Friday, November 26, 2004

When did my babies get so tall?

It's a good thing those turkey-bags come in packages of two, because that first one split right smack down the middle when I put today's turkey in it.

It's also a good thing I put the turkey in the bag over the kitchen sink. Otherwise I would have been chasing an escaped and scooting turkey across the floor.

And right now I would have been on my hands and knees scrubbing the grease-streak off that floor.

Hahahahaha, do you really believe that? That I would SCRUB THE FLOOR? Heck, there's scrapings on that floor from 1997.

Okay, not really. But it's only because we had the floor installed just last year. The carpet we had before that was a memorial to various meals from way, way back. It was like a calendar, or maybe a memory quilt of stains.

Kind of like the hideous tie one of my former bosses wore to school every day. That tie bore the stained and crusty traces of many a meal. This is the same man who used to remove his false teeth all the time and keep them in his pocket. Then he would forget the teeth were in his pocket and sit down. Almost every day he bit himself on his own butt.

We all hated him because he was stupid and stolid and humorless. You know, a typical administrator-type. When he sat down and jumped right back up, we laughed.

My husband's family is arriving in about four hours. I am so happy they're coming, and so excited! Both families are lovely kind funny people; is there a better compliment than that? Oh, probably, but nothing comes to mind just now. Lovely, kind, funny people were sitting around my table yesterday, and in a few hours another group of lovely, kind, funny people will be sitting around my table.

Life is good.

My kids are still here but they have to leave immediately after the meal today. They're all grown up and they have jobs and stuff. Like real adults. They might have the general public fooled, but I know better. When I look at them, I see my beautiful babies, not responsible adults who look at me funny when I say things like "put that on the children's table for you and your brother, please."

I suppose they're old enough to be promoted to the grownups' table now, but that table is full of old people. Oh man, look at that one fat frumpy woman sitting there! Scheiss, that's a mirror! How could this have happened? And when did it start showing? And where did she get that shirt? Somebody needs to get that rag off her and bury it in the back yard.

Old people often refer to themselves in the third person. I think that's because they simply refuse to use first person pronouns for that wrinkly stranger in the mirror.

It seems like only yesterday that my sisters and I were at the children's table.

We still behave as though we were at the children's table. Does that count for anything?

And no matter how grown up your children are, it's still scary to see them in your kitchen, using sharp knives and taking hot things out of the oven. Be careful, children. Let an old person do that.

That would be me.