Kitchen Crisis

“Mom! Ryan stuck the vacuum cleaner hose up under the stove and now there’s smoke coming out of his pants!”

I opened one eye and waited while the whirling scenes behind my eyeballs settled into recognizable figures. A young boy stood by the bed, the very bed upon which I collapsed in the early hours of the morning after arriving home from an intimate anniversary trip to the coast with my husband and his MasterCard. This must be a dream. I closed the errant eye gratefully.

“Mom. The turtle is missing out of his pocket!”

I’ve heard you can change the course of your dream if you concentrate. I concentrated on Continental breakfasts on the hotel terrace. I concentrated on platters of pastries and piles of fragrant fresh fruits of the season. I tried to concentrate on going back to sleep, but this act is difficult when confronted with a young boy leaning in close enough to breathe your exhaust and visions of Hoover-bound turtles are dancing in your head. Unless that turtle was Michelangelo or one of his Teenage Mutant Ninja buddies, he was probably exiting my son’s shorts in a puff of I Dream of Jeannie Smoke.

Fine. If reality was going to intrude into my unconsciousness and stomp barefoot across my fantasies, I’d get up. I swept down the hall in a swirl of pink nylon and polyester lace to take command of the sandstorm.

“What are you doing?” I shrieked, fanning away the clouds of dust that threatened to cover my body like a “just add water” mud pack.

“Good morning, Mom,” Ryan greeted me calmly without looking up from the task at hand, which seemed to be a daring attempt to suck the oven’s inner workings piece by piece into the vacuum. “Jeffrey’s dinosaur head rolled under here, so I thought I’d get it out so he wouldn’t bother you.” A fresh pillar of dust-filled smoke arose as he hit a warren of dust bunnies that didn’t need to worry about finding a place on the endangered species list.

Son Two, The Informer, was right. As Ryan knelt on hands and knees on what must be the kitchen floor, jabbing at the stove with a vacuum cleaner bayonet, the clouds appeared to be passing through the billowing folds of his star-spangled shorts. I couldn’t imagine a prettier picture to greet me after a week of soaring seabirds and glimmering shells at sunset. A threadbare moon in my kitchen.

I wrenched open the kitchen door and turned on the ceiling fan, industrious actions that succeeded in creating a tornado-like whirlwind that rerouted the dusty smoke back up Ryan’s boxers. Seen through sunlight filtered by vacuum exhaust with dust clouds rolling up one leg and down the other, my oldest son looked like a “person of interest” in a Stephen King novel.

“Here, let me,” I screamed over the roar of the vacuum sucking up dust clots, Jeffrey jumping up and down like a caffeinated flea, and Lucy the semi-dachshund barking disapproval of the chaos. I grabbed the vacuum hose from Ryan and knelt down to survey the situation. As I squatted, not wanting to commit to a full bend and kneel unless absolutely necessary, the vacuum hose brushed the flimsy pink folds of my gown and sucked a foot or so of the delicate fabric inside. I immediately voiced my surprise and disapproval in a calm and controlled manner.

“Stop screaming and stand still!” Ryan grabbed one edge of the flimsy material and began to heave mightily in the manner of someone wrestling an unruly reptile.

“Help!” I squealed back as the struggles resulted in a blow to my left eye and a near-miss indiscretion involving my modesty.

“Excuse me. Is this a bad time?” asked a friendly voice. I squinted through my remaining good eye and discovered the local pastor peering in the open kitchen door from the steps outside. Dropping by to inquire about my trip, the good man took in this lovely picture of family unity: Me, dabbing at my swollen eye with a dishcloth, my nightdress sucked down the vacuum hose while the three of us--the vacuum hose, the nightdress, and me—snaked around my teenage son whose heavenly-body boxers flapped as he endeavored mightily to wrest me loose, and my youngest offspring jumping about excitedly in backwards pants with a lizard’s tail flapping from the back pocket which was now in front.

“Can I be of assistance?

“Pull the plug!”

Responding to emergency situations is an important part of a pastor’s life’s work and he responded admirably. He lunged through the door and remedied the situation with a yank to the snarling monster’s cord.

Slowly, my night dress drizzled back down my thighs and the swirling clouds of dust began to silt at our feet. I stammered and sputtered, looking for an explanation that didn't involve animal abuse, child neglect, or chiffon in the kitchen after breakfast time.

The good pastor collapsed in a chair at the kitchen table as dust bunnies swirled around his head in a halo pattern before coming to rest on his shoulders. He took in the situation with a soulful look and began to laugh.

“I’d use you in my sermon this week,” he paused to wipe his eyes. “But I don’t know if you would fit in better with The Good Samaritan or,” he winced as he pulled a small, surprised turtle out from under him, “the Ten Plagues of Egypt.”

Life in the Fast Lane

I spent 40 years pinning my bra straps to my undershirt, and here comes a whole new generation that never tried to put on pantyhose in a moving vehicle who they think they can rewrite the Ten Commandments of style. Fashion rules these days are scratched on sticky notes instead of carved in stone.
Today, my niece wears Tommy across her chest, Abercrombie down her arm, and Liz on her behind.
“Who is Tommy and why are you wearing his clothes?” I asked her one afternoon as she pranced in to show off new duds.
“They’re MY clothes, they just have his name on them.” She stared imploringly at the ceiling as if hoping enlightenment would come from above and strike me with a smart bomb. She pointed to a label I shouldn’t be able to see. “He’s a designer.”
“Let him wear his own clothes. Any boy that’s plastered across your body like that should give you a ring. Or share his nights and weekend minutes.”
“You’re out of date. Tommy is tight.”
“I can see that. Didn’t he have anything your size?”
“No, TIGHT.” She drew the word out like she was playing the sound game on Sesame Street. “You would probably say Tommy is cool.”
“I would say Tommy is living high on the hog with your college savings. What did you pay for the rights to that dustcloth?”
She shrugged. “It was on sale. I cashed a couple of bonds.”
“You spent your future on a rubber band with one strap and a few sparkles? Couldn’t you just cut armholes in a shower cap?”
“You’re too funny. Shower caps aren’t made of breathable fabrics.”
“And what natural fiber gave its life for that plastic skirt you’re wearing?”
“It’s called leatherene.”
About that time my mother oozed into the kitchen clad in a leatherene miniskirt tighter than an onion’s skin. She was melted into a crop top that read “Princess” in metallic letters, and sported a jeweled tattoo beside her navel that boasted a word I was once grounded for writing in my diary. Could this be the same woman who went white around the mouth when my nail polish and lipstick didn’t match? She crossed her legs and I winced. I haven’t seen that much of Mama since the day I was born.
“I see your appendix scar hasn’t faded.”
She snapped a strap and winked. “That’s not a scar. That’s my thong.”
I choked on my wheat toast and shot decaffeinated coffee out my nose. Just my luck. I spend my whole life trying to stay out of the fast lane and my Mom passes me on the curve.

Roast Rage

Contrary to the biased opinion of teenaged boys in the 17-19 age bracket who crash into my kitchen at an hour past minute rice, shedding sweaty soccer gear, band instruments, and rented video games, My name is not What’s For Supper. Likewise, I am not the seating hostess at Denny’s, nor am I the Sample Girl at the food court.
Now I understand my mother better. She used to stare longingly out the window while mashing potatoes and mutter, “If the world were to end today, I would have to serve biscuits to the four horsemen of the Apocalypse before I could go to glory.” I thought she was batty. Really it was roast rage.
Pondering the matter while I munched on the crunchy brown parts of the chicken crust last night, I decided that there are some actions that could tend to make me snippy in the kitchen. So I have thoughtfully prepared a menu of activities for potential combatants to avoid when I’m engaged in actual food preparation. Break one of these rules and I can’t guarantee what will happen with the potato masher.
* Don’t kiss me when I’m making gravy. Gravy is a narcissistic beast and fully capable of expressing jealousy in the form of oddly shaped lumps and unappealing consistency. (This one is directed more toward the head of household who is filled with joy and the love of life whenever he smells food in the final stages of preparation. I don’t see much of a problem where the teenaged boys are concerned.)
* Don’t tell me the potatoes have lumps, but you like them that way. The potatoes won’t be the only thing that’s served up with a few extra bumps that evening.
* If your main objective is to stand in front of the stove and steal samples from the chicken plate, don’t offer to help me in the kitchen. If you want to be of assistance, save me the trouble and stick your bottom lip in the cheese grater.
* Anyone apprehended peeking into pots boiling merrily away on the stovetop and making the same sound I make when I step in something gooshy will come away with a better understanding of the term "cauliflower ear. "
* Sampling the meatloaf and saying, “You know what would make this good?” is grounds for assault with a meat mallet.
* Don’t report the fun everyone else is having in the living room, scream for me to come watch the new Geico commercial, or exclaim “Oh, you missed it!” while I’m carefully browning the crescent rolls. Pillsbury didn’t spend all that time packing dough in that little can for me to let it go up in smoke while I’m dashing into the next room to watch a lizard talk.
For those of you who can't remember the rules, feel free to ask questions. I'll be in the kitchen. Sharpening my potato peeler.