138 posts tagged “life”
Maybe you have had something like this happen to you:
The other day I knew we were planning to have tacos for dinner so I decided to stop and get a 2 liter Coke on the way home from work. Walmart is right on the way, but I hate running in there for just one item, so I stopped at the CVS which is just off the main road.
I rushed in and went to the soft drink aisle only to find that they were completely out of Coca Cola. I didn't really want Pepsi, but since that was all they had I picked up a bottle and headed to the checkout counter.
At the checkout line a customer was pitching a fit about their passport photos. The lady behind the counter kept trying to explain the situation, but the irate customer refused to listen. This went on for about five minutes and didn't look like it was anywhere near ending. Frustrated, I put the Pepsi back on the shelf, telling myself that I really didn't want Pepsi anyway, and decided to run into K-Mart which was in the same shopping center.
In K-Mart, I walked all the way to the food aisle (and it wasn't a short walk) and was happy to see plenty of Coca Cola. I quickly grabbed one and went to checkout. When I almost got there I pulled out my wallet and was mystified to find only $2.00. (I thought I had more than that, but later remembered that I had left my other cash at home). Unfortunately, the Coke was more than that so I wasn't going to have enough.
Sighing heavily, I walked all the way back to the food aisle (still not a short walk), put the Coke back on the shelf and once again grabbed a 2 liter of Pepsi (although I still really wanted Coke) because it was only $1.29.
By the time I got up to the front of the store (of course there was only one checkout lane open) a line had magically formed and there were seven people standing in it, two of which had full shopping carts.
I didn't even stop walking. I just placed the Pepsi on the conveyor belt of one of the eight unused checkout lanes and headed out the door.
We had sweet tea with our tacos that night... and it never tasted so good.
With everything that has been going on lately, I am designating this as my song of the week (especially the first verse). Check it out on YouTube.
JUST ANOTHER DAY IN PARADISE by Phil Vassar
The kids screaming, phone ringing
Dog barking at the mailman bringing
That stack of bills - overdue
Good morning baby, how are you?
Got a half hour, quick shower
Take a drink of milk but the milk's gone sour
My funny face makes you laugh
Twist the top on and I put it back
There goes the washing machine
Baby, don't kick it.
I promise I'll fix it
Long about a million other things
Well, it's ok. It's so nice
It's just another day in paradise
Well, there's no place that
I'd rather be
Well, it's two hearts
And one dream
I wouldn't trade it for anything
And I ask the lord every night
For just another day in paradise
Friday, you're late
Guess we'll never make our dinner date
At the restaurant you start to cry
Baby, we'll just improvise
Well, plan B looks like
Dominoes' pizza in the candle light
Then we'll tippy toe to our room
Make a little love that's overdue
But somebody had a bad dream
Mama and daddy
Can me and my teddy
Come in to sleep in between?
Yeah it's ok. It's so nice.
It's just another day in paradise.
Well, there's no place that
I'd rather be
Well, it's two hearts
And one dream
I wouldn't trade it for anything
And I ask the lord every night
For just another day in paradise
Well, it's ok. It's so nice.
It's just another day in paradise.
Well, there's no place that
I'd rather be
Two hearts
And one dream
I wouldn't trade it for anything
And I ask the lord every night
For just another day in paradise
For just another day in paradise
Well, it's the kids screaming. The phone ringing
Just another day
Well, it's Friday. You're late
Oh yeah, it's just another day in paradise
I took the family to Alexander Springs in the Ocala National Forest today. My youngest brother and his family, my mother and two of my older brother's sons came along as well. Florida has many springs like Alexander. The water stays 72 degrees year round and is extremely clear. We had a good time swimming and just lounging around in the shade under the oak trees.
It reminded me of when my wife and I were dating and went to another spring called Juniper Springs. For some reason a load of bikers decided to visit the spring that day and they were all over the place. We found an open piece of ground close to the bikers, set everything down on a blanket and made haste for the cold water.
After swimming a while we came back to find that our tin of chocolate chip cookies that had been made just for the occasion was missing. We immediately blamed the bikers. There wasn't a lot I could do about it. I was six foot tall and hardly weight 150 pounds and the bikers were... well, they were an assortment of leather clad, tattoed, overweight, long haired, furry faced men and women (no furry faces on the women though) and there were a lot of them. I might have been young, but I knew better than to start something with that bunch.
Later on, after bemoaing our lost cookies, we decided to take a walk on the nearby trails. On the way to the trails a movement caught my eye and I looked over toward the trees. To my amazement, our tin of cookies was rolling on the ground and there, running right behind it was the cookie thief. It was a brown, furry faced... squirrel. We chased him off and took our cookies back. Thankfully, the squirrel never managed to get the tin open so we still got to enjoy them (they were a little crumbly though). I did feel pretty bad about blaming the bikers.
The church we are attending has seats instead of pews. I went in about halfway and sat down beside an older man. On the other side of him was an older woman, so I assumed they were a couple. After the song service we all sat down and I noticed that the man had sat in the woman's seat instead of his. She didn't know he was there and sat down right on his lap. She immediately jumped up and so did he. He scrambled back to his seat, apologizing profusely. I just watched, slightly amused. After a few moments he leaned over to me and whispered, "I meet more women that way."
I turned toward him with a look of astonishment on my face. He simply smiled. I don't know if it actually worked out for him, but after the service I did see him talking to her.
Preston Walters rolled his eyes and sighed heavily as warm air started coming from the air conditioning vents. This always happened when he was in the car line; it was one of the reasons that he hated picking Misty up from school. He shut the air off and pushed down on the electric window buttons. The front, passenger window glided down with ease, but the other three stayed put. He slammed down on the buttons with his fingertips repeatedly, hoping to get some kind of reaction, but the windows didn’t budge. By the time he got to the pick-up point he was soaked with sweat and totally frustrated. Misty saw his car and started jumping up and down, waving excitedly. When the all clear signal was given she ran to the window and shrieked, “Hi Daddy!” In a sour voice he uttered, “I’m hot. Just get in the car so we can get out of here.” She opened the door and jumped in, throwing a pink book bag in the floorboard. Totally oblivious of his bad mood, she said, “I like it when you pick me up Daddy.” Preston looked her way, forced a smile and lied. “So do I Honey. So do I.” Misty talked non-stop all the way home, going into great detail about every minute of her day. Preston simply drove and half listened, offering an obligatory, “Really?” or, “You don’t say?” during the rare quiet moments. When they reached the house Misty jumped out as soon as the car stopped. Before he could even get out of the car she was bursting through the front door. As he watched her run inside he could hear her small, excited voice, “Mommy, Mommy! Guess what I did today?” Preston sighed and leaned over to pick up the book bag. Later on that day, while walking to the garden, he relived his drive home with Misty. He didn’t like the way that he felt toward his six year old daughter, but he just couldn’t seem to get over it. Misty was their third child and the only one that wasn’t planned. In fact, she was a total surprise, coming nine years after Tiffany and eleven years after Jack, now a senior in high school. He thought about having one child ready to graduate while another was just starting out. He suddenly felt tired… and very old. He stopped at the gate and looked out onto the garden. This was his favorite place to be, his silent escape from life. He spent at least thirty minutes a day here pulling weeds, picking off bugs, looking for new growth and just enjoying the time outside. It always helped him get his mind straight. His eyes moved to the end of the garden. There, completely covering the fence was the plant that had become the central point of his backyard getaway. He had found it about a month before, one little leaf poking out of the ground at the end of the bean row. He had started to pull it up, but it looked like a squash plant, so he left it where it was. He checked it almost daily and the little plant seemed to take on a life of its own. Before long it had put out large green leaves and Preston decided that it was a pumpkin. Then, it started branching out with long, wispy tendrils that reached out and took hold of the fence. One day he looked in on it and a beautiful white flower had opened up. There, attached to the flower, was a small green fruit shaped like an hourglass. He knew then what it was; it was a gourd. Disappointed, he thought about pulling it up. It was, after all, in the bean row. Besides, you can’t even eat gourds. But he couldn’t bring himself to do it. He enjoyed watching it too much. So, he left it where it was and every day since then he had rushed out to the garden to check on it. He spent a lot of time manipulating the vines so they would grow up the fence and it had practically covered every square inch of it. He was amazed how something that started out so small could grow so quickly. Preston was still admiring the gourd plant when he felt something brush against his leg. He looked down and saw Misty. Her small hands were holding onto the chain link gate and her face was pressed up against it so that one eye was staring through a rusty link. She only said five words, “I like your garden Daddy,” and then she looked up at him and smiled. Then, as quickly as she was there, she was gone. Preston watched her skip away and a disturbing thought crossed his mind. Misty was, in fact, just like his precious gourd plant. The gourd plant came up unexpectedly; so did Misty. The gourd plant showed up in the wrong row; Misty showed up in the wrong part of his life. He was disappointed when he found out what the gourd plant really was; he was disappointed when he found out his wife was pregnant with Misty. His heart melted as he thought about Misty. Was he treating this gourd plant better than he was treating his own daughter? How much time had he actually spent with her, talking to her, really listening to what she had to say? Was it possible that he was holding a grudge against her for coming along so late in his life? Was he actually blaming her for some of his marital and financial problems? The more he meditated on it the more he shamefully realized that it was all true. He thought a moment and then looked back toward the flowing plant at the end of the garden. He had been so wrong about that plant. In a matter of weeks, with a little care and nurturing, it had become the centerpiece of his garden. What if he would have pulled it up when it was just coming out of the ground? He would have never gotten to watch it grow or see it bloom. He would have missed out on so much. What was he missing out on with Misty by acting the way he was? A sound shook him out of his thoughts and he turned to see Misty running across the yard with her arms held straight out to the side of her body. She turned and waved, “Come play with me Daddy.” Preston looked at his garden, then back at Misty. He could almost hear the gourd plant silently pleading with him to step inside the gate. There was a moment of indecision. Then, somewhere in the back of his mind a distant voice spoke to him, Go play with her. He spoke out loud, in answer to the voice, “But what about the garden?” The voice answered back, Are you raising a garden or are you raising a daughter? The question shocked him and he was still thinking about it when Misty called out to him again, “Come on Daddy, play with me. Please?” She stopped right in front of him, arms still extended, making bubbly airplane noises. Then, she stepped forward, wrapped her arms around his legs and said, “I love it when we play together Daddy.” Suddenly the garden didn’t look so enticing and he found himself leaning over to hug her back. With a slight tremor in his voice he said, “So do I Honey. So do I.” And this time, he really meant it.
I was talking to my wife the other day and she mentioned that her tummy was upset. I said to her, "You know, most men would never use the word tummy."
"What?"
"The word tummy. Most men would never use it in a sentence."
"Why not?"
"I don't know... it just seems like... like a feminine word."
Sarcastically, she asked me, "Well, what would a "real" man say instead?
I responded with, "Stomach. A "real" man would say stomach. It's possible that he would use the word belly, but that even has a slightly feminine edge to it."
This started a conversation on other words that I would never use and I think I can speak for a lot of other men as well. I have listed some of them below. Feel free to add any.
TUMMY - Stomach.
PANTIES - Come on! Moms, never tell your son to put on his panties. Use the word underwear please.
PEE-PEE (POTTY) - This is mostly used in potty training. "Did you go pee-pee (potty)?" How about simply, "Did you go pee"?
POO-POO (POTTY) - Again with the potty training. "Did you go poo-poo (potty)?" Isn't it confusing to a child anyway to use the same phrase for both body functions? This is where us guys have to almost give in because there isn't really a good way to say this. I mean, it just wouldn't be right to say to a two year old, "Did you take a sh**?" Even "Did you take a crap" is inappropriate. So, most of us will use a variant of poo-poo and say poop. It still doesn't feel right to say it, but I don't think there are too many alternatives.
BOO-BOO - Not to be confused with poo-poo. There are plenty of other things you can say here instead like hurt, pain, scratch, laceration, gouge, severed limb, decapitation. It all depends on the situation.
YUCKY - Disgusting, terrible, unpleasant, nasty, vulgar, gross.
ICKY - See above.
KITTY CAT - It's just plain ole' cat. OK?
I know there are plenty of others, but I honestly can't think of any right now. I actually went to Google and tried to find some more, but either I didn't use the right search term or there just aren't a lot of people really concerned about this sort of thingy... I mean, uh... thing.
Before I planted the garden, I noticed a plant had come up at the end of one of the rows. I could tell that it was from the squash family, but I wasn't sure if it was a squash or a pumpkin since I planted both last year. It was on the row that I was planning to plant the beans, but I decided to leave it and see what came of it.
Well, it is clear now that it is not a pumpkin or a squash, but a gourd. This plant has literally gone crazy, completely taking over the fence at the end of the row. The leaves are big and green and it has dozens of beautiful white blooms every single day. There are at least fifty small gourds growing on it and more seem to show up constantly. Funny thing is, I'm still not sure how it even got there.
I am amazed every morning when I go out there and find that it has somehow managed to grow even bigger than it was the day before. It has become, quite accidentally, the center piece of my garden.
I'm glad that I decided to leave that little plant where it was. It would have been easy to remove it while it was still small, simply because it was in the wrong row. But what would I have missed by doing so?
Perhaps there is a lesson here somewhere. Too many times we try to remove something from our life because it doesn't seem to be in the right place. Maybe, just maybe, by doing so we are removing a small piece of joy that would have grown and blossomed into something beautiful if we had only given it a chance.
It really irritated me this morning when I turned to the news and found that the incredible Navy Seal rescue on the Indian Ocean got less attention than the story of a new dog in the White House. Who gives a flying rip about Obama's new dog? The United States Navy pulled off a seamless rescue operation by simultaneously taking out three armed pirates and our media wants to focus its attention on "Bo" the wonder dog. I don't get it.
Not only that, after I did find the story of the rescue, one newspaper actually reported that we probably did more harm than good. We are told that the pirates are mad now and will be seeking revenge. By rescuing a US citizen, killing three pirates in the process, we have placed others in imminent danger, especially those who are still held prisoner.
What?!? So, instead of taking action we were supposed to pay the ransom and let the kidnappers go on their merry way? We should have given in to terrorists to keep from making things worse? I don't think so. That kind of thinking will encourage more terrorism. That kind of inaction would only turn the United States of America into a mandy pandy, mama's boy, no back bone nation. And I pray to God that never happens.
No. We did the right thing and I don't care if every Somalian pirate in the world is mad at us.
My kids were on Spring Break this past week. Last year, we went camping with some friends during Spring Break and it ended up raining every day we were there. We talked about doing that again, but other things came up. Good thing because early in the week we had a frost and the weather was too cold to be camping at the lake.
It had warmed up by Friday and the company that I work for actually gives us Good Friday off, so yesterday we took the kids to New Smyrna Beach. Our friends who went camping with us last year also went (minus the dad who had to work). It was fairly crowded yesterday, but it was a nice day. The sun was out with hardly a cloud in the sky. The only thing was the wind was worse than normal. That was OK too though because it kept us cool.
My son and I went into the the water for a while. The Atlantic Ocean is still cold this time of year, so it took some time to get used to it. We tried to body surf, but the waves weren't high enough. At one point I saw a fin in the water and panicked a little, but it turned out to be a dolphin. There were two of them and they swam along the coastline slowly, taking their time. I also saw a big stingray swim by me.
After we got out we played in the sand, building sandcastles and other sculptures that weren't quite discernible. Then, we walked up the beach and checked out the shells. Most of them were small or in pieces.
By five thirty the wind had really picked up, so we decided to leave. We had pulled our vehicle onto the beach while our friends had parked in a public parking area. When she got to her car she found out that someone had run into it and left. Fortunately, someone else had witnessed the hit and run and left a note on her car describing the other vehicle and giving their plate number. So, the police were called and a report filed.
We ended up stopping in Deland at a small Italian restaurant. I think it was called Fivola's, but I'm not 100% sure. The food was pretty good and when I went to pay I found a dollar bill that had a stamp on it stating "FIND OUT WHERE THIS BILL HAS BEEN AT WHERE'SGEORGE.COM." I jotted down the serial number and looked it up this morning before I started this post. Unfortunately, I spent the bill at the restaurant, so I couldn't make an entry on it. You have to have it in on you to do that.
After the drive home we took a hot shower and hit the bed. I thought for sure I would sleep in this morning, but 7:30 rolled around and I was wide awake. Oh well, time to start another day.
Three things have taken up my spare time lately.
First, I've been reading a lot. I've been stuck on Clive Cussler for a while now and even though sometimes the story is a little corny, I enjoy reading his books. Also, my brother has a collection of Louis L'Amour books and I've been raiding his library. I just finished Hondo and even though I am not much for reading westerns, I thought it was a great book.
Second, my son and I planted the garden two weeks ago. We learned a lot from our gardening experience last year and we are hoping for even better results this year. We've got a drip water system set up and so far everything is looking pretty good. We're even getting prepared to try our hand at the pumpkins later on in the summer. That didn't work out for us last year, but I we know more about it now.
Finally, I don't exactly know the correct way to go about it, but I am in the process of writing a book. I know, I know... a lot of people say they want to write a book, but the truth is most of them don't. For me, it has become something of an obsession lately. It's not about writing so that it can be published, this is something that I am doing for myself. I just want to be able to say that I started it and completed it.
I take my writing seriously but, to be honest I am pretty private about it. Other than posting it here, I really haven't told a lot of people. I did tell one good friend at work. He was courteous and showed interest when I told him a little about the story, but I could tell that he was only trying to be nice. That's okay though. After all, I don't expect other people to be as excited about it as I am.
Honestly, I'm not quite sure how I am doing the reading, writing and gardening and still have time for work and family. It's a balancing act, that's for sure, but isn't life always that way?
