Footprints

It wasn’t so hard to recycle when the boys were small. It really wasn’t any trouble to toss the glass juice bottles in one bin and the pamphlets for weight loss programs I’d decided not to try in another. But now that they’re big enough to leave six month old soda cans in places I can’t reach, the job is a little tougher.

My first instinct was to don a HazMat suit and spray their room with that industrial strength foam they use to clean up chemical spills. However, I decided that this wasn’t the example I wanted to set. First of all they’d both want to be the next to wear the suit and the first to spray their brother. I decided on another tactic: put them in charge.

Son Number Two, Destructo the Younger, flattens cardboard boxes and maintains order in the mixed paper box. Each warlord, er, boy, gets to enforce rules governing his domain (By royal decree, crushed cans go in the Christmas coffee can painted like a Gingerbread Man and flattened boxes go upright in their own tall kitchen trash can--I guess vertical is the new green.)

I let the oldest, Destructo the First on the Scene, be in charge of can smashing. There’s not a piece of recyclable aluminum that’s safe when he tours the house looking for additions to fill his container.

From what I can tell, we’re doing well on the recycling, but it sure looks like we’re leaving one heckuva carbonated footprint.

Special Delivery

For a while, the Captain of our Kennel discovered he could waylay any latent longings for new experiences in motherhood I might display with the addition of a new pet. Pets aren’t less expensive than children, but in rare cases their obedience training is actually effective. I am now the Angelina Jolie of the animal world. Presently I have six animals representing various cultures lounging on the living room furniture, ringing for takeout.

The cats are no trouble. They thrive on indifference. And aloe plants. Aloe plants that you’ve pampered and promised roomy new pots to if only they will “Live, please, live just one more day!” Shortly after a feline gourmet vegetarian meal, you will discover that fillet of aloe plant makes them puke fancy green spearmint gum-type designs on the new living room plush.

I can also keep up with the Labradors. Chunk a ball down the driveway and they will knit themselves into a scarf trying to be the first to grab it up and chew it like Double Bubble. Big dogs are easy. They know they’re dogs (okay, they also know they’re people and feel entitled to at least half of your sandwich, but that’s another thing entirely.) The thing is, they EXPECT to chase a ball and to be invited outside of the house for personal chores, such as watering topiaries and chasing squirrels. They come in the house to sleep or to help with the vacuuming or to beg for potato chips.

It’s the Dachshund that gives me trouble.

So far she has successfully trained me to retrieve a toy, give her a treat, and dress appropriately for carrying her outside under the umbrella in inclement weather. I’m striving for more complex achievements, but if she thinks I’m good for agility training, she’s going to be disappointed. I’m 51 years old. I don’t always make it safely through the hallway obstacle course on my 2:00 a.m. bathroom expedition. For me, agility is the ability not to trip over shadows and to open the bottle of pain reliever without calling for the Jaws of Life.

Occasionally, I will look down by my chair to find the little darling gazing up at me with the kind of eyes that would make Ebenezer Scrooge sign up as a Salvation Army bell ringer, attempting to assimilate me into her thought processes. Usually I’m not adept at picking up other languages, but now I recognize Dachshund for “play,” “treat,” and “let’s send the big dogs to live with your brother.”

As an added embarrassment, she doesn’t care for clothes like the movie stars' dogs do. Oh, she’s up for sleeping on your new sweater or dragging your soiled underwear through the dining room to pad her bed when company is passing the sugar bowl for tea. But she turns surly if you present her with a set of twinkling reindeer antlers at Christmastime, and no matter how nicely you ask, she won't let you tie the chinstrap in a fetching bow.

She once shunned a beautiful sweater, knitted entirely by the hands of her loving auntie, to shield her from the winter wind. She pulled her head and paws in like a turtle so that trying to dress her was like stuffing a sausage. And I’m quite certain that the thoughts parading through her stubborn Dachshund brain were particularly unladylike. I informed her straightaway that I knew a little Pug that would love to have that sweater, and with one look she invited me to pack it up and send it along special delivery. And the Labradors along with it.

I think I’ll need a bigger box.

Old Family Recipe

I can’t think why I gain weight during the holidays. I’m sure to eat a balanced diet from every food group: food made with cream soup, food made with Cool Whip, food that combines vegetables or fruits with marshmallows in a creative way, and food that distant relatives make. I’m always careful to use garnishes, such as triple chocolate cake and pecan pie with discretion.

But here I am again, straining the seams of my purple puppy dog pajamas and forcing the elastic in my stretchy pants to call for reinforcements. To take the stress off my seams, I find I can generally go easy in the “food that distant relatives make” category.

What is it about seeing people only once a year that makes them think they can try out their experimental recipes without fear of retribution? Everybody has an aunt on a health food kick that makes everything with soy milk and seaweed or an uncle whose specialty is peanut butter casserole, but my family members have earned honorary placement in the Food Terrors Hall of Fame. (Their motto is “Smell This!”) With an eye toward family unity, I have always suffered through the asparagus jello of a forgotten time, but from now on, I’m taking a stand on the Aunt Betty's Rice and Raisin Balls.

I also find that I can resist:

Any dish that combines crushed corn flakes, cottage cheese, and butterscotch topping.

Any dish that blends chocolate chips with a random type of canned fish product.

Any finger food that leaves a film on my hands that requires turpentine to wash away the evidence.

So now I’ve concocted a secret weapon. The next time I’m faced with Sauerkraut and Strawberry Casserole or Better Than Roadkill Chili, I’ll whip the top off the mason jar I’m keeping for such an occasion.

“What’s in there?” the Captain asked when the mixture etched a hangman's noose on the inside of the jar.

I grinned. “It’s an Old Family Recipe.”

“Your great-grandaddy’s moonshine?”

“Better than that."

I unscrewed the lid and a passing fly hit the lineoleum like the top scoop of vanilla on an August ice cream cone.

"My brother’s carp bait.”

Field of Streams

Homeward bound from a Fourth of July picnic, we passed down the main street of our small town. The journey was slowed somewhat due to the unusual traffic, but the tractor soon turned off and we had the road to ourselves.

As we approached the Municipal Complex, the kids, excited by alarming and possibly disastrous situations, noticed a mob outside the fire station who both appeared to be hard at work placing letters on a large sign by the road.

“Look, Firworks!”

Nothing says small town like a budget without enough spare change to buy a vowel.

Boys are natural fans of pyrotechnics, particularly the pyro part, and I’m always on the lookout for fresh air opportunities, so we whipped a U-turn at the abandoned gas station and came back to join the crowd.

The public parking places were occupied by the fire truck and a wheelbarrow, so we parked the car in the Fire Marshal’s yard, and struck up a conversation with the boys’ Scout Leader. It seems the Town Council had a son who got them a good deal on fireworks, so a Fourth of July blowout was in full swing.

At the time, we didn’t realize the importance of the word “blowout.”

The kids, with a genetic instinct for finding free food, headed toward a table dripping with slices of watermelon. An unlimited supply of a fruit that’s 90% liquid. There’s a good thing to have on hand when the yard is full of free-range kids and the bathrooms are locked up.

In the fenced pasture across the road, the fireworks launch squad strode into view. The crew chief carried a cardboard box full of bottle rockets and a disposable lighter. His wife wore blue jeans and a motorcycle bedecked tank top that didn’t leave much room for the handlebars.

Son Two materialized out of the twilight. His cheeks were sticky and there was a misfired watermelon seed stuck to his chin. “I have to go to the bathroom.”

Across the street, the launch chief sorted through the rockets like he was searching for the half inch piece in his socket set, and carefully arranged a bouquet of bottle rockets in a soda bottle.

“It’s about to start. Can you wait?”

Son One appeared beside his brother, wearing a pained grin and dancing a familiar jig. “You, too?” He nodded just as the first rocket took off with a sizzle of sparks.

Both boys disappeared. Nothing comforts nature’s call like a lit fuse.

The fireworks display proceeded with random showers of red and gold sparks, interrupted now and then by an unmotivated dud rocket that bailed on liftoff and headed back to the picnic table that served as Ground Zero. Once, the launch team was visible through the gloom and gathering smoke, stamping out embers in the tall grass of the pasture.

Son One appeared by my side, clutching another slice of watermelon like it was a football and I was the defensive line of the Pittsburgh Steelers. “They set the bench on fire, but they put it out with a juice box.”

I’d had a slice of watermelon myself and the juice box reference made me think fondly of indoor plumbing. I squinted at him. “Don’t you have to go to the bathroom?” Across the street the launch crew ducked as another dud rocket zoomed in low over the pyrotechnic staging area.

“I can wait.”

Stephen King never came up with a scarier line.

He dashed away, weaving a path around knees and ankles like an Olympic skier on a timed run.

Suddenly, the grand finale accidentally erupted. The entire area lit up in a patriotic display of billowing smoke and crackling fire. The picnic table and the box of fireworks were ablaze and nearby portions of the pasture showed signs of imminent ignition. The fire truck swept out of the driveway and across the street where it made short work of the ambitious embers.

As the excitement died down and the crowd drifted away through damp ash flakes floating in the air, both sons appeared at my side, eyes alight, wearing Junior Firefighter stickers. They smelled like bacon.

“This is the best Fourth of July ever!”

“So, where’d you get the stickers?”

We heard a blast from the fire truck and turned to see the driver give the boys a wink and a wave.

“What’s that all about?”

“Well you know how you always tell us to use our natural resources wisely?”

I’ve been a mom long enough to know that when they remind me what I’ve said, I wish I hadn’t said it.

“Well we don’t have to go to the bathroom anymore. AND we helped put out the fire!”

Big Business--A Retrospective

My son, Donald Trump, is to big business what Bill Gates is to electronic solitaire. He exploits the common good to create a formerly free product that people stand in line to pay money for. If Omarosa had taken lessons from this kid, she would have a corner office at Trump Tower and the Main with the Ugly Hair would be matching up accessories for her.

My son “The Don” maintains a network of dedicated employees that work hard to support his extravagant lifestyle. The fact that he’s in the seventh grade is a bonus. Money made under the school desk is not easily tracked by results-oriented Internal Revenue officers. I’m nourishing hopes that he’ll support me during retirement in case of undesirable Social Security trends.

One morning as The Don was leaving the car for Algebra class, enough change fell out of his pockets to finance gumballs for a middle school chewathon.

“It’s okay,” he shrugged, nonchalantly sweeping the pile into a mini dustpan and dumping the lot into his jacket pocket where it ripped through the lining and crashed to the sidewalk, chipping out a divot in the concrete the size of a gold bar. “I’m rolling in it.”

“That’s preferable to stepping in it,” as my Old Man, an old hand at Black Jack used to say.

Normally this sort of statement from a twelve-year-old is alarming to a parent. But, having lived with this particular twelve-year-old for about forty years, I was as cool as Frosty’s button nose—on the outside. The turmoil inside could have caused his corncob pipe to spontaneously combust. I couldn’t help but remember The Kid’s past forays into Big Business.

Taking a lesson from his older brother, who cleaned out the pockets and lunchboxes of all the kids at Daycare playing draw poker until I discovered the trend and made him repay the winnings—nickels, drink boxes, and all, he stuck to value-added enterprises that ensured customer satisfaction. During the last fad faze, The Kid bartered his lunch for highly collectable trading cards and took advantage of an established market of eager ten year olds who readily traded their allowance—and their lunch—for hard-to-come-by cards. He scored his first card for a Twinkie, invested in a carton of Ho-Ho’s, and by the time The Kid graduates from high school, he will either be a multi-millionaire or a convicted felon. Either way, I’m not liable for college tuition.

I’m not saying this kid is different, but last year he listed an underground laboratory, strength of a gorilla, and stock options as the main items on his Christmas wish list. In a fit of sudden inspiration, he invested his birthday money in a metal detector and now he collects treasures on the playground the way other kids collect bubble gum wrappers in their jacket pockets. He’s gathered enough jewelry at recess to open his own pawn shop.

Other kids have dressers to hold their clothes. This one uses his bureau like a cash register: tens and twenties in one side; fives, ones, and loose change in the other. I borrowed spare change for coffee from him until I realized he was charging ten and a half percent interest. I stopped giving him ice cream money when he offered to change a fifty.

His latest venture is pure genius. In an age where instant gratification is as close as your Blackberry, today’s tykes spend their pocket money on cheat guides for video games that are obsolete before the clerk hands them their receipt. My young entrepreneur launched a line of energetic young players with well-conditioned thumbs, who beat the games for their less talented or motivationally challenged friends. For a price, of course.

When I discovered this enterprise, I didn’t know whether to pat him on the back, send him to his room, or sign him up for political office. “Kids PAY you to play their video games?” My mind couldn’t grasp the concept.

“Technically, that’s not the exact truth,” he explained, as serious as Dan Rather under intense questioning. This kid knows more about technicalities that Johnnie Cochran knows about loopholes. “I created the concept, so I don’t actually do the physical labor. I assign a customer service representative to handle the problem, and he pays me out of the money he earns.”

“You’re getting paid for playing games you’re not even playing?”

“Ummmm. Yes.”

“Any chance I could get in on the action?”

“Mom, this may be a family business, but I’ve got to be realistic. You’re lousy at video games. You always die. But you can give me a ride to Jake’s house. I have to make a pick-up.”

“Okay,” I said, grabbing my keys. “But it’ll cost you.”

What can I say? A girl’s got to get ahead the best way she can. And unless The Don cleans his room pretty soon, he’s looking at a hostile takeover.