I’m one of those people - the ones who write a Christmas newsletter each year. However, with understanding that many people find this sort of behavior irritating, I do my best to spice the normal who-did-what up with humor. So, this is what went out this year…
It’s been a pretty quiet year. Cheryl was concentrating on school, taking three courses in the spring. Cayce was concentrating on the business, still trying to make a go of it. The kids were… um… honey, where are the kids?
I kid, of course. The kids had a good year, Eoin played another couple seasons of soccer, Aine tried it, but returned to gymnastics. Both are doing well in school. But, really… as we go back over the year there’s just not a lot that stands out in the “I can make that funny” sense. We’re just not quite in the holiday spirit. We sort of go through a cycle, I guess: two years on and one year off. We have a tree this year, but whether due to laziness or just being busy, we have utterly failed to roll out any outside decorations. The usual list Cheryl makes of what went on in the past year that prompts me on what to write has yet to materialize and, well it’s the 15th and there’s a deadline. So, I’ve given it a lot of thought (and by “a lot” what I mean is “very little”), and I’m just gonna tell you this story of my evening last night, and hope that you find it funny (cause it is).
The first sign of trouble greeted me as I walked through the door. As the story goes, to what do my wondering eyes should appear… In this case, what appeared was my wife, Cheryl. At the sink. With a plunger.
“We have a problem.”
The sink/disposal was clogged. A bucket-full of week-old spaghetti will do that. I’m pretty sure it was all a plot and that Cheryl actually boiled up extra spaghetti just for spite. She denies this, but I ask you: where’s that box of vermicelli, Cheryl? Where?
I poured half a bottle of Liquid Plumber into the water and we sat down to eat some tasty meatloaf and taters. And, hey - guess what? Liquid Plumber sucks eggs. Seriously. I have never, in all my 40 years, seen Liquid Plumber have any appreciable impact on a clogged drain. Ever. Ever. Friggin’ ever, I tell you.
So. Cheryl started pulling stuff out from under the sink and I got a bucket from the garage and prepared to drain everything and get at the problem.
Before we venture any further into the story, you should know that I have this thing. Everybody’s got their thing, right? Well, I’m no different. In high school and college I worked for a number of different restaurants, and I bounced around quite a bit among all the different jobs – busboy, barback, waiter, host, bartender, cook – basically every worker-bee restaurant job in existence. By far the least enjoyable job in a restaurant of any size is dishwasher. And the worst place to be a dishwasher? The Chili’s restaurant off of Old Keene Mill Rd. in Springfield, VA. In early 1987. Trust me on this, I tell no lies.
The dish area was configured so that you were blocked in on all sides - you actually had to go under one of the roller bars to get in there. The steam from the dishwasher rose through the half-eaten food on the dishes and enveloped you in a misty, soupy fog that permeated your clothes with wet stink and stayed in your pores through your next three showers. It was disgusting, and I was in there a couple times a week (though I was technically a busboy). I hated it, and to this day I get nauseous when I smell that wet food smell. I habitually rinse the food out of dishes left in the sink even though I’m not actually washing them or putting them in the dishwasher, and I badger Cheryl and the kids every time they don’t rinse theirs. So that’s my thing.
On with the story… of course, at this point you see where this is heading. There I am, sitting on the floor reaching under the sink, with the trap unscrewed, but contemplating the best way to dislodge it, knowing there was a gallon or so of warm, greasy, spaghetti-water up there in the sink, waiting patiently for it’s moment, it’s Big Hollywood Break, if you will. Do I just pull it away quickly, or try to angle one side down and away? Decisions, decisions.
In the words of a famous silly movie: I chose poorly. The best way to describe what happened next is that the sink drain burped on me. But not one of those little lady burps that squeak and everyone giggles. And not even one of those nasty, foul-smelling things I let go on Cheryl after eating radishes. This was the Merry Christmas burp: one-beer-too-many-and-there’s-no-more-room-at-the-inn. And guess what – I’m the barn.
I won’t disgust you with (any more of) the details. Suffice it to say that it was all I could do to keep Mr. Tasty Meatloaf and his date Miss Taters from trying to crash the party. Cheryl ran out of the room into the garage - I’m not sure if the smell got to her, I’d really like to think that was it, but I suspect that she actually went out there to laugh and snicker in private and compose herself before facing me. Meanwhile, the sink drained, I put everything back together and – still covered in sink burp – started to clean up the mess. Cheryl took the bucket outside to dump it and I started spraying everything down and mopping up.
The story doesn’t end there. The kids had been playing this whole time, I don’t know what they were playing, but I notice in retrospect that it had been a loud and raucous game, but we were too busy with the situation at hand to pay attention. Suddenly, Aine lets out a scream, and I hear a crash and look up to see Cheryl’s three-foot-tall and 2-foot-tall vases teetering towards me from the countertop. I manage to catch one, but not before it knocks the spice rack over and sends the marble mortar-and-pestle crashing into the dishes, while the other vase rolls off the counter in the other direction with a crunchy thump. Both kids are frozen in place, staring at me with eyes the size of saucers. Apparently, they had never actually seen steam come out of someone’s ears.
WHAT IN THE WIDE, WIDE WORLD OF SPORTS ARE YOU TWO DOING IN THERE?
That’s what I wish I’d said. What I really said was “WHAT IN THE HELL ARE YOU TWO DOING IN THERE?” This was in my loudest Daddy voice. Honestly, I do my best not to let loose with any blue language in front of the kids. At this point, however, my top was fully blown and I was mentally rehearsing Clark Griswold’s Christmas rant, just to make sure I had it straight should I need it. I continued to holler at them for a minute or so. When I finished, Eoin sort of choked up and ran to his room. Aine, often the tougher of the two in these situations, quietly headed over to the couch, but close to tears as well. So, you know: Mission Accomplished. I took a breath and finished spraying out the sink, called Eoin back in and told him to put all the spices back together, and went to take a much-needed shower, and a breather.
I’m skipping the part where I came back into the kitchen after my shower, reached into the fridge for something and knocked an almost-full glass jar of spaghetti sauce crashing to the floor, because that was just life laughing at me, and honestly if I told you about that you’d be convinced that I was making it all up.
When I came back to the kitchen I called Eoin in, gave him a hug and apologized for my outburst, and explained to him that maybe he should listen in the future when we tell them not to throw pillows in the living room. He agreed, and we both chuckled as the cat rolled around after some piece of fuzz or another. I called Aine in and gave her the same talk, but little miss tough-britches is no easy sell.
“Daddy, I think you were a little harsh on Eoin.” Always the protector, this one. Pity the girls that treat him badly in the future and have to answer to his wild little sister. I explained to her that everybody knows the house rules, and when you break the rules and bad things happen, well sometimes Daddy’s gonna yell.
“Yeah, but you didn’t have to use a bad word.” She’s tearing up again at this point. I explained that I was pretty miserable at the time it all happened, and that sometimes people tip over in situations like that and lose a little control over what they say.
She wiped her face and looked me right in the eye, and said, “Well, there’s just no reason for it.”
And, well there you have it. How do you respond to a double-barreled take-down like that? And from an eight-year-old? I don’t know. I told her she could go back to the living room and she walked away without another word. It set me back something fierce, and I’ve been thinking about it all day, which is why you’re hearing about it now. There’s really no more point to it all beyond it’s kind of a funny story, and for whatever weird reason thinking about it all day resulted in this warm feeling about how much I love my family. We all have bad days, but when your little girl calls you to the carpet and essentially tells you to shape up, you can’t help but smile and move on. And, if nothing else nice happens for the next month, the thought of that alone will keep me happy through the holidays, even though we’re not quite in the spirit of the season.
So, if you are in the holiday spirit, more power to you. If you’re not, take comfort in the schadenfreude of my misery of last night. Either way, just know for sure that …
We wish you and yours the very best this holiday season, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.
