Funny Things Pearsons Say

I've about collected enough of my boys' witticisms for another of these.

I was trying to shove Charlie's snow boot on. This never works very well when he isn't making an effort to apply counter thrust. His boot sort of flew off and almost landed on his other leg, just above the heel. "Hey!" he said, "You almost hit me in the intestine!" (Doubtless, he meant Achilles.)

The boys were "eating" their dinner, which involves, as with most little boys, a lot of pushing food around their plates. Joe had finished, and was going in and out the door carrying loads of firewood, (Yes, we live in Kentucky. Contain yourselves.) so he was far enough from the table that he didn't hear me correctly when I said, "Would you eat, you goobers!?"
He turned to me and inquired, quite dryly, "Did you just tell them to eat their boogers?"

Abraham was running around the living room, jumping from couch to couch, which obviously resulted in my yelling that "This house is not a jungle gym!"
Leaping into the kitchen, he replied, "But I'm a jinja!"

Charlie was watching "Lilo and Stitch," and he apparently has a tenuous grasp on reality, because he turned to me and quite sincerely declared, "Everyone in Hawaii looks like a moron!"

Poemless

Don't get too excited. This post does contain a poem.

Now that I have forever destroyed your ability to trust, I can get on with my story. Over the weekend, I organized my sock drawer. I can see you reaching for the red X in the top right hand corner, but it had to be done. I couldn't find any matching socks or any underwear. Too much information. Moving on. I organized my whole dresser, actually. And since I know you're wondering; yes, my closet is hung by color and clothing type. My 200 disc CD wallet is alphabetized, as are the DVD shelves. My book case is organized thematically and also by book type, which is to say, hardcover, trade paper, mass market, odd sized... You get the idea. I am completely unhinged. I build cities out of Duplo blocks where the main criterion is that each building be all. One. COLOR!!!!!

I really don't understand how the separate entities that are "me" can coexist in one brain. Not comfortably, let me tell you. Once I start cleaning, I find it almost literally impossible to sit down until I fall down. Cleaning, for me, is a feast or famine thing. Daily maintenance, my derriere. Wait until it looks like there was an avalanche, and then go at it like a ninja. What? This is a blog. I'm perfectly within my rights to mix metaphors.

What I'm getting at is that I don't really like being this way. I try to be organized, but some demented inner part of me rebels, like the Gollum within. And that is the part that says, "Break all the dishes! I'm going for a hike!" Then, while Gollum and I are hiking happily, catching raw fish, and writing poems, Smeagol pops its melanin deficient little nose up in the air and says, "Kids! There's no need to actually roll in the mud!" But Gollum thinks there is.

Gollum also sees no need to file the paid bills in the filing cabinet. Ever. Smeagol gets violent when it can't find proof that it did, in fact, pay last month's phone bill, my precccciousssss. This is the duality that I live with. Anyway, I think that Smeagol thinks that Gollum has been winning of late, what with all the poetry and all. That's why Smeagol needed to organize the sock drawer. And the tee drawer, the jammy drawer, the tank top drawer, the husband's closet, and the guest bedroom. Freakin' Smeagol! Go annoy a Hobbit, already! Gollum and I are flipping out because we want to write some gosh. Darned. POEMS! (Or make some jewelry or design greeting cards out of paint swatches or build with Legos or go for a hike or......)

 So... this is the result of that...

Poemless

At home

my aimless mind

writes poemless lines.

Homeless, under

trees or sky,

my lines take aim

to fly.

(my preccciousssss....)

(P.S. Elaine, you can call Jon to translate that for you. I never have to know. :D )

Answer to My High School Self

Sometimes it's fun to look back through old photos and writings and see who you used to be, half your lifetime ago. And sometimes, you just think, "Wow! How did I live this long being so stupid and arrogant?" Lucky you! I'm going to take you on the Odyssey with me!

when i grow up

when i grow up
i'm going to live alone
in an immaculate little apartment
with very sparse furniture.
i only want a bed for sleeping,
a table for eating,
a chair for reading,
and a shelf for books.
i will hang my own drawings
and collect only the best books,
which include classics,
and those written by my friends.
i will eat pasta often
and broccoli when i like
and drink a lot of caffeinated beverages.
i won't keep any pets
except maybe a small reptile
in case i get lonely.
i'm going to listen to whatever music
however loudly i like at odd hours.
there will candles on the floor
and no tv.
i will go out to movies alone--
maybe even twice if i like them.
i'll write letters home
and go on holidays
but not if dad is in a bad mood.
i will live this way when i grow up.

Dear Self, Now That You Have Grown Up

Dear Self,
               Now that you've grown up,
you've decided that you like capital letters.
You've also found that you often wonder
when you "officially" became a grown up.

Living alone proves impossible
when you have two kids.
Kids don't even like to let you be
alone in the bathroom.

"Immaculate" also only applies to
"conception" when you have four
people making messes and
one point five of them cleaning. Just saying.

Husbands also tend to want you
to live in the same house and share
a bed. Four people seem
to require rather a lot of furniture.

Your husband seems to require
rather a lot of books.
His are mostly nonfiction.
The only classics

you own are the ones you found
you actually enjoyed in college.
Sorry, I guess I'm not as much
of an intellectual as you were.

Also, I hate to break it to you,
but you did, in fact, read
the Twilight Saga.
Not that you will admit that in public.

But hey, we do tend to eat a lot
of pasta. And occasional broccoli.
But not the kids.
Not even under extreme duress.

Oh, and by the way,
I discovered in college
that caffeinated beverages
turn us into a raving lunatic

so that part of the dietary plan
is out. But hey, avocados
are really really good.
And you never knew that until now!

For company, lizards really
kind of suck. Not that I don't still
like them. They're cool...
well, actually, cold. Blooded. Get it!?

Anyway....I've found that dogs are much
better friends when you're lonely. Unfortunately
though, I've kind of lost count of the cats
we've gone through since moving

to the country. Yes, you moved to
the country. You found out you like
quiet and actually
kind of hate loud music

or any music of any kind. Ever.
Because kids are loud
and adding a sound track
just gives you vertigo.

No TV... Well, I still
agree with you on that one but,
ashamed to say, sometimes the only
time you get to wash dishes

is when those two unexpected kids
are "stupefying themselves." But at least
you've trained them to call the TV
the "dumb box." So, ten points

to Ravenclaw! Oh, you disdained the first
book of the Harry Potter series when
you were in high school. But they're seven
of the books you have on your

(more than one) shelves now.
Movies, for the most part,
are out. For one thing
most of them are a waste

of two good hours of your life.
For another, you have to watch
what you play in front of those kids.
Avengers was good, though.

I don't want to spoil it for you
but the best part was when Hulk
punched Thor. Or maybe
when he trashed Loki.

But I digress.
Where was I?
You don't write letters home.
That's why you have a blog!

That, and to share this crappy poetry.

Oh, and Dad? Sorry for the
teenaged commentary on
your moods. I was one to talk

wasn't I?

Embarrassing Poetry from High School, and a Recipe, Because That Just Makes Sense

Recently, like a brave archaeologist venturing into the tombs of the Pharaohs, I dug out a folder of musty poetry and other writing that I did in high school. Much like that first sentence, I discovered my high school poetry to be rife with overblown sentiments and trite imagery. So, because I think everyone should embarrass him or herself at least once a week on principle, I have decided to share the least horrible of it with you. May you snort liquid out your nose in mirth at my sophomoric (and occasionally junioric or even senioric, but I don't think there's any freshmanic) efforts.

Who, What, When, Where, Why, Huh?

Oh no! I'm late again!
I really have to run.
I've got nowhere to be
and I must be there by one!

You ask why I must go?
I have nothing to do;
and if I don't finish it,
I'll be nowhere 'til two.

I've got No one to meet
and he'll be mad, I know
if I'm one minute late
so I've really got to go.

In no time I must be there
and there's no time like the present
to leave and get there early.
It's high time that I went.

I've no reason to go
and no excuse for being late.
No one is important
and I'd hate to make him wait.

I'm glad we talked that out.
I hope it's clearer now.
Nonsense always makes sense
when you don't know how.

I also, apparently, spent a lot of high school pondering the efficacy of the most important meal of the day. So here are those brilliant musings, for your edification.

Time for a Healthy Breakfast

Cereal is for chipmunks!
I like my breakfast hot
or if I'm eating bark and twigs
I should get to eat a lot.
Nor do I want technicolor
crunchy marshmallow stuff.
I would much rather have eggs
and toast browned just enough.

On that note, I think I created a fantastic recipe for pancakes this morning. My family loves pancakes, and I am trying to add some nutrition to our diets through stealth and treachery. So...

Banapple Oatcakes

1 cup oats
1 cup flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
3/4 cup milk
2/3 cup apple sauce
1 ripe banana
4.5 tsp honey
2 eggs
Optional: 1/4 tsp each of cloves, cinnamon, and nutmeg

Put the oats in the blender until they're practically flour, then stir together all the dry ingredients.

Put the banana and other "wet" ingredients in your blender and make a smoothie of it.

Stir the wet into the dry and cook on a hot griddle like you would normal pancakes.

I found these to taste sweeter than regular pancakes, and lightly fruity. They'd be great with apple butter, or fruit topping, but I had them with honey with splash of cloves and cinnamon stirred into it. I loved these pancakes, and I'm not generally a pancake person. They didn't fool my family, but since everyone but the four year old liked them, I will probably make them again. These could be made dairy free by using coconut milk instead of dairy milk, but then I might leave out the honey or they'd be too sweet. From what I read on the omniscient internet, these could also be made gluten free by substituting Teff flour, but you'd also have to look for specially marked "gluten free" oats. I gather this is because commercial oats are often grown in close proximity to commercial wheat and become contaminated? That sounds a bit whacky to me, but I don't want to kill someone with Celiac disease, so that's my disclaimer. Anyway, try these, they're sure to please all but the grinchiest of grinches.

Take No Revenge on Thorn Bushes

So, the boys and I took an off-road ramble today. This, admittedly, involved minor trespassing, since we had to climb over the place where the really persnickety guy's fence meets itself at one sharp corner. We were probably on his property for a grand total of three seconds, so I'm not too fussed about it, really. Where we ended up was completely worth it. It was really just the path between hills that had been carved by hundreds of years of run-off, but it was a place we had never gone.

Charlie was reluctant to follow me where I wanted to go, at first. He was worried about coyotes. Myself, I was looking for R.O.U.S.es. And if you don't get that movie reference, I'm sorry: there is no hope for you. And anyway, after we had defeated all the horrors of the fire swamp, we decided we could live there quite happily for some time... Wait, wrong story...

What did end up attacking us, or at least Abe, was a thorn bush. After we got him untangled, he was pretty angry with the bramble, so he gave it a good whack with the stick he was carrying. Long story short, don't whack something that can whack you back with a pricklier stick.

Aaaaaand that resulted in today's poem. I swear, I don't go looking for these things. We're just walking around, and something happens. A line pops into my head, and then a poem writes itself around that line. I'm really just incidental to the process because I have a keyboard and opposable thumbs.

Revenge

As I hiked through the winter woods

a bramble snatched my hat,

tore my coat and scratched my face,

tripped me this way and that.

When, swearing, I had freed myself,

I whacked it with a stick

and for my pains I got more pains

where I, again, got pricked.

I learnt this then: on thorn bushes

one cannot take revenge;

they will best you every time

and they need not bring friends.