(One of the views Phyllis and I enjoyed on a recent day trip)
A FEW DAYS AGO ... Oh, you know how time flies, so it may have been just a smidgen farther back ... but it seems like just a few days ago that Phyllis and I rolled out of bed before sunrise, dashed out the back door and hopped into The Little Red Car.
We were heading off for a day of adventure. Little Red seemed to sense that, too, for we zipped right along, and were at the Senior Center in practically no time at all. Still, the motorcoach was waiting when we arrived.
Up until that time, I think, Little Red had assumed we’d be a threesome on this outing. But when Little Red saw that motorcoach, well ...
I screeched into a favorite parking place, Phyllis and I got out and headed toward the building. Then I looked back and saw that Little Red’s brake lights were on. I knew I had turned off the lights, so I went back, got in, and tried a few things ... none of which worked.
We didn’t want to miss our trip just because Little Red had gone stubborn on us. So we boarded the motorcoach and headed off.
All day, though, as we visited a beautiful park where sparkling waters cascaded over the rocks and went dancing on downstream ... as we had a wonderful lunch at nicely-appointed tables on a covered bridge ... as we strolled through a country store (ah, the memories that brought back) ... as we visited the orchid farm ... as we enjoyed the sugar camp so far out in the country I had thought we were lost ...
All day, I was thinking about Little Red.
And when we returned that night ... late ... about 15 hours after we had left ... sure enough, Little Red’s battery was dead.
So what did we do? What else? Phyllis and I walked the remaining five miles home.
No, no ... I’m kidding. We didn’t do any walking ... and help came to us.
First, Kathy, our tour director, seeing Little Red’s hood up as the parking lot emptied, came over to offer assistance.
At that point Phyllis was calling a reliable source of help (I can provide the name, on request), so Kathy, reassured, pulled away.
But then she came right back ... and provided us with cold drinking water. Mmm, good!
Phyllis and I waited, oh, thirty minutes or so, until our rescuer arrived, got Little Red started again ... AND (this is the best part) fixed the problem with the brake lights.
But the story doesn’t end there.
If Phyllis and I were singers (and I’M definitely not), we probably would’ve been singing all the way home. Instead, we kept marveling at what a happy ending we’d been treated to ... I, in particular, had been thinking all day about other kinds of outcomes.
Finally, we pulled into that long driveway at Brimm Manor, and there, staring back at us ... wide-eyed and open-mouthed ... was a possum ... as though he were saying to us, “Hey, I heard you guys were having car trouble ... and I didn’t expect you home until morning, at the very least.”
Well, Mr. Possum, we found some good help, and here we are, so skedaddle.
He skedaddled.
-S&G-
LOREE (Kansas) is still settling in after that move into town ... says in a recent e-mail, “I’m STILL looking for all the stuff I so carefully packed so I could find it when I got here. And just as sure as I take pains to put something where I CAN find it, then that is the thing that is HARDEST to find when I need it.”
Loree concludes: “Must be human nature ... just think ... squirrels would starve to death if they were like us and forgot where they buried their winter supply of NUTS!”
-S&G-
As Grandma always said: No matter what you’re looking for, it’s always the last place you look.
-S&G-
TODAY’S QUOTE: “Can you believe? Seems only yesterday we were in the middle of June ... now we’re at the end of July ... next thing we know, it’ll be August.” - Professor Squigglee
-S&G-
In response to my story about the mouse chewing a hole in the pocket of my robe (don’t worry ... I wasn’t wearing it at the time) and stealing a piece of candy, LOREE offers this suggestion: “To keep mice from chewing holes in the pocket of your robe, or elsewhere as well, store the robe in your deep-freeze! I guarantee you that both the robe AND the chocolate will be safe in there!”
(To borrow a phrase from the younger generation: What a COOL suggestion, Loree)
-S&G-
HELEN (Florida) sent this along: Grandma was in the bathroom, putting on makeup, under the watchful eyes of her young granddaughter, as she’d done many times before. After she applied her lipstick and started to leave, the little one said, “But, Gramma, you forgot to kiss the toilet paper good-bye!”
-S&G-
WALT (Ohio) shared this: Why, WHY? Why do we press harder on a remote control when we know the batteries are almost dead?
And this ... Why does someone believe you when you say there are four billion stars, but have to check when you say the paint is still wet?
-S&G-
RUTH (Ohio) sent this along (a long time ago, as a matter of fact): “I joined a health club last year, spent about 400 bucks. Haven’t lost a pound. Apparently you have to go there.”
-S&G-
TODAY’S POEM - Sorry, I don't have a picture of a sweat bee to go along with the poem.
Those rascals are too tiny, too unpredictable, too fast for me and my camera.
The poem itself is almost a haiku moment, a tiny flicker of activity broken off even before I became fully focused on what was happening.
But it became a little more than that ... and it carries so many memories of all those places this kind of "stare down" has happened to me over the years.
Originally published in Capper's:
FROZEN FLIGHT
A sweat bee
hovers in my face,
wings invisible
in the heavy air,
then, satisfied
at having won
this stare down,
darts away.
(I know, regular readers will remember having seen this one fairly recently ... but ... go figure ... our auto predicament somehow brought it to mind ... the "frozen" part, I suppose ... so here it is again)
-S&G-
COMMENT? Feel free ... below, if you like.
Or if you prefer e-mail, that's fine, too ... especially for more detailed observations, to
rbrimm@peoplepc.com
... and it helps if you put "Squiggles" or "S&G" ... something like that ... in the subject line (just remember, no religion or politics ... please!)
-S&G-
If you’d like to see what’s up with my other, DAILY blog (no, this is not my “Home Page”), here’s a link to it:
http://rbrimm.blogspot.com/
Thanks for paying a visit.
-S&G-
UNTIL NEXT TIME ... take care ... see ya!
-S&G-
© 2010
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