Paper Bag Saturday

Some people do Friday Fragments and I guess there's even some sort of guidelines or something for that and I enjoy reading those fragments but you know me- I can't be walking down the road someone else has already shined a light on. Nah. I have to get out my tiny blue flashlight and head through the woods, tripping on fallen logs and getting caught up in the thorn vines.
So I don't do Friday Fragments but every now and then I do a post which is just a bunch of little found items and I throw them in a paper bag and fold over the top and give it to you and that's the deal here today.
Even the picture really doesn't have anything to do with anything except it's about everything if you look at it the right way. I had no daddy growing up and dammit, if there's one thing I've done right it was to find a man to be the daddy of my children. Jessie spent the night last night after serving tables at the Opera House and there she is with her daddy. They both complained about how they would look- Jessie in what she slept in, Mr. Moon in his work clothes.
But they let me take their picture. They know how cute they look.

So. Can we just briefly discuss the fact that a killer whale killed a trainer at Sea World? I feel terrible for the person who was killed and the family of that person and also all the people who had to witness such an event but dammit! What in the name of God do we humans think we are doing when we take a creature like a killer whale and try to make a trained toy out of it in a tank in an amusement park? I have been to Sea World once and maybe twice, back in the old, old days when the kids were little and it made me vastly unhappy to be there. I was struck with the feeling that we had captured aliens who were as sentient and as intelligent as us and removed them from their planet for our amusement. They can prattle on all they want about education but the bottom line is- whales and dolphins do not belong in tanks and although they are really good at learning tricks, we have no right using them for that purpose and when we do, tragedy often results. Sometimes the tragedy is the death of an animal and sometimes the tragedy is the death of a human animal but it just ain't right.
Not in my book.
We should be in their world which is the deep blue ocean, humbly asking the creatures there for their permission for us to observe them and learn from THEM. Maybe they could teach us a trick or two. Throw us a fish if we do it right. Clap their fins and laugh giant bubbles of laughter at our poor attempts to function in their world by their rules.
So that's what I think about THAT. I'm sure you wanted to know.

On to animals in this house. Pearl, my fourteen-year old boxer dog is losing her shit. Not in the sense that she is incontinent but in the sense that she's demented. All of the dogs demand to be let in and let out hundreds of times a day. I am not exaggerating, either. But suddenly, Pearl's entire day is spent standing on one side of the door and then the other, scratching to be let in or let out. She walks through the door which I have opened, wanders around on whichever side of it she's on, looks completely baffled, and then goes back to the door and scratches on it in order to be let back to the side of it she was just on. This goes on all day. Sometimes when I open the door, she just stands there, not even looking at me. I think she's forgotten where she is. I love this old dog but I have to be honest with you- if she dropped dead right this second it would save her a lot of inevitable pain and save me at least a tiny portion of sanity which I may still have. Since I started this paragraph, we have gone through the routine twice. TWICE! One paragraph!
Correction: Three times. And Buster has wanted in once. That's five times I've gotten up in the last three minutes.

I complain to Mr. Moon and he says, "What do you want me to do? Take her out and hit her over the head?" I contemplate the idea and then say, "You wouldn't do it if I asked you to."
And he agrees.
Dammit.

So speaking of Mr. Moon, the car biz has been tough the last few weeks. Real tough. He's been gently depressed. The other night though, he perked up and said, "Well. Really. I have the best life on earth. I have you as a beautiful wife and I'm not wanted by the F.B.I."
Seriously. That was a direct quote. I wrote it down.

Pearl wants in again. Zeke just came out.

Our last performance is tonight and get this- we have reservations for ONE HUNDRED dinners and a waiting list for more. This is an Opera House record. We had a great time last night and cranked our performances up another notch, but the audience...well...let's just say that for the average-aged woman in that crowd, menopause is but a distant memory. Kathleen swore they were laughing but the laughter barely made it up to our ears. Oh, I could hear Jessie giggling. Thank God. And we got some laughs but basically- yikes! We refused to blame ourselves and rightly so, I think. We gave it our all and we cracked ourselves up and we are looking forward to tonight. And dreading it because it IS our last night. Sigh. And sigh again. It's just so much FUN! Last night, after the performance, we were all downstairs eating leftover manicotti and squash and cake and drinking our post-performance beverages and there I was at a table with my daughter and my husband and my next-door neighbor and all the actors and Kathleen, and we were all silly and happy and Colin kept saying, "How did I get so lucky? HOW?!" We all felt that way. And we are going to be depressed as hell for the next few weeks. I can tell you that.

Pearl just came back out. Oh. Now she wants back in. Zeke went in too.

Well, it's a gray day. The finches and cardinals are fluttering and eating and chirping and oh my! There's a redheaded woodpecker at the feeder too! That's rare. And Mr. Moon is working on the garden fence and Jessie is studying her maternal nursing with Buster on her lap. She was fawned over and admired last night so sweetly. They love Jessie at the Opera House. She was told she looked like Uma Therman, only prettier. I know she hates that. She hates the egg sandwich I made her this morning too. And she really hates washing the bowls the dogs have licked clean. She told me.
I haven't given the chickens their scratch or told them how pretty they are today yet. I need to do that. We only got two eggs yesterday but in the two days before that we got fourteen so I suppose they needed a rest. My lovely hens. My handsome rooster.

And I suppose that's that. Pearl just came back out. Are you keeping count?

Oh- one more thing- Lily and Owen are going to be baptized in the Lutheran church Jason's mother and grandmother belong to tomorrow. (Pearl just went back in.) I am having a bit of a hard time with this because I consider baptism something that should be done by parents either in the bathtub or in the rain or the ocean or a river or a puddle in the yard. Whatever. Water represents life and so it is right and good that a baby should be exposed to it. I give Owen sips of water from my glass when he is here. I have bathed him AND taken him out into the rain. Bringing God or god into the whole situation baffles me. Why? It's not like Lily and Jason are going to be going to church. And Lily is doing this in order to keep peace in the family and I commend her for that and I'll be there because she's my daughter and Owen is my grandson and if they want me there, then I'm there. (Buster just came out. Then he went back in.)
It'll be fine. It's not like Lily has become a Republican. That I truly could not handle. A bit of sprinkled water isn't going to hurt anyone at all and besides- I'll get to see Owen and that is worth a trip to church on a Sunday morning. And then we'll all go out to lunch and as I recall from my childhood church-going days, the post church lunch is what it's all about anyway.

I better get to those chickens now.

Thanks for visiting.

Please recycle the paper bag when you're through with it.

And Pearl wants out again.