Blog #421 April 3, 2025
The
other day, my granddaughter, Charley (17), gave me and Carol each a Hershey’s
kiss. What a sweetheart! I ate mine instantly, all 22 calories. My wife, on the other hand, peeled hers, bit
off the tip and threw the rest away. Who
does that? She barely got one calorie
out of it. It’s like licking a sirloin
steak and then giving it to the dog.
It’s like buying one chocolate-covered raisin. She did that too, you know, a few years ago
at a fancy chocolate store. Not only did
she ask the clerk for one raisin, she pointed out which one she wanted, the fat
one in the back on the left. The clerk
complied, weighed the lonely little thing and charged us eleven cents. Who does that?
My
wife does, that’s who. She keeps herself
in great shape by exercising and by eating only one chocolate-covered raisin
every decade. And she keeps her mind in
shape by playing games. She plays
scrabble, bridge and Wordle on line and does Sudoku and crosswords in the
paper. She was doing a crossword the
other day and the clue was “Court and Short” – five letters. She couldn’t get it and asked me. I said, “Rhyme.” She asked, “Rhyme? Why rhyme?”
I said because court and short rhyme.
She said no they don’t. You see,
St. Louis has this funny accent where the number 40 is pronounced farty,
the opposite of tall is shart and nobody puts Baby in the carner. I was raised by a Chicago-an mother, so I
don’t have that accent and was able to answer the clue correctly. It is an ongoing battle between us.
I really am sad to report
That my Honey cannot pronounce “short”.
She says “shart” instead
Drives me out of my head,
But I love her with all of my hort.
The
interesting thing is that my daughters pronounce those words my way. I guess I was the predominant influence in
their lives – the strong, decisive father figure. (I hope my wife’s not reading this.) Truth be told, Carol and I have had our share
of disagreements in fifty-seven years of marriage, and I have had about as many
victories as the Washington Generals.
You see, I have the undergraduate degree in Mathematics, the graduate
degree in Law and the Phi Beta Kappa key – but she has the brains. (Too young to remember the Washington
Generals? Look it up)
Hi
there and welcome back. I hope you are
feeling well and happy. What makes you
happy? Well, another granddaughter,
Alyssa (19), just texted us a questionnaire to fill out. It was for her college Sociology class and was
about happiness. She needed input from all
age groups, and she chose us because she thinks we’re old enough to be the
original cast of The Bible. My wife and
I are both 79 years old, and we look like a 158-year-old couple. She looks 45 and I look 113. Hey, mirrors don’t lie. I just wish mine would stop laughing. But besides the mirror, there are other
nagging little reminders that I have passed my prime. The main one is that I can’t even remember my
prime. When we were in North Carolina
recently, I took my wife to the store to shop. Shopping for clothes is an
activity I rate one step below watching C-SPAN and one step above having a
tooth pulled without Novocain. Luckily,
I had a volume of short stories by Rudyard Kipling (does that even surprise you
by now?) and I went to find a seat.
There were no seats for patient husbands, but near the door were two
soft, comfy-looking wheelchairs. I
picked one, relaxed and opened my Rudyard.
Not a minute later, a woman carefully led her shuffling and drowsy
mother to the other chair and left her.
And there we were -- the ancient
and nearly-comatose woman and me sitting in our wheelchairs. You don’t have to say it – I know.
Anyway,
back to the Sociology questionnaire. It
was about happiness. One of the
questions was to list the following topics in order of how important they are
to your happiness: Money, Friends,
Children, Spouse, Job. My #1 pick, of
course, was my spouse. Carol’s pick was
her Friends. Then her children. I came in third. I thought, “Well, third isn’t bad,” but then
I recalculated. Here’s how Carol’s list
looks:
·
Her
75 closest friends
·
Three
children
·
Eight
grandchildren
·
Her
hairdresser
·
Princess
Kate
And
then there’s me, in 89th place.
In retrospect, I’m surprised I came in that high. You see, my greatest pleasure is to
mollycoddle my wife. Mollycoddle,
our Weekly Word, means to treat a person with excessive
indulgence or attention, and I constantly try to make her happy, while her
greatest pleasure is spending time with her friends gossiping and looking for
round tables. You know who you are.
Message
from Shakespeare: How bitter a
thing it is to look into happiness through another man’s eyes (As You Like It). What about me,
Pops? Am I not on your list of things
that make you happy? I follow you around
more than she does and I spend more time on your lap than she does. And I don’t shop. Purr.
I
was just looking at Shakespeare and thinking about when we adopted him five
years ago, which was right about when Covid started. Can you believe what we all went through back
then? I mean, who could have imagined a
year:
·
When
entering a bank without a mask was forbidden
·
When,
at a family gathering where everyone was smoking pot, the only thing that was
illegal was the gathering
·
When
the only math the children learned all year was how to measure six feet
·
When
finding a needle in a haystack was easier than finding a roll of toilet paper
in a grocery store
That
was five years ago, and yes, Shakespeare, you make me very happy. Such a good boy. And you make me happy too, coming back each
week to read my silliness. But I think
we’ve reached the upper range of your attention span by now, so I’ll let you
go. Stay well, count your blessings and
please come back next week. I want you
to, and that’s from the “hort”. See you
then.
#89 Send comments to
mfox1746@gmail.com
