“... and Meme was ironing and the phone rang. She answered it, shook her head and said, ‘Tell your brother Deadeye is on the line.” She put the receiver down, went back to her ironing board and began a steady shake of her head. ‘Deadeye. Rooster. Muldoon. Don’t these boys have real names?’”

I sooooo wish I could have been a fly on her wall when she read that text.

Nope. Nope. I don’t. I takesie-backsie that one.

No fly. No wall.

Moving on!

Sheryll Bodine made a quick appearance and started doing some gozintas. I sent her to relax by the cement pond because money isn’t going to be the determining factor in this life and death decision.

The ending result was that my head took on the stability of a ‘bobblehead.’ If an image of a dashboard Weiner dog — a poor little pooch whose head bobs and shakes from side to side and up and down without one measure of control just popped into your head — then good for you.

Positives can be negatives.

And

Negatives can be positives.

Okay. Enough stalling.

Let’s talk about my body scan.

I assume some of you chose to look at it — so:

I don’t know about any of you, but I was left aghast when I first saw the images. A tsunami of physical and emotional reactions took place, each one leaving me a shaking and weeping mess. The trauma lingered for quite sometime, and for days I repeated this admonishment, “Why the fuck did you look?” Almost immediately I hissed this recrimination, “Why the fuck didn’t you look sooner?” Those questions bring us to this blog.

Narrative:

Examination: Whole body bone scan.

Nothing to kill or die for

And no religion, too

Imagine all the people

Livin’ life in peace

During my last phone call with Don, he went off on a tangent about a piece of furniture he’s refinishing. 

  “Denise and I have an old-fashioned, metal Hoosier cabinet that I’ve been restoring. I spent some time today screwing in a T-bolt to hold the marble top,” (I’m not sure what he actually said about the bolt because I’d already started zoning out). 

Ten effing minutes later I interrupted the snooze fest. “You do know I’m dying, right?” 

Don. Cracked. Up. Laughing. 

“And you just wasted ten effing minutes of my life, right?” 

He kept on laughing. 

I need to live until Mother’s Day.

May 8th.

I need to be here for my mother.

I need to be here for my daughters.

I need to be here for my granddaughter.

Really, friends. I need to be here.

Mother’s Day.

It’s my new goal.

I would appreciate your positive energy.

Thank you.

“How about freakin? Is that word allowed?”

“That’s between you and your mother,” I said. (I can pass the buck, too).

Out she went – in she came.

“Mom said that I should try hard not to say it, and I could only say it at home or here.”

Within days she said it here.

“The freakin internet is down,” the 7-y.o. bellyached.

So, where are we?

The crack of book spines – love it.

The crack of body spines – not so much.

Isn’t it ironic?

Red sky in the morning, sailor take warning.

Red sky at night, sailor take delight.

“I’m gonna hang up and see if I can sleep.”

“Okay.” Before she could disconnect, I stopped her. “I’ve a question, an important question.”

“What?”

“You still have my ocean water and sand, right?”

“Yeah.” She laughed.

“You protected it, right?”

“You’re an ass.” She laughed harder.

“And you’ll give them to me, right?”

“I know just where I’m gonna put them.”

“Not possible what with the broken wrists and all.”

She laughed – until she cried.

That experience paved the way for me to purchase manual transmission cars and to date dudes who could drive manual transmission cars. It became a prerequisite, much like my dudes needed to love the Red Sox. I wasn’t a hard ass about things. If a guy asked to buy me a drink, I didn’t counter with questions about cars and baseball, but it didn’t take long for me to suss out the pertinent info. Usually, all it took was a gentlemanly walk of this girl to her car – her 280Z.

Broad smile and impressed nod of the head =

he knew how to shift a stick.

No smile and no question =

he wasn’t long for my bucket seats.

He got me to my recliner and opened his arms. I stepped forward, leaned my hips against my walker and let him embrace me.

“Thank you for Date Night.” He kissed my head, waited for me to sit, tucked me in, kissed my head again and put his hand to my cheek. “Call if you need me.”

“I will.”

I needed him for quite some time.

While I waited for my Tramadol and Xanax to kick in,

I listened to the recording I made.

I laughed.

I cried.

And thanked God we had Date Night.

A perfect Date Night.

I smiled at my daughter — then dropped the smile when I followed her stare and her pointed finger toward the woman standing in line behind us — the woman who looked exactly like Margaret Hamilton aka Almira Gulch aka the Wicked Witch of the West.

Ding. Dong.

Dead Ringer!

At the moment, I’m not sure where Vinny’s piece is. I should track it down and find a place for it – just on the odd chance I run into the artist during my stint in the afterlife. I would rather be able to say it’s hanging on a wall somewhere in my house, than having to admit it’s tucked behind a piece of furniture or worse yet, hanging in my upstairs bathroom.

“I’m sort of trying to stay on the downlow. You know, out of sight—out of mind. Kinda hard hiding out from God if I invite a holy dude into my home. I imagine the Big Guy has some sort of GodPriestSatellite capability, so I intend on staying off radar. Actually, I think the prolonged sitting is working --- there’s no attention calling being done by Sheryll O’Brien, and as long as Mr. Wonderful dusts me once a week, it’s all good.” 

“If you don’t want a visit, just give Father Dude a call.”

“Huh. 1-800-Call-A-Priest. Never thought of that.”

“I don’t know who the hell built that house, but there wasn’t a damned 90 degree angle in that place. There wasn’t a wall that was straight, or a single corner that met. It was like someone threw a pile of lumber in the backyard and a gust of wind whipped the wood into a house.”

“And insulated it with newspaper,” I scoffed. “What the eff was that about? Behind the walls there was newspaper, nothing else. What. The. Eff?”

“Damned miracle the tinderbox didn’t burst into flames.”

“I used to pull newspapers out from behind a baseboard and read them.”

“Jesus.”