Friday night we all went out to see “The Avengers” in 3D, on my neighbor, Ann-Marie’s dime. She got us a gift certificate to the Beacon (the only movie theater I have an interest in patronizing around here) in thanks for me driving her to work for a couple of weeks when her foot was injured. (She and I both work at LMMHS.) It was great, but a late night. And then Saturday, we got up for a full day.
Q had a soccer game at noon, for which we had to arrive at 11:15. I brought the ladder, the tripod, the camera, and extra batteries, and I filmed the whole thing. Q’s coach asked for a copy of the film, which I was glad of – it made me feel official there, recording. Strange – considering the dedication with which Pam and Ken filmed all our athletic endeavors back in 1987, I would think there would be far more parents with whirring cameras at these things. But I was the only one. And as I’ve previously learned, keeping the camera trained on the action keeps my mouth shut.
Thereafter, T went to a birthday party, while Q went to Bennett’s house for a playdate, where Owen and Jude were already paying, and by the time we had a chance to catch our breath, Q had organized a sleepover. He asked us first, of course, but it was hard to say no. And what a nice bunch of guys – we warned Q, and through him the boys, that the plan had been to play the new game that T had bought for the family (“Guesstures”), which all the boys played with enormous enthusiasm. And by the time they went to bed, around 11:00, we were all wiped out. Back at it this morning – but not before Q and T, with help from all Q’s buddies, whipped up a breakfast of cereal, eggs, toast, jam, and juice, and Q and T carried it in to present Janneke with their mother’s day cards. She was tickled. But the day was already in motion, with T going to a birthday party at 10:00 AM or so, and me trying to figure out whether I really want to put a tire swing (I’m coming around to that as opposed to a regular swing) in the front yard, which Q and T are lobbying hard for.
I climbed the tree to cut – pull down the cords T and Q had tossed up there in their crude attempts at building the swing themselves, and got a little cocky on the way down – my foot was pressed into a crook in the tree, and I figured I could just swing my body down below the branch I was lying on, and thence to the ground. They body cooperated in swingting down, but the right foot stayed jammed at a very uncomfortable angle. Imagine planting your foot on a slight incline, toes pointing up at about a 45 degree angle, then freezing it while your whole body swings down below the level of the ground. That ankle jst ain’t gonna cooperate. I struggled to pull myself back up, but it quicky became clear that that wa s impossible; then I started yanking myself toward the far end of the branch, away from the trunk, trying to change the angle. That wasn’t working either. I contemplated calling for help, but I figured they wouldn’t get there before my arms gave out and I swung all the way perpendicular to the ground, foot still jammed in the crook of the branch, ankle tearing and breaking. I panicked a bit and thrashed and jerked and kicked – and it came loose. The cool tingle of adrenaline shook me, and I dropped to the ground, unhurt.
Man. That could have given the day such an ugly turn. But it didn’t. So then all of us piled into the car to go to T’s soccer game in Dalton. (We (I am coaching) got pounded, but it was competitive in the first half, and all of our girls are 2nd-graders, while all theirs are third and fourth. So we felt good about it.) T left the game with the father of her friend Ava, who was having ANOTHER birthday party. Home again, where most of us slipped into catatonia. Fetched T from her birthday party around 5:00, and when I got back Janneke declared she was too tired to cook. So it was Chopsticks tonight, eaten out on the deck. T lobbied to get some practice in goal after supper, and it went fantastically well – I taught her how to punt, which she was doing quite effectively by the end of the lesson, making her the first girl on any of the teams I’ve seen who can do it.
She was in goal for about a quarter of the game today, and had some really nice moments back there – she knows what to do as well as anyone, and prefers it to the clearly dangerous business of running out there anong all those towering third and fourth-graders. And this, even after having played a bit of a game in goal a couple of weeks ago, and having gotten absolutely pegged in the thigh by a powerful shot. She came off he field crying then, but had a blast at it today, and I’m glad of it, because out in the field, she is a very timid player. Much like her brother often is, I have to say – like him, she has great foot skills, but just doesn’t want to mix it up.
We all showered, and then T came over to lie on my lap and let me rub the vitamin E oil into her scar. (In case you don’t know, she cut her face on some barbed wire in WI on our April trip. It was a very traumatic experience, but at the same time, it wasn’t traumatic at all – my sister Jayne was there to keep us all calm (she’s an emergency room nurse), and T was an incredible trooper. We have a whole collection of pictures of her cuts and her scars – just on her left cheek, and only on the lower part, apart form one up near the middle of the cheek, about an inch long. Here's a pic from just after she got the stitches out:)
This is becoming one of my favorite moments with T – she les there and we speak gobbledygook languages back and forth, pretending to get angry with each other, apologize, laugh at our jokes, all while saying “P’te k’a no-oalita, ganghitsa-pu a-ookilow.” Massage is apparently good for keeping the scar tissue from getting too bad, so I do that for a good while. She likes it, and can take pretty heavy kneading of the area – another piece of evidence that she is definitely my daughter. T to bed, and the rest of us to pile onto the couch and stare at “Avatar” on TV until we can’t take it any more and pile into bed. A long and awesome weekend. Punctuated, by the way, with the production of many copies of the DVD of Quinn in “Aladdin”, as well as three of his soccer game for his coach. It turned out better than I would have thought with the Flip video camera. I’m definitely going to keep doing that.
I’ll leave you with a picture or three, I suppose. Take care - Oh: One more thing - This picture, of Q and the other three main actors from the musical, is just too awesome not to include, even though this post wasn't about the musical so much. So here it is:
No comments:
Post a Comment