|
It's no joy to be sick. It's
even less joy when your child is sick. But the most unjoy
is when you AND your child are sick together.
That happened to my poor
wife a few weeks ago. She and Little Lady, going on three
years old, both had a cold -- with all the sneezing and
wheezing, hacking and coughing, wailing and whining
required for a certificate of authenticity.
Little Lady normally
bubble-pops with zest and vigor. Actually "bursting
at the seems, bouncing off the walls and ka-booming
through the roof" would be a more accurate
description. So it was quite eerie to see her mope around
like the drooping leaves of a Siberian Peonies that's been
fed too much stale beer...not that I have a clue how the
drooping leaves of a Siberian Peonies that's been fed too
much stale beer would look.
Every now and then, the
moping would be punctuated with a sneeze. Little Lady has
a most flamboyant sneezing style, adorning the walls in
unique patterns. No corner of the room is safe when she
sneezes. In fact, her projection has taught her baby
sister in her playpen across the room the fine art of
dodging.
While I was cleaning up
Little Lady's flamboyance, my wife was trying to sooth a
sore throat that was threatening to rip her very insides
apart. Normally she doesn’t drink tea. Normally we don't
even use the kettle, except to heat water for warming up
the baby's bottle.
But this day was different.
My wife was sick and she wanted a cup of tea. So she
turned on the already full kettle, waited for it to sing,
poured the water over a tea bag and sat down to enjoy a
soothing cup of tea.
I walked into the room.
Frequent readers will recognize this critical error of
mine from past columns. You'd think I would learn.
"This tea is soooo
good, honey," she said.
"Uh, where did the
water come from?"
"It was in the kettle.
You know, not only is it soothing, but I feel like it's
cleaning out my entire insides," she smiled.
"That wasn't water in
the kettle."
"What was it?"
her eyes were wide in alarm.
"CLR."
"Phfrttpfrt!!!!"
she blurted out. Suddenly I felt like a soggy version of
our sneeze-adorned walls. I love being part of a new
fashion trend.
When both your wife and
daughter are sick, housework suffers. Not only are there
fewer hands to clean things up, but those hands are more
needy than usual. So it was with particular pride that I
had managed on day 4 of their cold to actually catch up on
washing the dishes.
OK, so I didn't quite catch
up, but I was at the point where the stove and the table
were clear of dishes. This was partly due to my uncanny
talent for balancing dirty dishes several layers high on
the counter, but it was also partly due to an
hour-and-a-half of washing. All I could think was,
"Nobody had better use any of these dishes after I
spent so much time washing them."
SNEEZE!!! Oh no...more
flamboyance. I put down the dish cloth and headed to the
living room to survey the damage.
As I entered the living
room...SNEEZE!!! I was becoming a professional sponge. All
I needed was a certificate of authenticity to prove my
credentials.
Before I could decide what
to do next, I heard the distinct sound of juice being
mixed in the very juice pitcher I had just finished
washing.
I darted for the kitchen.
"Noooo. I just washed that pitcher. Don't dirty it
already." I lunged at my startled wife, and it took
only a second to realize how useful I would have been to
the Dallas Cowboys. And how useless I was in our kitchen.
It's no joy to be sick.
It's even less joy when your child is sick. The most unjoy
is when you AND your child are sick together. But if you
want to be 100% free from all trace of joy, get sick while
your child is sick and ask your sneeze-adorned husband to
tackle you in the kitchen while you are trying to mix
juice to wash the taste of CLR from your mouth.
|
