A QUICKIE: Posts that are short and sweetly short.

Coming across some old homework of Conner's, I asked what the hole in his paper was. He said, "It's a tear hole. That's right. A hole made by my tears."

His smart aleck (God bless her) older sister suggested that we put a hashtag in front of the words "The Struggle is Real."

BATCHLING

They come in batches. That’s my theory on babies. I call it the Baby Batch Theory.

My worldview [And you have to respect it, if it’s my worldview. That’s what I learned in college.] My worldview is as follows: This is not our first go ‘round. We lived before—as spirits in Heaven or Valhalla or whatever you’d like to call it. I’m open-minded. 

What’s a spirit look like, you say? Just like you look, except without the zits and stretch marks.

So, spirits wait to be born into this life: to get bodies, to get experiences, to get eyes to watch the stars with; that sort of thing. Remember! This is my worldview. I am diverse. [Also a thing you must respect. I listened in college.]

So, back to my theory on Baby Batches . . . God sends those spirits to earth in batches. I’ve done the study. [Studies are the science of crooked lines. They tell us what’s real and what’s wonky. Again—college.]

For thirty plus years, I’ve watched the nursery at church. Last year, it was a wild batch, and when I say wild, I mean children that refuse to be potty trained, curse before they can talk, and are convinced they were born knowing how to drive the family car. We call them pips.

And I’ve seen years when it was a mellow crop of little darlings. These are the children who won’t walk until they get around to it, laugh at dust motes, and find life a stunning marvel to be embraced with chubby arms. They give us a nice break from the pips.

Of course, there are outliers. [You can’t believe how much I paid to learn the meaning of that word]. In every “batch” there are babies who groove to their own tambourine, thus proving the crooked line theory.

My husband was born into a poke ‘em first, ask questions later batch. Every family has one. You know the kid. He/she/pick a sex [Gender neutrality. College 101] is that kid who can get a perfectly quiet batch of mellow kids screaming in 2.4 seconds. My husband is still at it. He picks, mostly online. My brother was a picker. Might still be.

Which brings me to my next theory. God uses the batch method to keep the distribution even: one picker in the group—max—one pip to balance it out, throw in a mellow baby and shy one every once in while and poof; you’ve got a family.
I’m sure more studies are needed. In fact, I feel they are necessary for world peace and stability. So . . . I probably should get started writing that grant proposal for the additional funding further studies will require. 

Me? I was part of a smart mouth, know-it-all batch.

Linda (First Born) Zern 

Light It Up

My youngest son and I were in the checkout line at Kmart. He was confessing.

I was trying to look cool and unfazed, while choking on my own horror spit.

Youngest son was telling me that he and a couple of his buddies had been experimenting with an incendiary device of the low cost, high flammability variety—also illegal—sweet Mother McCrea. 

I won’t bore you with the details, and that way you won’t have to testify at the trial.

“But don’t worry, Mom,” he assured me, “we couldn’t get it to blow up.”

Sweet Mother McCrea.

Beyond shocked, but still trying to play it cool, I looked to the gentleman behind the register and appealed to him for some kind of mature adult support. I was hoping he would roundly condemn the mercenary actions of my son and his gang of four.

The male cashier said, “Ah lady, that ain’t nothing. Me and my buddies burned down a bridge once, a big one.”

The elderly man behind us in line started to chuckle gently. The cashier joined in, giving us a conspiratorial wink and looked wistful.

“They still don’t know who did it, but that was in New York.”

Another man in line sighed—nostalgically.

I am ever puzzled by maleness.

I have never, ever had the overpowering desire to ignite, blowup, or dynamite anything. I do, occasionally, burn some lemon-scented candles when I soak in the tub—but not the same thing—I’m thinking. I have never heard my daughters chortle and exult with triumph because they can (and did) urinate on a fire. I have never had one of my female type friends confess a bridge, barn or hay wagon burning to me.

I have never heard any women of my association rejoice in their penchant for mayhem by saying, “Come on girls, let’s get some rags, stuff them in a bottle with some gasoline, light it up, and see what happens next.”

Let me think . . . nope . . . don’t remember any sleepover stories like that.

Men are such a puzzle. If men aren’t from Mars then where are they from?

They’re from a place a lot farther away and hotter than Mars. That’s where. Burning down bridges. Indeed.

“And if you don’t put that sharpened stick, chunk of rock, or spear down this minute, mister, you’re going to lose an eye, and then how are you going to see to light up all those Molotov cocktail fuses?”

My tips on raising boys include setting up checkpoints for full body searches and always assuming that where there’s smoke, there is fire . . . or there’s going to be fire . . . or urine. Always be ready to remind your boy-child that burning down a bridge may sound like fun now, but does he really want to be working in the garden department at Kmart when he’s fifty-seven.

Pssssst . . . I have no idea how bridge burning and garden department cashiering are inter-related, but that’s one of my strengths—verbal gymnastics and convoluted reasoning. I’m a girl.

Linda (Fire Marshall) Zern