Blabberings

I mentioned to Chuck that I thought a Disney cruise would be fun sometime. “Absolutely not,” his typical response to things not his idea. “Do you know how much those things cost?!” Then, early in the summer, the Ramseys told us that they had booked one for October. After we got the kids settled back in school, I asked Chuck where he’d like to go for vacation, which we always took during fall break. He said, “What do you think about going on that Disney cruise with the Ramseys?”

We were to sail on Sunday and drive on Saturday. The kids were out of school on Friday, too, so we had to spend the day washing, packing, and cleaning. Auburn High and Justin had a football game in Enterprise that night, and we planned to meet the Spencers there. Chuck had been out of town all week on business and was supposed to be home sometime Friday evening. I would have everything ready to go before we left for the ballgame. No problem.

Friday afternoon, I was up to my eyeballs in dirty socks and wet underwear, and I was beginning to fret. After I sent the kids downstairs to clean up the playroom, the doorbell rang. I stomped to the front door ready to shoo off neighborhood children. Instead, I looked straight into the eyes of a policeman. He rattled me a bit, because I thought he had come to alert me to some trouble in the neighborhood.

“Can I help you, Officer?”

“Are you alright, ma’am?”

“Yes, sir. What’s going on?”

“You called 911.”

“No, sir.”

“Someone in this house called 911.”

“Follow me.”

For some frazzled reason, I wanted to strangle one of the girls. The officer and I stumbled through the mess all over the floor with me explaining about vacation, my husband’s trip, yada yada, until we got to the trashed playroom, where every Lego and Polly Pocket was thrown in the middle of the floor. Suddenly, I was terribly embarrassed that he fights crime, and I can’t even keep my house clean. I threw open the playroom door and demanded of the girls, “Which one of you called 911?!” Of course, they were stunned. I looked around the room and over to the bed just as a little strawberry-blonde head sneaked under the unmade covers.

The police officer went over to Phillip and asked him for the phone, which he had not hung up and was still connected to the dispatcher. He told the dispatcher that everything was fine. I told Phillip that police officers are very busy people, and we can’t call 911 for fun, only for emergencies. Those were my words, but my tone was flustered and exhausted and humiliated. I told Phillip to look the nice officer in the eyes and to apologize to him. He refused to do it. If it were not for the presence of the law, I might have harmed the boy. I sent him to his room and coolly escorted the policeman out of my crazy house.

I couldn’t go into Phillip’s room until I calmed down. He was content in there, so about an hour passed before I remembered him and went to talk to him. He wasn’t there. Since the door to his room was closed, I assumed he was in there hiding from me. I looked in all the usual spots and couldn’t find him. I started calling him all over the house. Angry again, I went downstairs to see if he was with the girls. Nope. 

Now I wasn’t angry; I was frightened. Even though the doors to the outside were locked, I went out and called him. I looked in the van. Where else could he be?! At what point should I call Chuck and tell him Phillip was missing? I knew I couldn’t call 911, BECAUSE THEY HAD ALREADY SENT SOMEONE HERE TODAY!!!! Besides, that policeman knew how angry I was. I would have been tops on the suspect list. About the time I decided to panic, Abby hollered, “Mommy! I found him!” I went to his room where his sisters were hysterical—with laughter. He had crawled into his yet-to-be-packed duffel bag and fallen asleep.

After a not-in-the-schedule, hour-long visit with Uncle Buddy, we left for the ballgame after it had started. We arrived after halftime, and the woman at the gate made me pay full price for all four of us, including the kindergartener, who had practiced what he learned at school that week about what to do in an emergency.

That night, Chuck came home. And the next day, we went on vacation.

Sara Beth, 3; Rebecca, 7; Wilson, 6; Abby and Emma, 9; Phillip, 5

Emma had begged for a bunny for a decade. “NO! NO! NO!” What was the purpose of a bunny as a pet? She would play with it for a week and then tire of it, and I would be stuck with trying to get rid of a nasty bunny and its stinky cage when she left for college.

But, an 18-year-old is different from a 10-year-old:

“It will be all your responsibility.”

“Yes ma’am.”

“You will buy it all of its food with your own money.”

“Yes ma’am.”

“I will not clean the cage.”

“Yes ma’am.”

After the pinkie promises, I caved. Jessie found a cute Dutch Bunny in Auburn. A War Eagle bunny. Jessie hid it in the dorm on the night before she brought it to Dothan. Her name was Ruby. I didn’t expect to hate her, but I didn’t expect to like her, either. However, that nose was pretty cute. 

To quote J.K. Rowling, “All was well.”

“It will be all your responsibility.”

“Yes ma’am.”

“You will buy it all of its food with your own money.”

“Yes ma’am.”

“I will not clean the cage.”

“Yes ma’am.”

Abby took him to Pets R Us. He found a black guinea pig with a white stripe on his face and a perfect little French mustache. His name was Pierre.

They had such happy little lives. Emma and Phillip would let them out of their cages to frolic together in the playroom. (I must have misplaced my spine.) Biscuit was certain we had all lost our minds. We kept the critters in the playroom behind closed doors on a table out of Biscuit’s reach.

“All was well.”

Until one dark and gloomy Wednesday night about a week later. I was helping with youth supper at church when I received a text from Abby: “Biscuit killed Pierre.” I uttered some mild swear words under my breath (I was at church!) and called Abby. 

Apparently the attack was premeditated. Biscuit watched us leave for church (Abby was in her room, so maybe Biscuit thought she went, too). She discovered the door to the playroom at least cracked. Pierre’s cage was on Granny’s Hoosier cabinet. Biscuit jumped up on a nearby chair, leaped towards the cabinet, and knocked the cage to the floor. The cage door flew open! Pierre squealed a terrified squeal! He ran for his short life! Biscuit snatched the rodent and snapped his neck.

Abby heard the racket and knew EXACTLY what had happened. She hurried downstairs with hopes of saving his life. Alas, Biscuit was standing over the broken Pierre, looking guilty . . . and yet proud.

I told Abby to leave the body for Chuck. “It’s a man’s job to kill the bugs, and a Daddy’s job to bury the pets.”

Back at church, I showed Abby’s text to my friend sitting next to me. And her son. And his friend. And Emma. And all the other moms. Soon, everyone on the youth floor—except Phillip—knew of the homicide.

There are things you instinctively know when you find out the baby is a boy. You know you will genuinely grieve when he doesn’t make the Team or when the Team loses the Big Game. You know you will pretend to grieve when Miss Priss Who Thinks She’s All That breaks up with him. You never imagine when you see the tally on the ultrasound that you will some day have to be The One to tell The Boy that The Dog murdered The Guinea Pig.

But I did. And I did. And I promised my sadder, wiser, now worldlier son that Daddy and I would buy him a Second Guinea Pig.  

Although he could never replace Pierre in our hearts, the next night, Chuck and Phillip returned to Pets R Us to purchase another guinea pig. Phillip named him Hardison, after a favorite character on a TV show. The cashier at the store told them that there is a two-week return policy on animals. If the animal died of natural causes, we need only to return the body for an exchange . . . .

Again, “All was well.”

Until Hardison seemed lethargic. As the days progressed, he got stiller and stiller and stiller. Until he quit moving all together.

The moment Hardison ceased breathing, I was at a funeral with 89-year-old Aunt Betty for her first cousin that I don’t remember ever having met. It was on a Saturday. Chuck was at the office. The kids were all at home. Phillip came upstairs to find his sisters, cradling his Second Dead Guinea Pig, who had died in his arms. They didn’t know what to do. They texted me at the funeral. (I only checked my phone because we had spoken to everybody and were sitting in silence waiting for the service to begin. I PROMISE!) I told them to call Their Daddy.

We had been googling about lethargy in guinea pigs. We discovered a parvo-like illness that is passed around in pet stores.

Emma immediately began to fret about Ruby. She thought she noticed some lethargy. She texted me—still at the funeral—that she was concerned that Ruby (a RABBIT!) was not pooping. Emma said her tummy was swollen and hard. Weary, I texted back, “THEN SQUEEZE HER!”

That afternoon, after the funeral of the cousin I didn’t know, they all three took Phillip and Hardison’s corpse back to Pets R Us with the receipt and came home with the Third Guinea Pig in as many weeks. Meet Trip.

By now, Ruby really did seem a little lethargic.

Emma was an editor for her school yearbook. The yearbook staff went to a local photographer to have pictures taken. They could take fun things with them for their photos. Emma took Ruby, but she just didn’t seem herself. She died later that afternoon. She is forever memorialized in the 2012 edition of the Northview High School Spectrum.

The day Ruby died was sad. A guinea pig is a rodent, but a rabbit is a mammal. There is a kinship with a rabbit. Flopsy, Mopsy, Cottontail, and Peter were rabbits. The Easter bunny is a rabbit. Pooh’s friend, Rabbit, is a rabbit.  Emma cried, and I sighed, and Chuck disposed of the body.

Trip was living on borrowed time. We waited. And checked his breathing frequently.

On the Saturday of Disciple Now weekend, two weeks to the day of the death of Hardison, the seniors came to our house for lunch. They were briefed on the dire situation. In hushed whispers, they asked, “Is he dead yet?” Chuck offered to give him a shot of insulin to hasten the dying. I wasn’t sure if that was morbid or kind, but I didn’t let him. Trip finally died. And Chuck disposed of the body.

The whole Critter Episode took place over the course of only about a month.

After the cages were cloroxed and Emma’s wounds had healed, we found another Dutch bunny at a different pet store. Her name is Cas, and she lives a happy, hoppy life to this day. She has a cute lime green leash and an Instagram account. Phillip’s guinea pig need had been sufficiently met. He likes to watch his turtle, Poseidon, splash around in his tank. Abby, not to be left out, has a betta fish named Bailey that she won in a vicious game of Dirty Santa. (She stole him from Bailey.) Biscuit suspiciously tolerates the current arrangement. 

All is well. (Knock wood.)

Jordan Lee had just decided she wanted to be a girl and moved into her pretty pink bedroom.

When JL was born, Starla moved Justin to the twin bed in his room and put JL in the crib. That way, she was able to keep the 3^rd bedroom as a guest room for Mama and Granny. When Jeremy was born, she was able to fit another twin bed in the large-ish bedroom. She moved JL to the new bed and put Jeremy in the crib. When Jeremy was ready for a bed, Starla moved JL’s clothes to the front bedroom and told JL it was hers now. But she wasn’t budging. So, Starla moved the twin beds out of the shared room and bought a bunk bed with a queen mattress on the bottom. Six-year-old Justin got the top; 4-year-old JL got to share the bottom with her 2-year-old baby brother (and their daddy at bedtime, who used to pray them to sleep–himself included).

By the time JL was about 8, she decided maybe being a girl was a good thing after all. Wasn’t she lucky to have a pretty pink bedroom of her own? She slung her hair and stomped her feet and declared herself moved out.

Mama was an only child and had just been diagnosed with “atypical Alzheimer’s Disease,” which only meant she was confused, but she acted differently than someone with “typical” Alzheimer’s Disease. Other than her perpetual grief over Daddy’s early death, no one really knew what she had or why she had begun deteriorating at such a young age.

She was so young that her own mother was still living. Starla and I were in the car one day, and in a Rock-Paper-Scissors manner, I said, “I want Mama.” Starla said, “Good, ‘cause I want Granny.” And that was that.

I don’t remember how Granny ended up in the hospital with a quadruple bypass at 85 years old. I do remember the doctor saying afterwards, “Mrs. Brown, you have the heart of a 40-year-old.” Forty-one-year-old Starla said, “Granny! You’re younger than I am!!”

Since Starla had “dibs” on Granny, she had to go to Auburn to recover from her surgery. We were suspicious that she would never leave, but we didn’t share that with her. 

Where was Starla going to put her? The little grey house was stretched to capacity and was liable to start popping nails any second. There was nowhere else to put her other than Jordan Lee’s pretty pink bedroom. But where could she put JL’s clothes? 

The little grey house had a laundry closet in an L-shaped kitchen. There was a smidge of room there. JL’s clothes got moved to the kitchen, and she went back to the boys’ room. At least this time, she got the top bunk by herself.

At 8 years old, when she was trying to grow up, when she had decided maybe she was a little tired of her brothers, she was stuck with them again. Indefinitely. And not by her own choice this time.

Granny lived in Jordan Lee’s room for 3 years. When Starla just couldn’t take care of her anymore (which is way past the limit for mere humans), she moved Granny to a nearby nursing home where she lived for one year, but she was confused by then and didn’t really even know it.

An 11-year-old Jordan Lee finally moved into her pretty pink bedroom. Without brothers. Without an old woman and a hospital bed. But with plenty of time to finish growing up.

Today, Jordan Lee is married to Peyton and is mommy to Harper. I asked her about Granny recently. She said, “I miss her. We had so much fun when she lived with us. We laughed all the time.”

Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth. 1 John 3:18.