Monday, October 24, 2011

In Which Owen Gargles, Sticks His Fingers Up His Nose And I Proclaim My Love



Owen was especially delightful today. I am not sure why but he was. He let me hug him and hold him a bit more than usual for one thing. Two-year-olds don't have all the time in the world to indulge their grandmothers' needs for constant kissing and it is with great patience and forbearance that he usually tolerates such silliness but today, he was more open to the idea of it all.

We took a walk which we haven't done lately. The idea of the stroller hasn't appealed to him as much but today he got in it and told me that he wished to go to the post office. So we did. He told Miss Joanne, the postmistress that he was going to be a cowboy for Halloween but he pronounces it "toe-boy" and he also pronounces football as "butt ball" and so lately, his Bop and I have taken to calling him the Toeboy Who Plays Butt Ball.
I am sure he will not appreciate this when he is older but he does not seem to mind now.

After we stopped in at the post office, he said he would like to walk up the road a bit and so we did but I noticed that he was being so very still and I checked, and yes, he was falling asleep so I hot-footed it on home and kept him awake and when we got in the door he said, "Bed," and so we made our way back to the bedroom and got out Big Bear and he picked Mother Goose from the stack of books on my vanity and before we had gotten through the entire book, he was asleep.

He took a good nap and when he woke up he ate some yogurt and some Chex Mix and some popcorn and then we went out and sat on the steps and fed the rest of the popcorn to the chickens who love popcorn as much as any movie junkie and I had another one of those perfect moments of peace and awareness in the golden sunlit fall air and why these always occur with Owen and the chickens I do not know but I have a feeling that it's at these moments that I am living my destiny most profoundly, my DNA completely satisfied with the clucking hens and the rooster and my grandchild by my side.

I thought about how I have been tending children since I was twelve years old and how I don't really think of myself as someone who likes children that much and it came as sort of a shock to me to realize how much of my life has been taken up with them. And how it has been, of course, the most satisfying aspect of my life.
Something to think about as I sat there, Toeboy Owen beside me in his jeans and flannel shirt. He pulled at the strap of my overalls and said, "Overalls," and when Ozzie got too close for Owen's liking, he jumped into my lap and said, "Scary!" the way he does but like I said, he isn't really scared. Or maybe he is, just a little.

I know that one of the reasons Mr. Moon fell in love with me is that he was ready to be a daddy when he met me and I was proven breeding stock and was obviously a loving mother, albeit a crazy one. He'll deny all of that, or maybe he won't, but it's true. It was the mother-thing and the way I shoveled chicken shit off the back of a truck for the garden AND the biscuits AND a few other things too which caught his attention. But come on- it's not just women who have biological clocks ticking away and he was twenty-nine and ready to settle down and make a family and there I was and before I knew it (like in two days) he'd essentially moved in and we were married less than a year later and had Lily a year from that. Well, eleven months from that.

And tomorrow will be our twenty-seventh anniversary.

Twenty-seven years.

We will have been married for twenty-seven years tomorrow and I can't even imagine how that has happened any more than I can imagine how I have achieved the age of grandmotherhood but it would appear that both are true.

And you know me- I completely believe that lust is nothing more at the beginning than womb calling to sperm and vice-versa and so he and I have done our part in fulfilling the role which nature provided for us but at this point- when we are not apt at all to conceive another child- we are still married and still, quite frankly, in love and speaking for myself, I would wish nothing more than twenty-seven more years with this man.

He's gone tonight to hopefully buy a car at auction tomorrow for a customer and so we'll wake up on our twenty-seventh anniversary in separate beds, separate towns, but that's okay. We have a broad perspective at this point and we know a little about life and love and anniversaries. We know we're going to be celebrating all of it when we go to Cozumel in December and we know that we celebrate it all every day. We never end a conversation on the phone without saying, "I love you," and we often cry when we talk about our life together. There's a whole lot of glue that binds us and Owen is the newest part of that and this new baby coming will be even more. We look at each other frequently and say, "Can you believe....?" and we know we're talking about this next one.

Ah-lah.

Twenty-seven years of marriage and we met because a friend of mine wanted some pot and he knew I had some in a bag up in the closet with cat hair and pine needles in it and he brought over the guy he was painting houses with and that guy was so ridiculously tall that I didn't give him a second thought as to a possible love-interest and besides, the tall guy was dating another woman.

But one thing led to another and one night he saw me in a bar and I was wearing my friend Sue's blue angora sweater that kept slipping off my shoulder and within a week from that, I knew he was going to ask me to marry him.

And he did.

And here we are.

Kids and grandkids and chickens and a thousand biscuits later.

Here we are. And I always keep buttermilk in the refrigerator for emergency biscuit-making.

And I love that man and I am still, STILL amazed at how tall he is but mostly, amazed at the fact that he still loves me.
And he still surprises me all of the time.

Well, that's that. I'm going to go pick some tiny salad greens for my own tiny salad for tonight's supper. And tomorrow night, for our anniversary, I am going to cook some venison tenderloin with heirloom potatoes and garlic and onions. And biscuits.

We may not wake up together tomorrow, but we'll go to bed together and I will sleep under the quilt of the years of our love together and I will remember so many things and I will hope for so many more even though that is selfish, selfish, selfish.

How much can one girl ask for? How many gifts can one old woman receive?

So far, too many to count and no one knows how many to come.

I am the luckiest woman in the world. I have tended children, I have loved and I do love and I have been loved and I am loved.

There you go and there you are and honey-darling, Mr. Honey Moon, if you are reading this, please know...I love you. And isn't our Toeboy Who Plays Buttball gorgeous?
Yes. Yes he is.

Yours truly forever...Mrs. Moon

23 comments:

  1. Oh, thank God it exists. Love is real and you and yours do it well!!

    Happy, happy Anniversary to you and Mr. Moon and the whole Moon family who wouldn't be here making all of us sooo happy if it weren't for some narly pot, a slinky shoulder and two people who knew when to say...YES!!

    God Bless Love

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  2. Happy anniversary. We have 35 years together, me and mine. love is grand and simple. No wonder you feel it with Owen and the chickens.

    I see you have a new picture for your header. My confederate rose opened it's first bloom today.

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  3. you make me believe so many things are possible i do love your universe and my universe with you in it.
    rebecca

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  4. Using apples to extort love. Jeez.

    I obviously spend too much time with a five-year-old because Toeboy Who Plays Buttball sort of cracked me up.

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  5. liv- One thing does lead to another, eh? Thanks, sweetie.

    Ellen- The Confederate Rose is just so gaudy, isn't it? And that's why I love it. Mr. Moon and I would have more years together but we got distracted by others to begin with...

    Madame King- Honey, your universe enriches my universe in ways you will never, ever know. Solid gold/mist of ocean. Love.

    Stephanie- I knew when I asked that question that it was a fool's errand.

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  6. Many of my favorite posts of yours do have buttermilk biscuits in them----
    they epitomize something I can't quite name. Happy Anniversary!

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  7. A- Buttermilk may be the meaning of life. Biscuits may be. I do not know.

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  8. You give me hope, as does Mr. Moon. Happy anniversary -- and a thousand more!

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  9. Happy Anniversary to the Moons...and back!
    you two kids make my heart feel all squishy.
    love,
    yo

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  10. I'm sure you are already sleeping tonight and dreaming colorful dreams.

    Happy Anniversary and can I add how wonderful it is to see people who have been together so long still so much in love-as it should be.

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  11. Isn't it just so cool how babies know when you need them and they take on that different personality, and husbands do the same.
    Congratulations on a beautiful marriage and happy family!

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  12. Happy Anniversary to you both. I think that it is all about being friends and having respect for each other with some plan old commitment thrown in. Wishing you many more.

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  13. Twenty-seven years, how wonderful.

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  14. Aren't those little movies darling?
    That was indeed a very fine demonstration of gargling. Some friends can be the best match makers. I met my Mr Wonderful on a trip visiting a friend in England, and a year later I was married, moved out of Belgium TO England, and within a couple of years I will be living in USA with a man that 20 years ago would have been a sure NONO... For husband material, there are nerds and dancers. The dancers are fun to be with for a while, but you want to marry a nerd because this one will take care of you!

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  15. happy anniversary moon babies! your love story is pure magic, the biological clocks and all that. gotta love a man who has a biological clocK. and as for you miss moon, the way you whisper "gargle" to owen, the purring whisper of suggestion, well, mr moon never had a chance!

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  16. Happy Anniversary to one of my favorite couples.

    Love,

    SB

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  17. That boy is adorable. He's at that magical age where everything is fascinating and everything they do is sweet, funny and fascinating. I'm so glad you're sharing him with us.
    I wish you and Mr. Moon a very happy Anniversary too! You are a perfect pairing, except maybe for the height differential! I was very amused by your story, because ours was similar in that we were both otherwise involved and not looking, I never even considered going out with a man that tall, but there was some attraction I could not explain, and after one date we were never apart again either. Serendipity is a wonderful thing.
    I hope you have 27 more years together too.
    Hugs,
    Mel

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  18. Elizabeth- Hope. I think THAT may be the secret of life.

    Ms. Planting- My heart gets pretty squishy when I think about you and that Tearful Guy, too. Uh-huh.

    Mel's Way- Well, it is a miracle to me.

    Rubye Jack- I sure am lucky. I know it, too.

    Syd- And kissing.

    Mary LA- And it has happened so damn fast.

    Photocat- Well, Mr. Moon ain't afraid to dance. I can tell you that.

    Angella- Ha! Thank-you, sweet friend.

    Ms. Bastard-Beloved- We love you too, baby doll.

    Mel- God. We'll be REALLY old in twenty-seven years. But...that sure would be nice.

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  19. Happy Anny, Mz (and Mr) Moon and what a glorious life it is.

    Buttball. Only the Toeboy....lol

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  20. Aww, marymoon, I cried some reading that. I'm a sucker for true love and what you and mr. moon have is what I have with my sweet miss shayla and it all makes me so happy that I just get....weepy. thank you and thank mr moon and thank love and thank us all for being a part of it. I love yall.
    Love, daddyb

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  21. I am not surprised that he loves you, Ms. Moon. You are wonderfully loveable.

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  22. Akannie- Yep. That Toeboy. I sure do love him. And his grandpa.

    Daddy B- I am SO proud that I got to be the one to marry y'all. We love you so much too. You know that. You surely do.

    Angie M- Sometimes I am lovable. Sometimes I am not.

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  23. Belated Congratulations.
    You guys got / get it right.

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