Blog #96

On Sunday night, the night before my birthday, Carol and my daughter Abby made me my favorite dinner – Thanksgiving.  A big turkey with dressing and broccoli-rice casserole.  And lots of brown gravy!  Carol was in charge of getting the gravy at the store.  She bought a pound.  Get more gravy, I said.  She wouldn’t.  The gravy is the most important thing.  I want lots of gravy.  She refused.  This is not the first time she has pulled this Gravy Torture thing.  She does it every Thanksgiving and we never have enough.  What is her problem?  I think she has some internal fear that if there is fifteen cents worth of gravy left over, God will punish her by making her hair frizz.  You know, God didn’t have to turn Lot’s wife into a pillar of salt.  All He had to do was break one of her fingernails.  Now that’s punishment.

Now that I’m finished giving advice to God, I’ll get back to the story.  I WANT MORE GRAVY!  She refused.  Why didn’t you exert your authority, I hear you cry?  Authority?  Over my wife?  You must be new here.  That was Saturday.  Sunday morning, I slunk out of the house like the craven wuss that I am, bought another pound of gravy and delivered it to Abby.  The dinner was delicious!  We had lots of gravy left over. I really hate it when she’s right!  She’s always right.

For dessert we had Poppy Cake.  My mother used to make ice-box cake, alternating layers of whipped cream and chocolate wafer cookies chilled in the fridge.  It was always my favorite dessert, and one time in North Carolina, when I only had three young grandchildren, I said let’s make an ice-box cake.  They said, “Poppy, what’s an ice-box?”  Those little brats have no respect for tradition.  So we made it and they loved it so much that they named it after me – Poppy Cake.  Yummy.

Then Monday was my birthday – 73.  At McDonald’s, I gave my order to a young girl whom I had never seen.  As she was punching in the order, another employee started his shift and she gave him a hug.  “What,” I said, “don’t I get a hug?”  She said of course you do and came right around the counter and gave me a big hug.  Made my day.

From there, I went to see Dr. Heart.  I had a little this and a little that and I thought I should let him look.  The first person I saw was the tech in charge of my pacemaker.  He draped a mouse over my chest and told me everything there was to know about my heart while he stood six feet away at his computer.  “Now,” he said, “I’m going to slow down your heart a little and see what happens.”  What? You can slow down my heart from over there?  He said yes.  Can you slow down my wife?  There was actually one other thing I wanted him to try while he was controlling my body, but – well, it’s a family blog.  Isn’t it?  Aren’t you my family?  Who else would put up with my stories every week?  Then he told me my battery was good for another 6½ years.  I’m not sure I am, but the damn bunny is!  Wow, 6½ years!  That’s 338 more blogs.  Can you make it?

Next, I walked across the hall to Dr. Heart.  I was expecting to get a stress test.  But they’re no fun anymore.  The last time I got one, they inserted me into an Acme Handy-Dandy Heart Stuff Detector with a picture of Wile E. Coyote on the side.  For twelve minutes the Detector circled my body looking for my heart.  I’m pretty sure after this is over, I’ll get my peanut-butter cookie.

Then they injected me with some kind of Hypo-Nuclear Radioactive Strontium Serum.  I asked the nurse to be gentle with the needle, and as I lay down she said, “Now keep breathing.”  Good advice – I was thinking about giving it up for the rest of the day until you mentioned it.  It’s such a bother.  By the way, where is my peanut-butter cookie?

Wait 35 minutes.  Back into the WayBack Machine with Mr. Peabody and Sherman.  Twelve more minutes.  Then to the waiting room to get dressed. Ok, Nurse Whoosits, where’s my peanut-butter cookie?  Oh, we don’t do that anymore.  Well, it did seem a bit strange that the only fat grams I was allowed were at the Cardiologist’s office, but the only reason I come here is for the cookie.  Tough aortas, see ya!  I told you they were no fun anymore.

That was last time.  This time, Dr. Heart said I was perfect and didn’t need any tests.  Go home.  I went home.  No cookie. 

Hi there, and welcome back.  I hope your heart is happy and strong.  Does anybody remember Tom Lehrer?  He wrote wonderfully funny and topical songs back in the 1950s, 60s and 70s.  One of his songs was National Brotherhood Week.  If he will allow me to update one verse, it goes like this:

Oh the Protestants hate the Catholics and the Catholics hate the Protestants

And the Hindus hate the Moslems and everybody hates the Jews

But during National Brotherhood Week, National Brotherhood Week

Donald Trump and Maxine Waters are dancing cheek to cheek.

You get the picture.  It’s hilarious, but also instructive.  It’s a new year, and perhaps those who traditionally hate one another could this year find common ground.  Friday is the Islamic Holy Day and the beginning of the Jewish Sabbath.  Maybe these two groups, often enemies, can start on Friday to dissolve their hate.

Today I will call you my brother

And pray for your father and mother

Then I’ll pray to Allah

While you eat your challah;

Tomorrow we’ll kill one another.

My poetic hero has always been Tom Lehrer.  Tom is 90 and will never read this, but to see anything I’ve written printed on the same page as anything he’s written is profoundly humbling for me.  And while I’m in a rare state of humility, I will humbly say goodbye for now.  Stay well and count your blessings.  See you next week and 337 more weeks after that.

Michael                                    Send comments to:  mfox1746@gmail.com