Scattershot

Laughing and crying

Many years ago my sister and I were getting in my car to leave after a visit to my parents on the family farm. We had been carrying on, making our mother laugh. We loved how we could always crack her up, making her double over with laughter, unable to speak. That day, we continued our silliness as she stood at the door laughing. Suddenly, she choked out something about hating to have us go, and her laughter turned to tears. Ours did, too.

Today, I picture Mom standing at the door waving, smiling, laughing, and crying as we drove away. For some reason, that image of her is one I hold close to my heart.

She died on this day eight years ago, and I miss her still. I will always miss her—her laughter, her tears, her love.

Man and dog

Last week my husband and a friend and I walked over to a neighborhood Mexican restaurant, passing a Laundromat on the way. Inside was a man in his late thirties or early forties—strong, outdoorsy, handsome—doing his laundry in the company of a tiny Shih-Tzu.

My friend loves Shih-Tzus, so we wound up talking to the man and petting the dog. But after we left, I was soon off on one of my “What is wrong with this picture?” tangents. A big, masculine man like that didn’t seem the type to own a tiny, fluffy dog. Odd. He should have had a lab, a golden retriever, a border collie, not a little “keep it in your purse” kind of dog.

And what was he doing at a Laundromat? He looked like a guy who would have a cool apartment somewhere with leather furniture and a stainless steel washer/dryer set, or a wife and 2.2 kids in a ranch house in the suburbs with its own utility room. Was he maybe on vacation? In the throes of a divorce? Did his wife know he had the dog? Was it really her dog? 

Maybe their washer and dryer was broken, and he was a good guy—hauling off all the laundry to wash and fold on his own, out of the goodness of his heart. No….that didn’t seem right somehow. Something was off.

My friend just laughed and said, “You are always making up stories. I think that shows you really are a writer.”

My husband, on the other hand, shook his head, sighed, and said (with more enthusiasm than was really necessary) something along the lines of, “We’re here! Bring on those margaritas!” I guess he’s kind of used to my musings.

But, really, I don’t think that man belonged with that dog in that Laundromat.

 

Hair and other distractions

The other day I was sitting in a coffee shop proofreading a manuscript, and I glanced up as a man of around 70 sat down at a table near me. "Hmmm. He's certainly a good-looking older man," I thought. (It doesn't take much to distract me from proofreading.)

Then I looked again. Was this man actually good-looking, or did I just think so because he had more hair than most men his age? I re-evaluated.

No, he was a pretty average-looking guy. It was his hair—the abundance of it—that made him seem more attractive than he was.

I started thinking about hair and famous men with hair. Could it be that hair contributes to their success, making them seem not only better looking but also more powerful? Could Ronald Reagan have been elected president if he'd been bald? How about Bill Clinton? JFK? Could Mitt Romney have survived thus far in the presidential race, despite the charges of flip-flopping, if he didn't have all that perfect hair?

I wondered. And then I thought of that Bible story about Samson. Something about hair...what was it? I turned to my new iPhone and googled "Samson and hair."  Oh, my. The story is certainly a lot gorier and more involved than I remember from Sunday school. But, yes. Hair is definitely pretty darned important to the story.

I looked down at my manuscript. I had allowed hair to distract me from my purpose.

To be honest, though, just about anything can distract me from my purpose in a coffee shop. A pretty alpaca scarf around someone's neck. A paperback novel sticking out of a back pocket. (Can I manage to read the title?) A child's blue eyes. The smell of vanilla. A song playing in the background. (Who ever decided that "Come On, Baby, Light My Fire," played by strings, was a good idea?) Suddenly realizing, for no good reason at all, that I've forgotten what "antebellum" means and looking it up. Wondering about all the little life challenges faced by the lady in line who won't order the chai tea unless they can prove to her that the milk they use in it is organic.

I should probably consider doing my proofreading in a closet somewhere. A small one. Plain. White walls. No sound. No people. Definitely, no people.