Can I eat your flesh if we went down in a plane together in the bitterly cold and snowy Andes Mountain range? Remember, there’s no food anywhere, and I need to survive, and you’re dead. So far, I’ve gotten one no and one yes, and either way, I respect your decision but I will eat you. My desire to live is as vast as the—wait, hold that thought, the doorbell’s ringing.
Shit, I just remembered I don’t have any pants on.
To the closet I go, slamming one then two legs into easy-on sweatpants, and off I’m off!
I know it’s the neighbor’s son Chuck bringing steelhead salmon, and like tonight, I feel bad for him being an errand boy. Even though I don’t know if he actually minds.
Through the stained glass door I see his bright orange worker’s vest. Turning the handle open the door, trying to reel in my exasperation from running. “Hey CJ. Thanks so much for bringing this. Tell your Dad thanks.” I take the plastic-wrapped frozen pink and gray package the size of a lecture book, and then shut the door.
I haven’t told them we’re moving; I really haven’t had the chance to. Besides his text to refer a friend to be, and our catching up about his ocean fishing trips there hasn’t been a good time. This feeling, the heaviness in my chest, the disappointing people is what I wish wasn’t part of this moving process. But it’s because blah, blah, blah, people love us.
I’m consoling Evelyn, “You know why I don’t have good days?” she told me in our pre-sleep cuddle time, “Why?” I asked. “You broke my butterfly.” Recalling the hand-sized golden and sparkly butterfly that clipped to our Christmas tree, and the crack it made under my foot as I accidentally stepped on it after it became a playtoy two weeks back flooded in. She still thinks about that? I thought. The heaviness of her cries and the resulting barrier they created in my understanding her words answered that undoubtably yes, she did. To which all I could say was I’m sorry and it was an accident.
She’s calmed. But after listening to me type the “bump” noises the keys make is too loud. She’s decided to grade me for how quietly I do the final paragraph (fingers crossed I pass). Anyway, I want to share about an experience Evelyn had with her foot. It was a first.
Dave explained to me she pointed at it and kept calling it “poky”. This had him guessing a bit, perhaps even looking for a splinter. I don’t know how but he figured out what she meant. The dang thing was asleep. I love the way she describes things.
Alright, bedtime!
Love, Jaclynn
Going On 40 