A Good Idea

I’ve waited two weeks to process the following event. Even now I’m not sure I can do it justice.

It seemed like a good idea at the time.

I believe in the local charity which was putting on the fund raiser and wanting to support them signed up for….a scrap booking marathon. Twelve hours of cutting and pasting, or trimming, cropping and adhering, in the words of the professionals.

The Armory was lined with tables where 200 avid and very serious ‘croppers’ sat, spreading out their projects within their four foot table space. Ok, 199 serious scrappers and one novice. As fancy rolled cases were brought to the tables I dragged my supplies packed in an airline carry-on. I quickly emptied the case and tucked it under my table.

Whirring little machines and efficient desk-top rounds filled the tables. Borrowing a pair of scissors, I began, determined to finish a 20-page album by evening.

We broke for lunch. We broke for dinner. We broke for classes on scrap booking techniques. We broke for chair massages. We broke for door prizes. Well, they did the breaking. I sat cutting and measuring and keeping my eye on the clock and the goal, and except for the food breaks, I scrapped…as they call it.

And I finished, completing the project in time to win three of the door prizes.

In many gatherings, after winning one prize a generous and modest person would ask to be eliminated from additional prizes but that was not the case with this group. It was dog eat dog. In this case receiving was more blessed than giving.

The best part? “Spring Break with the Grand Parents” is now ready to gift my twin grand daughters on their 14^th birthday next week.

That’s what I’m thinking about.

Tempus Fugit

A while back my daughter and her husband were going on a trip. They were not taking their four daughters. That’s really why we moved here. To be a daily part of our family and help out whenever we could.

I figured I would be asked to supervise the kids while the parents were gone. A few days before her parents were leaving I was having lunch with my oldest grand daughter. I casually told her I would probably just stay at their house for the time her mom and dad were away.

She looked at me from across the table and said, not unkindly, “Gramma, I’m almost 20.” Gazing at her, I dug deep in my heart and pondered, “Where did two decades go and how did they go, wherever they went, so fast?”

So I stayed at my own house, providing some home cooked meals, a little transportation, keeping my cell phone all night for emergencies that never happened.

And pondered the passing of time. That’s what I’m thinking about.

Starting out good

Well it’s Saturday.

The lawn looks good thanks to Kinder Lawn Service who came twice this week.

The flowers are all watered thanks to the rain.

I hear the skittering feet of mourning doves as they make their way across the roof to watch for falling seeds from the bird feeder.

Car Talk is on PBS in a few minutes.

A family down the street is putting out treasures for their yard sale which has been advertised all week.

The two mares in the corral behind our back fence have given birth to beautiful little colts of one sex or the other.

This has started out to be a very good day indeed.

What was that again?

Went to Haiti a couple years ago. While walking from my hotel to the school I greeted a group of young teenage youths. They followed me for a little while shouting, ‘Hey, blond,” but aside from a smile I didn’t’ turn around to chat since I didn’t know Creole and they apparently knew limited English. I did however walk a little taller with a little catch in my step, thinking that they had mistaken my gray hair for blond and that I was being given quite a nice compliment. I was feeling very youthful.

Unfortunately for me, I couldn’t keep my feeling of pride to myself and could hardly wait to tell our host at the school what the boys had called out to me.

And it wasn’t blond.

Apparently the word blond has a similar sound to the Creole word for ‘old woman.’ I think more specifically it means white hair but whatever.

Wish I hadn’t been so proud and had kept the compliment to myself.

I could have gotten a lot of satisfaction from that…if I’d just kept my mouth shut and not boasted about it.

Probably a lesson in there somewhere. That’s what I’m thinking about.