of cute in a scruffy, mutt kind of way,” and I raised my hand and started scratching his ears. He sort of snuggled in closer to me and then I realized what I was doing. I was becoming attached. I pulled my hand away, and started writing a mental catalogue of reasons why this was not a good idea: Who was going to feed him? Who was going to clean up after him? Who was going to take him for walks?

Rap, tap, tap. His tail continued to beat against the wall in a slightly cute, but irritating sort of way.

“No, Pearl. You do not want a dog. No!”

Tap, tap, rap.

I repeated to myself, “Pearl. Stop it. You cannot have a dog. You are too busy with…” …and there I had to stop myself. Busy with what? Busy avoiding people? Busy thinking of ways to describe my husband’s … ummm… “redemption of his one-way ticket to the Great Beyond”? Busy trying to write a blog that hadn’t gotten off the ground at all yet? Busy making permanent butt indentations in the couch cushions?

Rap, tap, tap.

I put my hand back on his wiry, little head and scratched behind his ears … and then the phone rang.

He jumped. I jumped. I answered it to hear my daughter’s voice.

“Mom? Hey, were you sleeping? You aren’t still in bed, are you? Are you sick? How is…”

Before the interrogation got totally out of control, I interrupted her to say, “Of course, I wasn’t still in bed.”

May I just tell you something here? I always say that, even if it’s 5:00 am when the call comes in. The caller asks me, “I didn’t wake you, did I? You aren’t still in bed are you?” and I say, “Of course not,” like there’s shame in actually being asleep at 5:00 am. My little off on a tangent musing had been interrupted by the tiny, tinny sound of my daughter’s voice coming out of the phone.

“Mom? Are you there? Mom? Are you…”

I sighed and then answered, “Hi sweetie. Of course, I’m here. There was just something wrong with the phone…I guess you couldn’t hear me.”
It was at that exact moment that the little dog decided to bark. I quickly covered the receiver, but not quickly enough, it seemed.

“Mom? What was that noise? Are you okay?”

“Ummm… that was just me…I have a bit of a cough, but everything is perfectly fine here. In fact…”

The little mutt decided it was being ignored again and this time he issued a hail of barks that could not be disguised. “Mom, is that a dog? Do you have a dog there?”

“Yes,” I replied haughtily, “That was Edgar you heard barking.” Edgar? Edgar? Where had that name come from? I did not want a dog named Edgar reminding me of a creepy poem about ravens tapping and rapping.

“Edgar?” came the hesitant reply. “Where did you get an Edgar? I didn’t even know you liked dogs. Why did you get a dog and who’s going to feed him? Who’s going to clean up after him? Who’s going to take him for walks?”

Even though my daughter could not see my actions, I raised my hand imperiously and replied, “Jessie. I’m a grown woman, perfectly capable of getting and taking care of a dog. AND, I certainly do not need your permission to rescue a mangy, scroungy, dirty, ugly, smelly little …” Oops. I’d stopped myself, but it was too late.

“You rescued a dog? From where? How do you know it’s not sick? Or that it doesn’t have fleas? Or that it’s not vicious? Mother! Don’t bring it into the house. Put it in the garage and call a dog catcher to come get it. DO NOT feed it!”

“Are you finished?” I calmly interrupted, “First of all, it was your fault I rescued Edgar in the first place and second of all…” “My fault,” she sputtered, “How could you possibly blame this on me? I wasn’t even there.”

“If you’ll let me continue,” I calmly said. “It’s your fault because both you and your father nagged me over and over again to ‘do the right thing’. When I found Edgar and saw he needed help, that’s what I did…the right thing.

“Mom,” she interrupted again, “I don’t see how you can possibly blame Dad or me for you doing something crazy like this. You hate dogs!” She paused.

I fumed. What did she mean, ‘crazy like this?” Was this crazy? Was rescuing an adorable, sweet, darling little cookie-scented dog a crazy thing? And I certainly didn’t hate dogs. Hate is such a strong word, don’t you think?

She paused longer…and then, obviously having chosen her words very carefully she continued, “Mom, do you know what kind of a dog it is? Is it micro-chipped? Do you want me to drive up there and…”

“Jessie, I’m a grown woman. I think I can figure out how to take care of a dog. I don’t know what kind of dog it is, but it’s obviously a mutt. Right now, Edgar needs to go outside, we both need some breakfast and then I need to call a vet. I’ll call you later. Oh, and Jessie? You can read all about this on my blog. It’s almost ready to go. I hope I have enough time to get things finished up today. Bye, sweetie. Love you!” And I hung up.

Micro-chipped? Crazy?

“C’mon Edgar, let’s take care of some business!” I told him.

And we did.

It was kind of fun actually having a companion to walk out and get the newspaper with me. As he did his doggie business, I looked away and gave him privacy. I talked to him while I made coffee. He slurped down his milk and bread while I ate my toast in a much neater, quieter way. I looked up the number for a vet and made an appointment for later in the morning.

I washed my face and brushed my teeth while Edgar had watched. I tried making the bed while he tried jumping in it. He tugged on the pillows and made growling noises.

I found myself laughing more than I had in a long time.

And I didn’t think it was even a bit crazy to be talking to a dog. He was such a good listener and never once told me I should be over my grief and moving on with my life.

In fact, I think I began falling in love with Edgar just a tiny bit in only a few hours.

To be continued, Tuesday, November 30th.

(c) 2010 Jennifer R. Matlock
This publication is the exclusive property of Jennifer R. Matlock and is protected
under the US Copyright Act of 1976 and all other applicable international, federal, state and local laws. The contents of this post/story may not be reproduced as a whole or in part, by any means whatsoever, without consent of the author, Jennifer R. Matlock. All rights reserved.

When my oldest daughter was a little girl...

...she would get really emotional if she would see an animal that had been hit by a car laying beside the road.

For many, many years I would tell her, "Oh that wasn't an animal...that was just a crumbled up paper towel."


And that worked pretty well for a long time, but then she got older and caught on that crumbled up paper towels didn't really look like dead animals, and I had to discontinue the practice and deal with the hours of crying that would follow a 'viewing.'

So...

The other day I was on a busy freeway and suddenly I encounted dozens of rolls of paper towels smashed in the road. I saw a truck ahead of me that looked like the bed was filled to the brim with a two hour shopping spree at Costco, so I figured an especially bounteous warehouse-size package must have fallen off the back of the truck.


I really, really wanted to take a picture, to prove to my daughter that sometimes some of those animals might have been actually paper towels, but there was too much traffic.

After I got on a less busy road, I called my daughter and told her, "You would not believe how many squashed up rolls of paper towels I saw on the freeway. There had to be at least 30!"

And she let out a little gasp. "Mom," she said in a very alarmed voice, "What happened? Who hit them all?"

I explained that they fell off the back of a truck and she let out a big sigh of relief. "For a minute there, Mom, I thought you meant there was a whole bunch of squished squirrels or chipmunks and I wondered how they had all gotten there."

...

...

Now aren't you glad you stopped by today?

Seriously.

This has to be one of the most highly intellectual posts I've ever written.

...

Huh?

...

Oh, of course, you're welcome! You don't have to thank me so effusively. No problem, whatsoever.

Nothing defines my blog more then 'Off on my Tangent!"

Sigh...

"Pardon me," said Tom T. Urkee (Saturday Centus)

The prompt for this week is bolded!



"Pardon me," said Tom T. Urkee,
As he blinked his beady eye,
"What is that I see behind you?
What is that I think I spy?"

"It is nothing, Mr. Urkee!"
Was my swift and sure reply.
"There is nothing in my hands,
There is nothing that you spy."

"Pardon me," said Tom T. Urkee,
"Perhaps it's rude but I must ask."
And he stretched his neck out longly,
and then he spied my shiny axe.

"Pardon me, my succulent friend.
Yes, that is an axe you spy.
Thanksgiving is coming very quickly,
so I must bid you goodbye."


This silliness is linked to Saturday Centus. To see other contributins to this meme, just click here!

Sundays with Steve - Is Thanksgiving a Contest?

Since I’ve started writing “Sundays with Steve”, I’ve been thinking about vignettes of my life growing up in North Idaho. I realize the town where I grew up and the life I lived with my family is really a classic, all-American story. Perhaps you will recognize some of your childhood in these writings. And perhaps you will recognize the town you grew up in along with some of the characters you knew. Mrs. Steve has encouraged me to write these attempts of “creative writing” as opposed to the more factual journalistic style I was trained in and practiced in my early career many years ago. So my apologies if I stumble a bit here and there trying to blend the two styles together.

Is Thanksgiving a Contest

She beat me again last year! Drat, how does she do that? I think that Mrs. Steve (Mrs. Jenny to most of you) is basically evil; she must be stealing my secrets, that is the only way it can happen.

Every Thanksgiving at our house we have two turkeys, one a boring conventional bird cooked slowly in the oven all day long, a good six hours or more, that comes out a with perfect crispy golden-brown skin and slightly dry white meat. Ho-hum and a big yawn, another boring feast.

The other bird, on the other hand, is carefully placed on a rotisserie and roasted over a charcoal fire laced with sweet cherry wood to produce the most amazing, juicy, succulent bird you have ever had the joy to experience, see the picture below.


Or this oven roasted bird:


After the meal we canvas the twenty or so adults who share our Thanksgiving feast each year for their preference in turkey meat: The boring conventional perfectly oven-roasted bird, or the dramatic, succulent sweet meat coming off the charcoal and cherry wood fire.

The conventional boring bird wins of course, every year, and will probably win again this year. Really, what do all of these people know of fine dining and gourmet roasting? Obviously very little, or they are under the hypnosis of the evil Mrs. Steve. Oh my and ho-hum, another perfectly cooked and delicious boring turkey.

Boring perfect turkeys reminds me of my Aunt Eugenia, and of all of those Thanksgiving’s in the 1950’s and 1960’s at her house in our small town in Northern Idaho.

Every year, without exception, every single time, Aunt Eugenia massacred the turkey. She over-cooked it to the dryness and consistency of leather. Year after year the white meat was inedible; the juicy dark meat was not. It was obvious to everyone except her that she was secretly trying to make turkey jerky. In later years she laughed at her inability to cook a bird, but in the 1950’s, she was in fierce competition with her sister – my mother – to cook the best turkey. My mother (my father actually cooked it, but I think that was a secret at the time) would prepare the perfectly oven-roasted turkey to transport the short distance to Eugenia’s house for the late afternoon feast. The contrast of the two turkeys was always stunning.

Eugenia would be seem to be embarrassed and fume ever year that her bird was so dry, and that her sister out-cooked her yet again.

Aunt Eugenia (Genie for short) was kind of a strange duck: She was very prim and very proper, always dressed to the hilt, her house always picked-up and tidy, her language impeccable, her presence one of reserved elegance. But underestimate her or cross her at your own peril: Her glare, when you crossed the line of propriety, was like a death ray. Her pronouncements and judgments – out of the public view – were cutting, sharp, and decisive. You never wondered where Aunt Eugenia stood on anything, on any topic, on any view, and woe be to you if you disagreed with her pronouncement. And by the way, you had better shape up and behave yourself in her presence.

Thanksgiving was always at her house, while a month later Christmas dinner always at the Matlock madhouse. Thanksgiving usually consisted of us three rambunctious brothers and our parents, Aunt Eugenia’s two grown children who both lived still lived with her at the family home (one of whom for many years called us brothers ‘brats’, a term I still don’t like), Eugenia’s mother (my grandmother), and six or eight other adults that included several of Eugenia’s widowed lady friends. Mr. Eugenia had fled life with Eugenia in about 1950.

Eugenia always hired a bit of help for the holiday, usually someone in the kitchen to prepare the side dishes, the desserts, and then to clean-up the kitchen after dinner. For many years the help was a delightful lady named “Coxie”. Ida Cox was entertaining, energetic, and a fountain of local history of our town, most of which she had lived through personally. She stood no more than four-foot eight inches tall, thin as a rail, but with muscular arms. Coxie cooked on a wood burning stove at her small frame home until her death in about 1970 at the age of 95. She was a master of home cooking, she delighted in making cakes and pies for her friends and neighbors, and often, if we were lucky, for the Matlock family. She fried chicken on Sundays, after chopping their heads off with a hatchet on Saturdays. She chopped the wood for her stove, and she never believed that gas or electric ovens did a very good job. She would chase us boys around Eugenia’s house when her cooking chores permitted, to the consternation of my aunt, and she befriended all of us brothers for years. She was a delight, one of those characters you never forget.

Eugenia’s son was Eugene (Cousin Gene) who I have referred to in many of these stories as my father’s partner in the local radio station and the radio news broadcaster for our small town.

It was Cousin Gene, my father, and my grandmother “Grambie” who were most vocal about Aunt Eugenia’s annual destruction of the Thanksgiving turkey --- year-after-year. Grambie would have one of her two cocktails a year (the other was always an eggnog before Christmas dinner) while Cousin Gene and my father would dip into the bourbon for a couple of shots before carving the two turkeys that would be resting at the kitchen table. The men would groan over the destroyed turkey as it crumbled under the carving knife, and they may have had another shot of bourbon in honor of Eugenia’s bird. Coxie would cackle and laugh at the poor bird while preparing the stuffing and green beans, and Grambie would sit on a kitchen step stool out of the way, sipping her drink, going “tisk, tisk, tisk” at the pulled pile of white turkey meat. It was really very funny, even to me at that young age. While that was going on, Brother David and I would steal pieces of dark meat to sample. In later years, when home from college for the annual turkey day massacre, Cousin Gene would sneak glasses of bourbon to David and me as well. He was a good cousin that way.


As a curious youngster, I always found it fascinating that there was a little button under the carpet of the dining room table Eugenia sat at the head of. If she needed help from the kitchen, she could press the button with her foot to activate a buzzer. Coxie would ignore her, of course, with a loud laugh, but in later years when Coxie no long cooked for the family, others came running. It was weird.

My mother was no great cook, although she tried. Her salvation at Thanksgiving was two-fold: i) In the late 1950’s Butterball turkeys came on the market that had the plastic doneness probe that popped-up when the bird was done, thus generally preventing over-cooking (Eugenia never figured that one out, one of those new fangled inventions that made no sense to her), and ii) Coxie in the kitchen preparing everything else.

I wish Coxie were alive today -- I’d invite her to dinner and I would fly her from Idaho to Arizona to join us, not to cook but to experience our modern but traditional Thanksgiving and to enjoy our family. I wish my father and Cousin Gene were alive to join us as well, to sneak a bit of bourbon, and to rightly judge whose turkey this year is best.

I wish you were coming too, because I know that you, along with all of our Thanksgiving day guests this year, are going to appreciate the finesse, the delicacy, the suberb nature of the masterfully prepared cherry-wood smoked turkey that will jointly grace our table on Thursday along with its boring counterpart.


And I am absolutely certain that all of you would vote for the obviously superior bird! And that, of course, will be mine.

(c) 2010 Stephen J. Matlock
This publication is the exclusive property of Stephen J. Matlock and is protected
under the US Copyright Act of 1976 and all other applicable international, federal, state and local laws. The contents of this post/story may not be reproduced as a whole or in part, by any means whatsoever, without consent of the author, Stephen J. Matlock. All rights reserved.

Saturday Centus - Week 29

Welcome to week twenty-nine of Saturday Centus.

STOP! If you didn't read the end SC's from last week, please take a moment to do so. Just work backwards until you find out where you left off. I feel really bad that the people at the end don't get read.

Thanks!

Now on to regular SC biz...In case you've forgotten...

This is a themed writing meme. You can use UP to 100 words to tell your story. The prompt does not count for your 100 words AND it must be left intact in the body of your story. No illustrations are permitted. Your story can be fact or fiction, just keep it PG, please!

You have the entire week to link your work to the meme and you can link more than one story if you like.

Please display link button or just a hyper-link back to Saturday Centus. Be careful to link your SC URL to the Linky and not just link to your main blog.

I would suggest that since these are so short, if you can't think of a title just use your blog name as the title in the Linky.

Try to visit each one because there are some amazing writers participating in this meme. Since the links are so short they are also a fun and quick read.

Please e-mail me directly with ???'s or ask your question in a comment and I will do my best to get back to you as soon as possible.

This weeks prompt, is:

"Pardon me," said Tom T. Urkee..."

Link anytime between now and next Saturday morning.

She knows what she wants!

Or so she says.

Mr. Jenny and I give our Grands a Birthday party each year as their gift from us. They help plan the entire thing and always seem to know exactly what they want.

We've done the bouncer parties, and the pony parties, and the glittery girl parties...

And this past week I've spent quite a bit of time with our middle Grand planning her 7th Birthday party.

She knows what she wants!

She wants to have it in a park.

With a lot of running and races and relays.

She wants medals and trophies.

She wants cupcakes. Pink frosting, please.

She wants pizza. Just cheese, please.

She wants goodie bags for all her little friends.

She's been uber-excited and I really thought we had it all figured out.


Until last night when I talked to her on the phone and she told me "Grandma! Grandma! I forgot the most important thing I want for my Birthday party!"

I told her to hold on while I got my party notepad out and then she informed me, "The only thing we forgot Grandma, is to get Hannah Montana to come and sing!"

Hmmm...

Hmmm....

Uh oh!

Know any Miley Cyrus impersonators!?!

Sigh...

But in another little twist, she has now decided that she would really rather have balloon relays. Don't tell Miley how easily she was replaced, please!

PS. I had an e-mail from a fellow blogger who asked me to mention a jewelry giveawy she's having. If you have a second, just click here! She has some cool fabric flowers for hair and some pretty fall related jewelry. Thanks!

Alphabe-Thursday Letter I

BEEEEEEPPPPP!!!! Good morning class. I interrupt the regularly scheduled programming to talk about the holiday schedule for those of you that like to plan ahead!

11-25 - Thankful for Thanksgiving linky
12-2 - Letter J
12-9 - Letter K
12-16 - Letter L
12-23 - Christmas Blessings linky
12-30 - New Year Linky
1-6 - Letter M
Resume as normal

BEEEEEPPPPPP!!!!

Now! Good morning class. This week we are focusing on the interesting letter:

Before you link, though, please STOP and read this! Keep up the great work on blog visits! This is sooooo much better!

Please link directly to your Alphabe-Thursday URL (if you don't know how to do this let me know!) and please continue to visit the five links before and after your link and leave a comment. Minimum of 10 links visited please. You can visit more if you like, of course.

I also want to let you know that each week I visit every blog. If it appears I haven't visited your blog by Wednesday morning, please let me know, because it is important to me to make sure you know I've visited you! This will avoid you trying to skip out on doing your assignment as well.

If you have any difficulties with your link, please make sure to include the number of the link when you e-mail me. It is really difficult for me to find you easily otherwise.

If you have any questions about Alphabe-Thursday or problems doing your link just post it in a comment or send me an e-mail. I'll do my best to help you as quickly as I can.

The McLinkey will be live from 1:00 pm MST time Wednesday afternoon in an effort to assist our lovely "friends across the pond" and continue through 10:00 am MST time Friday morning!

And remember.... link back to this post, you need to be registered as a follower of my blog, PG posts only, and try to visit the 5 students before and after your post at minimum. The links will stay live after the final post deadline has passed so you can even wait and visit over the weekend or whenever you have more time.

Please feel free to enter your intelligent "I" link now. Class is dismissed.

I is for Insanity!

Geez. You call yourself nice people?

C'mon!

How come nobody mentioned next week is Thanksgiving?

We host Thanksgiving here each year and use our dining room table along with with two other tables that we set up in the living room.

And yesterday I decided I would start making my Christmas cards...



Seriously.

If you would have mentioned it, I would totally have waited.

This cranky little "I" post is brought to you by Alphabe-Thursday's letter I. To read other less indignant posts, just click here.

So...did you hear about the economic summit at my house?

...

Yea.

I'm pretty sure it was on the news and on page one of many newspapers.

The economic summit occurs once a year at our house when we attempt to arrive at a Christmas budget. (You can click on the picture to see Mr. Jenny and I more clearly)


Sigh.

I know. Christmas isn't about shopping and buying, but still...

Here's what happens every single year at my house.

Sadly, mind you...I don't have a 'real job' or this summit would not even be necessary. By that, I mean, I don't get a paycheck. Heaven knows I do all the work around the house all the time, but since I have no access to disposable income of my own, here's what occurs the first or second week of every November.

Me: So...Christmas is like 6 weeks away.
Mr. Jenny: (not paying any attention whatsoever)Hmmm?
Me: SOOO!....CHRISTMAS IS LIKE 6 WEEKS AWAY!
Mr. Jenny: Hmmm??? That's nice...
Me: SOOOOOOO!!!! CHRISTMAS IS IN THREE DAYS!
Mr. Jenny: Hmmm? What? WHAT DID YOU SAY?
Me: Can you pay attention, please, this is important? We need to discuss my Christmas budget.
Mr. Jenny: Now? Why now? Isn't Christmas like 8 months away or something?
Me: No. Pay attention. HELLLOOOOO!!!! I just told you Christmas is 6 weeks away.
Mr. Jenny: So how much money do you need?
Me: (Internal evil laugh - and, hey, it always pays to start high!) $47,312.65. But let's just round it up to $48,000. K?
Mr. Jenny: Yea, good try. How about a hundred bucks?
Me: Yea, good try. How about $20,000?
Mr. Jenny: Yea, umm... good try. How about eliminating the comma and trying again?
Me: OK. How about ten thousand without a comma?
Mr. Jenny: Yea, you're killing me here....that is soooo funny...NOT!!!!
Me: OK, how much can I have?
Mr. Jenny: How much do you need? Ummm.... let me rephrase that...you know, it's tough economic times out there...can you economize this year?
Me: Sure thing. How about $3,000?
Mr. Jenny: No.
Me: Ummm.... $2,000?
Mr. Jenny: No.
Me: Ummm... $1,500?
Mr. Jenny: Ummm.... no.
Me: Well, just forget it then. I have a zillion people to buy for. Yea, maybe I'll just give everybody a postage stamp. Yea. So why don't you just give me $20 bucks and we'll call it a day?
Mr. Jenny: (sounding hopeful) Yea? Great! That's wonderful...Oh. You're just being a smart aleck.
Me: Well, yea, ya think?

See how exhausting this economic summit is? I am totally drained by the end of it. I end up without a comma in my budget and Mr. Jenny walks around looking shell-shocked for three or four days.

Yea.

We're all about the holiday cheer here during the annual Christmas economic summit.


And hey...don't be expecting a Christmas present from me this year. Unless you have better luck at an economic summit with Mr. Jenny.

Just sayin'!

Sigh...

Story Time Tuesday -

If you missed where this story started just click here to read it or simply click on the Story-Time Tuesday link at the top of my blog to take you to previous chapters.

Writing Fiction - Chapter 11

Here's where Chapter 10 left you...

After I heaved a deep sigh or two, I grabbed a few old towels from the bathroom closet and a cardboard box out of the spare bedroom. I threw my jacket back on and snatched up the car keys.

It took me a little while to find the bench on the street, beside the park I’d never heard of before, and when I finally found it, the dog wasn’t there.

I got out of the car and went over to the bench to see if maybe he was just afraid and hiding. Sitting in the shivery night air, I waited a long time. Finally, I’d figured he wasn’t going to show. I turned to go back to the car, realizing I’d need to make a donation to a Humane Society to offset my guilt, when I saw what looked to be some old rags lying on the ground beside the overgrown bushes. I took a step closer. It was him. The mangiest, scroungiest, dirtiest, ugliest, smelly little dog I had ever seen was lying there, perfectly still.

“Uh oh, Pearl,” I had told myself, “It’s gonna take more than a donation to help with this guilt.”

AND NOW, CHAPTER 11...

I had stood there, frozen in place, unsure what to do for a few long moments.

“C’mon you mangy mutt! Move!” I muttered. Then I clapped my hands together and whistled a little bit. OK, technically, it was supposed to be a whistle, but I’d never managed to master that particular skill, so it probably sounded more like a wheezy exhale. I thought maybe it wasn’t loud enough for the little dog to hear. I tried again, this time clapping my hands even more determinedly and saying, “Here boy! Here boy!” in a sugary voice. Nothing. Nada. Zip.

Then, taking a few steps closer, I tried it all again. The wheezy whistling, the hand clapping, the name calling…all to no avail. I felt the stinging sensation at the back of my nose that meant copious tears would soon be flowing. “Pearl, you did this,” I told myself, “It’s your fault this sweet, little, adorable dog has gone to the ‘happy hunting ground in the sky’.”

I hadn’t been sure what to do next. Should I just leave it laying there? Should I try to put it in the cardboard box so I could take it to…hmm..where? Where do you take a dog who had ‘abandoned his doghouse’?

The stinging in my nose became stronger and, just as the torrent of tears started to flow, the dog opened one eye. And looked up at me. Then it rolled over onto its back, which probably wasn’t a good thing. The matted and mangy back fur I’d shuddered over, didn’t begin to compete with the dog’s scroungy, filthy under-carriage. I would ‘ve liked to put on my reading glasses to see if there were things crawling around in that nasty fur. I was definitely having third, fourth and fifth second thoughts about my rescue attempt. Had I packed plastic gloves? Had I remembered a hazmat suit?

But before I could ‘cupcake out’ I’d walked slowly over to it, and just as I got about a foot away, it jumped up, barked at me and started wagging its tale as if it was a hyperactive metronome.

“OK, Pearl. So far,so good,” I encouraged myself as I got the cardboard box and towels out of the backseat of the car. The dog watched intently as I put a towel carefully inside the box and then it leaped up through the open back door of the car and settled onto the seat. I mean, right onto the seat! It’s filthy, mangy dog butt was in full and total contact with the pristine surface of my car seat. Accckkk!

“Here dog, doggie, dog boy!” I coaxed, but it was having nothing to do with the idea of a cardboard box as a means of transportation.

I cursed myself for not thinking to bring a bribe. Digging through my purse, I found a linty piece of gum at the very bottom, but judging by the disdainful look the mutt gave me, apparently even starving dogs don’t think linty gum is appealing.

My plan had been to put the little dog in the box, fasten the seatbelt around it and drive carefully home, but that was as far as I had gotten developing the whole ridiculous rescue project. Now, even those three simple ideas had already gone awry.

I was totally and completely in over my head AND I was exhausted, so I decided I’d just shoo the little flea-fest out of my car and drive home. No harm, no foul. Only the flea-fest part of the idea was unwilling to participate with this change in arrangements. He’d hunkered down stubbornly on the once pristine leather back seat of my car. I tried nudging him out with a towel with no success. I tried kneeling by the car with the linty gum and smacking my lips without victory.

In frustration, I revamped my plan and decided to drop Mr. Mange off at the humane society. Aren’t those places open 24 hours? I felt confident that at 3:14 am there would be smiling volunteers willing to happily great Mr. Odiferous with open arms. “OK! No seat belt for you my flea-filled friend,” I told the dog as I closed the door carefully and went around the car, but when I’d opened the driver’s door to get in I screamed! There, in my front seat, dirty dog butt sitting comfortably on the beautiful leather, was the animal. I swear it was ‘smiling’ at me…or maybe ‘smirking’ at me would have been a better word. Whatever it was doing, it wasn’t cute.

“OK, my friend,” I told it in that ‘you are disgusting but I’m trying to be a good person voice’ I sometimes use when I am in an uncomfortable situation with a smelly or scary person. “We’re going on a little ride here and then everything is going to be okay. I’m going to go home and take a shower with bleach and you are going to get a bath and have a good meal.”

He didn’t care. Comforted perhaps by the warm air circulating through the car, he’d fallen asleep, scruffy whitish ears falling over tightly closed eyes. The way his little head rested on his paws was sort of cute, in a disgusting, nasty-looking-dog kind of way.

I shook my head against the allure of perceived cuteness, and continued across town to the Humane Society. Which was dark. Where was the smiling volunteer who was supposed to rescue the mutt and me all at the same time? I drove slowly down the side of the wire mesh fence edging the parking lot and I could see no lights on anywhere. I rolled down the window and listened. I thought I heard a dog bark and a few lonely whimpers but I’m sure that was just my imagination.

“Now what?” I wondered. My smelly passenger had no advice. He just continued to lie quietly on the front seat.

On the rest of the drive home, I tried summoning my ‘flat lined’ husband for guidance. None was forthcoming. I toyed with the idea of calling my daughter, but realized it would just enforce her vision of me as being inept.

“Aaaarrrggghhh!” I shouted into the warm cocoon of the car’s interior, “Why does everything have to be so freakin’ complicated?!?” The dog didn’t even lift his head. “A fat lot of help you are Mr. Stinko,” I told him. He didn’t care. At all. My ranting didn’t even warrant a raised eyelid.

When I pulled into the garage a few minutes later, I realized I didn’t have the faintest clue what to do next. I had thought about just putting “Fido” in the garage and waiting until morning, but it was cold out and I’m pretty sure he had to be hungry. I’d wondered to myself if it would be cruel to just put layers of newspaper on the floor and trap him in the laundry room.

When I shut off the engine and opened my car door, though, he streaked across my lap, leaped out of the car and ran to the back door with his snarly monstrosity of a tail wagging like crazy. In that exact moment, I think I finally grasped that once I crossed the threshold with him, there would be no turning back.

Before we went inside, I pointed at the grass and using my firmest voice told him to go potty, and he listened!

I waited for him to finish before opening the door. He quickly scooted inside and waited expectantly on the mat right inside the warm and cozy kitchen.

I hung up my jacket, threw my keys into the crockery bowl, and tried to figure out what I had that a dog would like to eat.

Opening the fridge and all the cupboard doors, I realized it was going to have to be something simple like warmed up milk and some torn up pieces of bread. While that was heating a bit in the microwave, I got out an old dish towel and put a small bowl of water on it. The dog wasn’t very interested in that particular beverage but when I placed the bowl of warmed milk and mushy bread down he perked right up and almost attacked it. He ate quickly, glancing over his shoulder repeatedly as if he was afraid I was going to take it away from him.

My heart began to soften, but then I reminded myself and him, “Don’t get too comfy! You’re going to the pound tomorrow, Mutt.” He just lapped up the last of the food, had a big slurpy drink of water and then came and sat by my feet.

Darn. Darn, darn, darn! I supposed it would be okay to try to get him cleaned up. Maybe the Humane Society would like it better if I took in a clean stray dog, right?

So we headed upstairs and I tried to quiet the little voice in my head that was wondering how much getting the whole house treated for fleas was going to cost.

Mr. Mangy followed politely right behind my right heel all the way up the stairs and then he ran into the bathroom just like he knew what was about to happen.

I grabbed a bunch of towels, and the vanilla scented shampoo and conditioner my husband had disliked. You know, the one that he said made me smell like a cookie? I figured a mangy, scroungy, little mutt of a dog smelling like a cookie would be a good thing. While the water had filled the tub, the little fella stood, trembling, right beside my leg, but he let me lift him up and put him into the warm water without a whimper or a complaint.

I poured water all over his back and he yawned. With a big handful of shampoo and a lot of suds and I began to work gently, trying to unsnarl his fur. Around his neck I felt a small, metal disc tangled in the knots, but my slippery hands and the fear he’d leap out of the tub made it difficult to look at. I just set it aside and continued to scrub until he was creamy gold all over. It took two changes of bathwater and I tried to not look too closely at the little bits of icky-ness floating on top of the brown water as it drained. After the third scrubbing, the water was finally clear and I applied conditioner all over his squirmy little body. He wasn’t very big and he was really, really skinny.

I’d gathered him into a fluffy towel and dried him. I thought about cleaning his ears, but I wasn’t sure if dogs liked Q-tips. Then I tried brushing him with an old hair brush, but his fur was kind of wiry so that didn’t work very well.

The bathroom was filled with steam and a wonderful vanilla cookie scent; I decided to take a quick shower too. Opening the door to let out some of the steam, I turned the shower water on, very hot, and proceeded to use the vanilla cookie shampoo all over. As the hot water poured over my drenched head, I realized I hadn’t thought of my husband for at least an hour.

I dried myself off, put on cookie scented lotion and realized I was alone in the bathroom. Completely. There hadn’t been any ghosts in the room telling me I wasn’t washing the little dog right and, since we’d never had a dog, there were no memories casting their sepia melancholy over the evening’s canine adventure. And there was no canine in the bathroom with me. When I walked into the bedroom, though, there he was, doing a wonderful impersonation of a capital letter “C”, curled up right on top of my husband’s pillow.

To be continued, Tuesday, November 23rd.

(c) 2010 Jennifer R. Matlock
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