Apostrophes, Commas, and Women, Punctuation abuse.

Apostrophes seem to find the most unusual places to hide within words. Like their friends the comma and women, apostrophes like to preserve their mystique. For this trait alone I think of them as feminine despite their appearance, meaning the punctuation marks. From one paragraph to the next I’m not sure where they’ll stand on any given subject, noun, pronoun or even abbreviation.

Teachers say there are hard and fast rules for controlling the behaviour of these wily creatures. Since I’ve never been one to take study seriously, I haven’t learned the rules, so can’t apply them. This is probably why none of them show me respect. Without the knowledge to rule them they’re each free to humiliate me at their whim.

Writing things down is one of my all time favourite habits, bad memory you might say, and you’d be right. Jotting down the shopping, a list of things to do, or even random thoughts for further consideration is common for most of us. Do you include the punctuation marks in your little notes to self? I do, that’s why I use a pencil now. When using ink I found my lists were too messy, the commas and apostrophes had to be scratched out and chased back to positions more generally acceptable.

Although money would be appreciated, I never expect to be paid for anything I might write, no one pays for badly punctuated and phrased ramblings, and let’s not go near the subject of spelling. Reconsidering that last comment, let me say, I’m proud to have achieved the highest spelling mark among those who failed to pass it in the High School Certificate my final year. Mediocrity rules!

Writing for fun as I do, should be much easier while using the computer, correcting was such a pain when using pen/pencil and paper. Copy or cut and paste, searching for suitable words for concepts from my small brain, formatting the page, all should be easy, anyway, I'll keep trying. I have two books on my desk, much to the amusement of son number two. Amusement you say? Yes I do, he pokes fun at me endlessly, “Don’t you know how to search google?” “Are you that stupid, you have a computer right there use it!” “I bet you even go to the library!” I answer yes to all those accusations, at least two of those with some pride in my voice. The wife doesn’t understand that the mess my area of the living room is in, is simply because of the need to spread out my papers and books to chase down the correct words.  I use a real desktop as well as a Windows pseudo. 

My books are two English dictionaries, one by Collins the other by Webster, and College Spelling Studies by Charles G. Reigner. The latter is ten years older than I am so it must have accumulated a great deal of knowledge, and the dictionary is there in black and white.

Of course the computer is a great help I admit, but sometimes I like to spot check its suggestions, you know what they say, “A adjective in the hand... then something about Cyberspace. Google, grammar check, and spell check, all you need to write a novel, except for the story and other bits.

Squiggly lines, red, green, blue, whatever, they fill the page if you let them. I jump on them as soon as they rear their ugly heads. There’s one now, up about 12:00 third paragraph above. That word’s there for a purpose, I saw the error of my ways as soon as the squiggle appeared, I left it there to piss off the owner. I have something against a verb being capitalised unless it starts a sentence. I don’t believe that particular word is proprietary any longer, it’s the same as saying “K kleenex” meaning “tissue” common usage makes it so.

My spelling studies book contains pages of useful information on the structure and use of English in writing, it was in fact designed for people who were employed to transcribe spoken English into written words. The subtle distinctions in meaning between words indicated by punctuation is more important now than ever. Internet communication is usually in brief sentences which can leave meaning open, since context is often missing. That’s where the smiley comes in :).

The apostrophes and commas keep moving around on me, one minute I think I have them corralled ready to brand, then a new usage circumstance comes along. I have nightmares about pages with red, green and blue squiggly lines everywhere. Nouns, singular, singular possessive, plural... If I wanted this I’d still be in school.  Stuff it, let the apostrophe's fall where they may.

I can’t tell you about women and the art of apostrophe and comma usage here, I’m afraid my wife would punctuate me to within an inch of my life.

JAWhite                                                      Return To Main Page
February 2010
ABC Image Courtesy: Steve Woods, RGBstock.com

All spelling, punctuation, and grammatical mistakes on this page are clear evidence of carelessness.
For those who dare, a brief but deadly venture into "Women and Punctuation"

Dragon at The Window

The lizard crawling across my lounge room floor today reminded me of something that happened some years ago. Before I tell the story, let me explain the lizard on the lounge room floor. My wife and I like having a furry friend living with us, we’ve had woofers as well as those who meow. Overall we prefer the cat, although there are times...

Seeing a lizard crawling across the floor is not unlike seeing a toy left in a walkway, we simply shout Hunter! Instead of Matthew! Kids and cats activities are amusing to watch, if only they could be taught to clean up the mess they leave behind when interest shifts to new projects. It’s always my job to do the catch and release thing, it’s a job I don’t like anymore.

Before Hunter, there was Whiskers, before Whiskers there was Simba, they all seemed to be addicted but it was Whiskers that had a major lizard issue.

It was a dark and stormy night, the monotonous thump of the wipers was punctuated by the clap of thunder as I drove toward the house. We had only moved in a few weeks before and the still unfamiliar and wet street kept my attention on where I was going instead of where I'd been that day. I suppose being a salesman one gets used to driving by instinct, sort of autopilot, but the street being unfamiliar and the rain made me pay attention. That would be the only reason I noticed the dragon that night. It was on the nature strip in front of my house moving slowly toward the driveway when the headlights caught it. Shit! was the loud exclamation I used, this thing was at least two foot long. When it noticed the lights it started running slowly in an awkward twisting gait. It went straight to the retaining wall built from old railway sleepers, it disappeared into a hole I hadn’t noticed before. Stopping the car at the end of the drive I got out in the rain to look closer, that hole was four inches or so across but only two high, there seemed to be a burrow behind the wall. Still amazed I climbed back in the car and drove up the steep incline. I had no idea these things were in suburbs like mine. I knew immediately that it was a Blue Tongue lizard even though I’d only seen them from a distance. Normally they didn’t prowl around at night but it had become dark quickly because of the storm, and it was warm.

Shutting the garage door I climbed the steps up to the house, the storm growing worse. My wife was setting the dining room table as I opened the front door. Dripping wet I stood there and announced in what must have been a loud voice “We have a dragon in the garden!”, at the same instant lightening flashed in the doorway behind me. She started, then froze, more from the lightning than my announcement, the plate in her left hand poised a few inches above the table and a bunch of knives and forks in her right. Her head tilted at an angle and her face toward me as she bent over to position the plate, she said calmly, “have you been drinking?”

“No, really, there was a very large lizard down on the street, it ran into a hole in the sleepers.” “Dry off and check the meat in the oven” her only reply, so much for excitement tonight I thought. The boys had heard me arrive, and apparently my mention of dragons, running from the hall they stopped a few feet away and said in unison “Where’s a dragon?” perhaps there would be some excitement after all. Being a quick thinker my dragon immediately became three possibly four feet long with teeth. Apparently they teach too much in pre-school these days, it only took a few minutes of my laying it on with a shovel for them to decide that their Wonder Boy Sega game was more realistic. As they disappeared into the “Boys Room” until dinner was ready, I told the wife about my day, which took about as long as kicking off my shoes.

When I sat down in my usual spot to see what was on TV, Whiskers jumped up for his rub. The noise of the thunder, and the lightning didn’t frighten Whiskers, of all the cats I’d had he alone wasn’t afraid of anything. Over the thunder I shouted to Sally “Whiskers would think twice about bringing that lizard in”, she didn’t reply, I’m used to that. Since no one ever listens to me anyway, whenever I had a comment to make I’d developed the habit of saying nothing, silently agreeing with myself, and nodding sagely.

Our house stood on a sloping block of land, when standing at our front door street level was two stories below. The climb took a lot of effort, especially if one had to go to the up-stairs rooms once reaching the door. I told friends I enjoyed seeing people’s faces in the windows as they flew by coming in for a landing at Sydney airport. Could have been true, except that the hill continued upward behind our house, planes had to go around. It was this hill that gave Whiskers his supercat strength. The garden had been built by the previous owner, a landscape designer who won awards for his native plantings.

This place was cat heaven, like a jungle it was full of secret places to hide and jump out of. Whiskers spent his day chasing imaginary prey up and down the hillside at a full run. He was a large tabby to start with, the exercise had given him enormous shoulders and legs. In spite of the street being so far below, he could be easily seen from there when sitting in the window collecting sun. I think he enjoyed the hunt but had no stomach for a kill, in the time we had him he never gave us the brag walk. Cats like to show off their success at the hunt, bringing prey to the house as if to say “Look what I did”. Whiskers only went as far as bringing in live lizards he’d caught, he would play around with them for a few moments then move on to something else. I had to catch the damn things and show them the door.

There was a fish pond in the front yard, in fact it took up most of the small level area under the dining room window. I’ve seen Whiskers sit and watch the fish swim around, but he hadn’t tried to do any active fishing. We did lose some fish to Cranes whose long legs allowed them to wade in and spear one now and then. Whiskers would just sit and watch from a distance, the cranes seemed to know he had no interest in them.

After dinner we sat down together as the wife insisted, my job that night was to read a story before bed. I’m sure she could have done this after tucking them in but they wanted to hear the native story tonight. During a business trip to Papua New Guinea I'd found a small book used to teach remote villagers pidgin English. It had drawings of common daily events and descriptions in pidgin. I’d bought it for myself, even in Port Moresby pidgin is good to know. Although I made a mess of pronouncing words, the boys found it amusing.

We sat there on the couch which faced the front windows, with the TV and lights turned down low, thunder almost drowning out my voice at times, Whiskers was sitting on the brick window sill staring at us, back turned to the stormy night. Pretty much a scene of domestic bliss, until the dragon entered.

The older son saw it first, a small sound and a pointed finger was all he managed but that drew our attention to the front window. There, silhouetted by the lightning flashes, stood the dragon. Sitting on the couch, we were at eye level with him as he stood on his hind legs, his front legs and belly pressed against the glass, the blue tongue flicking in and out. As the lightning flashed and a crash of thunder shook the house we all stopped breathing for what seemed like ages. We must have been like a deer caught in headlights, frozen in shock. To be honest, I didn’t want to move, if it didn’t see me perhaps.... irrational in hindsight but that’s what it was like.

Whiskers had been quietly sitting like the Sphinx in the window, the thickness of the pane of glass away from it. Our frozen stare must have alerted him to something odd, he turned his head and, really there’s no other word for it, he flew. Literally, he was on the window ledge one second and on the couch with us the next. I remember seeing him in the air passing between us and the dragon at about four feet off the floor. I swear his feet did not touch the floor between the window and us. That was a good 12 feet of space.

I’m a little confused about exactly what happened next, everything was like a series of stop motion images, dark outside one second, backlit by lightning the next, thunder, a low moan coming from one of us. Whiskers, claws dug into the back of the couch behind my head looked enormous, fur standing at right angles to his body, back arched and teeth bared in a mad snarl. I couldn’t believe the continuous hiss he was emitting, it just went on and on. I saw the dragon slowly turn its head and look to its right, sliding its front legs and body slowly off the glass in that direction, it disappeared into the night.

The wife has never commented on that night, I’m not sure why. Both boys took it as children do, a couple of dream tossed nights then it was just something that happened. You know, I don’t think they ever questioned my stories again after that night, my dragon had turned out to be real. I had a look outside the next day, there were some spider webs around the window, this is what he was after. I checked the height of the window, for him to have been at eye level to us he had to stand on the outside window ledge, it was only two bricks above ground level. My estimate of two foot long was perhaps a little short, that is, if this were the same dragon I saw on the street. Why he choose a stormy night to do what he did we’ll never know, but it was effective.

Whiskers couldn’t tell us what he thought, but some odd things did happened with him after that. He wouldn’t go near that particular window again for about a year. It took him quite some time to return to his adventures in the garden, he would often jump sideways at the slightest rustle in the undergrowth. Where before the visit, he would explore without fear or much caution, he would now approach dark crevices warily. Thinking back now, I don’t remember him ever bringing another lizard into the house until his dying day. I have some regrets about moving from that house as we did a few years later but I still don’t like standing in a high window on stormy nights. I also think of lizards as small dragons, really.

JAWhite                                           Return To Main Page
February 2010

Lightning, Photo Courtesy: Steve Smith, flickr.com
Blue Tongue Lizard, Photo Courtesy: Tim Phillips, flickr.com
The Cat, Photo Courtesy: Zalgon, flickr.com

The Olympics, French, and Elvis

Watching the opening ceremonies of the Vancouver Winter Olympics was interesting and entertaining, as a matter of fact I’m still watching the local commentators summarise as I write this. I’ve only been to Canada twice but have met many Canadians and without exception have found them all to be wonderful people. One married couple did threaten to crucify me once, I met them in a King Cross restaurant in Sydney one night, on hearing the accent I asked which part of the states they were from. That’ll do it every time.

Everyone knows the French connection in Canada, fascinating history, characters, and conflict over many years, but what does that have to do with me and my friend Elvis? Well, when going to high school in Little Rock Arkansas once upon a time, I decided that a good elective subject would be the language of love, French. Not many of you know me well enough, but those who do, know I’m an old fashioned romantic.

I’m not embarrassed to say that I once kissed a ladies hand on meeting her, both she and I were 17 at the time, I even went as far as saying enchanté mademoiselle. Luckily she was a romantic as well, I didn’t get laughed at, I got myself....a friend. Sounds stupid now but you didn’t see her at that moment as I did, weak knees, pounding heart, I had the lot.

As to the Olympics, every sentence heard, and sign seen, must be in both English and French, which is as it should be given the history. I can still count to 10 but that’s about all I do remember of the language, should have paid more attention and practiced more often as it would have been very valuable in my business life later. I did keep the French textbook for many years, I don’t know what happened to it in the end, I wish I did, you see, it had an Elvis connection. Mrs. Presley was my French teachers name.

“The world isn’t all that big” is something I’ve said many times and it’s true, places and people come into and out of our lives more often than we think. There are quite a few coincidences that go into the making of this story, too many to write here so I’ll just stick to the Presley thread and that briefly, we’ll speak of French and the Olympics other times. Before living in Little Rock I had lived further south and had driven past the gates of Graceland in Memphis more than once, just one more of those coincidences that add up to form a connection.

Mrs. Presley had married one of Vernon Presley’s brothers so became an Elvis Aunt. Tupelo Mississippi, Elvis’s birthplace was about three hours drive from where my parents lived back then, in fact they were married in Tupelo about nine months before I was born. Elvis would have been riding around town on his bicycle, he didn’t get his first car until the next year.

Mrs. Presley would often tell the class bits and pieces of the family life she led, in French of course, the Presley’s were very close as many southern family’s were and still are. She even brought photos of the weekends she and her husband spent at Graceland in Memphis. Just the usual family snapshots, heads cut off, blurring problems etc. Splashing around the pool was a big activity, the Christmas photos were great.

My French textbook almost became part of history late one Friday afternoon. As I was leaving school, home a short walk away, Mrs. Presley stopped her car beside me and asked if she could borrow my book for the weekend. She had promised one of her sisters-in-law to teach her son a little French that weekend at Graceland, having left her book in the classroom and not wanting to go back, I was simply convenient. I must have hesitated because she smiled and said “I’ll get Elvis to autograph it for you.” I wasn’t a huge Elvis fan but said “sure, that’ll be great.”

On Monday Mrs. Presley looked for me in class and advised that she had left the book at Graceland and would pick it up the next trip down. After class I had to answer a lot of questions from other kids. I wasn’t worried about the book since I hadn’t been studying anyway. About two weeks later she handed me my book and said that Elvis had put it in one of the spare rooms for her. After she walked away I had a look, no autograph, just a note in pencil on a piece of paper stuck inside saying, “Aunt Silvia’s”. No I didn’t ask her about it, not much point and I didn’t want to appear like a crazy fan.

I could do with that book now, I would sure like to meet a young lady kiss her hand and say “enchanté” and perhaps a few more choice words, should the opportunity arise.

JAWhite                                                 Return To Main Page
February 2010

British Columbia Totem Image, Courtesy Jim Simandi
Elvis in Genoa Image, Courtesy John Burke

Modern Toys and Backseat Memories

When I was a kid, I didn’t have all the “toys” they have today, I know, you don't give a crap, but anyway.... Even now I don’t have all the toys men my age have. I was watching... no point in denial, Ellen. She was in the process of giving away a new GMC SUV. For those not acronymicaly inclined, General Motors Company, Sport Utility Vehicle. This “Toy” had something I would have loved having when I was a kid sitting in the back seat. Each front seat had a video monitor built into the headrest. Two kids in the back, each with his/her own screen. One playing a game the other watching a movie, heaven for the driver, but perhaps not time well spent for the kids.

When I and my siblings were travelling with the family we read books, and chatted about life, usually ours, but sometimes the lives of other, more interesting people. We would also look at the sights, asking questions which were occasionally answered in an informative way. We used our imagination to fill the sometimes long hours we travelled over many years.

When I saw Ellen talking about that car on her show, the first thought that jumped into my head was “where were these things when I was a Kid?” On second thought, I may have been pretty fortunate. Instead of each of us being engrossed in a private movie or game, we talked. Sometimes we argued, but we did interact and that had to be good.

My parents did a lot of driving around the country. Dad was a preacher, so he often spoke at churches in other states. Sometimes the drive would be along roads we had travelled before. These drives were occasionally boring since the sights were familiar, I remember watching for the familiar landmarks judging how soon we’d get there, and keeping a eye out for anything new. I liked the trips that took us along country back roads, even those we’d been on many times. Something about the closeness of the surrounding trees and fields, made me comfortable, perhaps it was knowing that if an emergency pit stop was needed a tree to hide behind was just there. City driving was fun of course, being a country boy the crowds and buildings were exciting and new. The country though had something that drew me. Open fields, narrow lanes between fences stretching toward houses with barns and out buildings, each lane ending at the road with a mail box, like the dot at the bottom of an exclamation point. What went on there? Who were the people? Dozens of questions popped into mind with every passing farm. This guessing game was one we never grew tired of, even today I always wonder about the places and people I see.

Each season presented its splendour as we drove. Autumn with its colours, the leaves swirling across the road behind the car as we passed by. The smell of dusty dryness and the many shades of red, orange and purple foliage. Winter was always an adventure, especially when my mother drove. When very young there seemed to be snow every winter, even if it came late it was always there. It really was like the Currier and Ives prints, except with cars instead of horse and sleigh, you just had to use imagination to see it. Mom could never get the hang of snow driving, if the car was sliding sideways toward where we wanted to go, fine... if sliding in another direction, cover your ears. Spring with the fields newly ploughed and planted, Green shoots in rows and wild flowers bordering the roads. Spotting and naming trees and flowers was a good spring car game. In spite of enjoying winter, the spring always uplifted the spirit, to me it was the prospect of summer freedom just around the corner that made me fly. Summer never arrived soon enough, school out and kids in fields playing ball, how many hours could we spend with ball and bat, endless. We didn’t use air conditioning when travelling, wide open windows, wind and summer smells beating against your face. Who could last the longest with mouth open letting the wind flap your cheeks? Making that sound like a wooden ruler on a piece of string being swung around your head, a few seconds was all my sister could manage. These fond memories come back now and then, as though I might be wishing for a return to that clichéd “simpler time”. That might be true, or maybe not. I don’t get confused by the “modern” pace of life we find around us. When talking with people younger than I, my mind seems to always be a few steps ahead of where their comments lead. Experience, knowledge, or just plain common sense could account for this. Or it may be that the pace of modern life isn’t so much faster than the past, just different.

I mentioned the Currier and Ives days of horse and carriage, can’t claim to have lived them, though I would have liked to have experienced them just a little. I didn’t live through those early days of the automobile which started during the finial decline of the “Wild West”. Wouldn’t it have been great to actually see Butch Cassidy or Bat Masterson hop into a car and drive off into the preverbal sunset. Missed the war to end wars, the roaring 20’s and the next war. I joined life just in time to greet the 50’s, It looked fine from my point of view. The 60’s found me old enough to know what was happening but not quite old enough to be fully involved. Saw the first computers invented, hell, I saw the first electronic calculators introduced. I learned the language of "today" as the language was forming, DOS, , hard drive, ram, Bill Gates, back-up, well I forgot the last one a few times. The time we experience is simply a constant flow of change. Whether we say the change we see is good or bad is a matter of personal perspective, the only people who would argue that, simply see things differently to me. A period of time doesn’t start with our birth or end in our death, like a moving average, as one point drops into past another approaches into present.

The “Toys” kids have today are the same as the toys we had as kids, just different. One day they’ll look back and remember with fondness the nights sitting in front of a plasma flat screen having a chat with someone 15,000 miles away. They’ll probably say “Where were personal transporters when I was a kid? It took three months to get to Mars back then.”

All these “new toys” are great, but sometimes I think we should remember some of the old stuff too. My son asked me to buy something from the store for him a few days ago, I said write it down so I don’t forget. A few minutes latter he handed me a printed sheet of paper from his computer with two words. Printer cartridge.

JAWhite
February 2010                                                    Return to Main Page

Child with computer: Image by, Carl Wuerz

I love this image, brilliant child bright future. I just know it.
Currier and Ives print: The Road Winter

Super Bowl Traditions Remembered

Every year at this time, members of our family would inevitably be doing one thing. If you wanted to locate us, just look for the house with three of four cars in the drive and a television set blaring loudly. We would be watching the Super Bowl.

American football bowl time. This year the Super Bowl is forty four years old. I’ve not seen all of those games myself but was old enough to remember the very first one being played and I do remember watching quite a few. There are many “Bowl” games these days but the Super Bowl is the one that all players and coaches aspire to reaching, information for those of you who don’t live on earth. In Europe, and in fact most of the world, they have soccer “Cups”. It’s none of my business but I can’t help but wonder why a huge cup? Far too large to drink from. A Bowl can be used for many things, putting your winnings in for instance (sorry Europe, South america, Asia, uh... the whole world, I'll make up for this later).

I’m sitting here watching alone today; the other male members of my family live far away or have simply passed on. The tradition for my immediate family is mine alone to carry forward, at least until grandsons arrive. Don’t get me wrong, girls can be part of the tradition as well, in fact within my extended family the women are a very important part of Super Bowl day.

The gathering of the clan for the day was like a family reunion, but different, this was more like the feeling one might get from wandering down to the field outside the castle for an afternoon of Jousting. Sure the whole idea for the observer is entertainment, but with the added spice of the fact that your home team might be playing. Sharing the experience with those we feel part of our group, our family, that’s the important bit.

Today I felt like reminiscing about that feeling of “family’ the Super Bowl gave to me. I was very young when introduced to the tradition; memory places me at about 12 years old I think. Excitement would build up for weeks before the event. To my cousins and I the main event was visiting one or another of my uncles’ houses, a strange house offered multiple distractions for the younger boys. The game was/is an excuse for the adults to have fun as well I think, although some seem to think it duty, in Northern Alabama football is a very serious business. Our family were not drinkers so the “high” we got from the game was actually the pure pleasure of each other’s company in a common interest, which is a real high.

There were no rules stating so but there were activities to which groups of certain ages and sexes would partake that day, a part of the tradition which made the day progress smoothly with a minimum of conflict. The host for the day would organise the seating in the TV room to accommodate the adult men, and those older boys who aspired to manhood. The mothers would make the kitchen and any convenient adjoining room their domain. The older girls would congregate in the bedroom of one of the host girls, with the younger girls attaching themselves as best they could, in the hope of learning the secrets of becoming a woman. It was not that the older girls in the family were close to becoming women themselves, just that they thought they were. To us younger males, this latter group would play an interesting part in our day.

Since February is cold in that part of the world, the kids would start the visit indoors exploring the nooks and crannies one finds in strange homes. The uncles house that had a large basement or garage, was always good for hours of imaginative games. While fathers cheered the players we called our home team, although they may be based hundreds of miles from where we lived, the mothers would swap recipes, and gossip about those relatives not attending, stirring a pot now and then literally as well as figuratively. The younger females could always be heard giggling about some poor boy whom they had latched attention onto that week. The youngest girls hanging onto every word and trying to flick their hair in that nonchalant way the older girls did.

Those of us who really mattered would be spending some time trying to throw a football across a garage or basement which would be littered with summer stuff left wherever concrete had been visible last fall. The shout of “go long” resulting in one or two steps and a softly thrown ball. Light bulbs hanging from the ceiling had little chance of surviving the day.

Every now and then one person or another from the women’s group would walk through the TV room and act as though they cared, “who’s winning” always seemed to be answered with a moan, or if the moment was not just right a loud “get out!”. The wives would have the best information though, constantly delivering soft drinks and chips to the masters. When a commercial break was on, the rush to the bathroom was like a crowd movement on a railway station when the train arrives. The young boys didn’t bother, those yellow stains in the snow outside the backdoor do not just happen.

Lunchtime would add a little something to the insanity, delivering sandwiches and soup to the men, the women would drive the kids into groups where spillage would not matter greatly. Unlike most family gatherings, food did not seem to play a great part in the day’s activities; it was just something there for consumption at the right time, that is except for the fried chicken hot dogs potato chips... okay, food was important.

As the afternoon wore on we “middle” boys often turned our attention to annoying girls, this is something boys of all ages do, just aks the wife. We once found a mummified lizard which had apparently wandered into the basement during summer but not out. Getting it to the girls’ room without attracting attention was part of the game. Mothers seem to have some kind of radar for these things, “what are you boys up to” is a demand not a question. The thrill of being able to convince a mother especially the mother of someone else, that innocence is your middle name is a high point. Lizards do well at creating squeals and shouts, so do threats to dolls and diaries.

Regardless of the game’s outcome, the day would end with all of us a little closer having spent the day doing something together, sharing common interests. I guess you could call it bonding, it sure felt good. I hope that one day my children and grandchildren can experience the same family closeness. On days like this, there are no richer or poorer relatives, no differences at all, just sharing.

JAWhite                                                  Return To Main Page
February 2010

Photo Courtesy Paulo Cavoto, flickr Photo