dead fish and stuff

It is a different Christmas in our house this year. We don't have the usual drive half way around the world and back, twice in 2 day plans that we usually have. I am not sure if I'm relieved or disappointed, and since it is my choice to make, I guess I'll pick relieved.

This has been a harder than usual year, and only now am I getting it into some kind of perspective. There is nothing like seeing some of your friends dealing with really big stuff, to realize how manageable yours is. Things around here are hunky-dory.

Now what does this have to do with dead fish, you're wondering? Nothing.

I kill fish, actually I kill most living things in my care. I don't do this on purpose, but the results are the same. As far as fish go, we have been through, Shaggy, Elvis, Jethro, Poncho, Sombrero, Troy, Gabriella, Zach, Kevin 1 and Kevin 2, and Bubbles 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6. To say I kill fish is a bit of an understatement. My intentions have always been good, and it actually hurts my feelings that it has become a running joke in my house. So far, the turtle has proven himself indestructible.

It isn't just fish that I kill either, plants are not immune to my death touch. I am so bad with plants that I am surprised when I walk by them if they don't start turning brown. I have an aunt that buys my kids and myself plants, and other growing things for birthdays and holidays (herb gardens, fruit trees, vegetable gardens, etc.), and they all wind up as buckets of dirt. Every time one of these gifts makes it in to the house, my husband always says, "It's like they don't even know you." or "Do they think they can change you?". My grandmother(Nana), my mom and all of her sisters, could grow a jungle on a rock with no soil or water, but the only thing I can grow is mold in my refrigerator. Really, my kids should be grateful that they've made it this far.

I have no reason for telling you this, but I needed some sort of lead in for this poem that Katie wrote that I am about to post.

My Fish
by Katie Hoye

I wish
my fish could fly
I don't
want it to die
Then I would cry
because
my fish would be dead
and I would be alive
My fish
is named Joe
He likes the snow
Joe plays with hobos
His best friends name is Romo
Joe and Romo jump off a cliff
Do you know what happens after this?

 

 

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stuff i found in the couch

Finally, the much anticipated, long ago promised, sequel to stuff I found under the couch.

3 pencils, 1 eraser, 1 High School Musical memo pad, 1 advertisement for Beverly Hills Chihuahua, 9 socks (3 Emma's, 1 Katie's, 5 of Jack and Billy), 5 lincoln logs, 6 assorted legos, an index card on which Billy wrote "I do not love you. I like you.", 1 lego astronaut, plastic fire, 1 shiny black rock, a tire to a toy car, a GI Joe arm (could also be star wars, or another action figure, hard to tell from an arm), an Expo pen, several sunflower seeds, 1 quarter, 3 pennies, a variety of candy wrappers, nerds, a gingerbread cookie recipe, vacuum cleaner fan belt, little stuffed rottweiler, something that looked like a pasty (turned out to be a spiderman suction cup), 1 Cars game for a Leapster, a placemat with the solar system on it, 1 pen cap, 1 tag that you aren't supposed to rip off the mattress, and 2 paper airplanes.

psycho

Every year, a few weeks before Christmas, I load the kids into the truck and head out to my favorite Christmas tree lot. The one that I have gotten my tree from for the last 6 or 7 years is from non-profit lot for the New-Life halfway house. They are a halfway house for some serious ex-cons, and they have the guys from the house run the lot. It is sort of like buying your Christmas tree from the Hell's Angels.

Why do I go back year after year?.....The atmosphere, of course.

This year when I get there my kids, in usual form, go barrelling out leaving me talking to myself about not knocking over trees or other people, and I idle in behind them. I first look at the Nobles, which I always want, but can never bring myself to buy because they are twice as much as the Douglas Fir, and either way it will be on the curb with the trash in a few weeks.

So, the kids pick a tree, and I go in search of someone to help me get it. The man I find looks like he wasn't ever supposed to get out, he only had a few teeth left and they didn't look like he was going to have them a whole lot longer, and everything about him said that he probably hadn't made many good choices in life. I liked him immediately.

Being the type of person that can't even go into the grocery store without striking up a conversation with the checker (yes, I am that person), I inquired about his giant drill bits he wore as earrings, and if they hurt. He told me that they didn't but that the ones that had been torn out of his other ear sure did, and he turned to show me his flappy ear skin on the other side. I informed him that I had tattoos, but that for some reason piercings gave me the heebie-jeebies. He laughs and shows me the tattoo on his arm that he got with a paper clip that said PSYCHO in block letters (in the same style I used to write the band RUSH on my notebooks in high school) because that was his nickname. None of this was meant to be intimidating. Psycho was very much a gentleman, and the conversation flowed easily.

He carried my tree up to the front, and handed it off to the guys who trim it up, and asked me if he could show the kids some card tricks while I finished up. I finished my business, had the tree loaded into the truck, and went to gather my kids from the game of three card monty Psycho was showing them, and tipped him well.

I don't know what Psycho did to wind up in prison, nor do I doubt that it is where he belonged, but he was more than kind to me and my kids, and I wish him well. I will be buying my tree there again next year.

*above picture isn't Psycho (well he maybe, but he isn't my Psycho)