Mark your calendars. This was a day of first for Val's family.
Genius started his senior year of high school today. I am triple-knotting the apron strings. I'm not ready for him to make his escape.
The Pony started his freshman year of high school. It's a cold, cruel world out there, little Pony. I'd keep you in the paddock a while longer if I could, but you have been chomping at the bit and kicking up your heels all summer.
I started my 25th year of teaching. That's right 25 years. I need to file my teeth down to nubs. A couple of years ago, students were guessing my age as thirty-five. Yes. I was a child faculty member. A prodigy. Attending Harvard at six years old. Hey! I can't help it if kids these days are not very observant. And since I never comment on my true age, I could not correct their honest mistake. Far be it from me to dash their tender self-esteem on the jagged rocks of truth.
This morning I stopped Hick as he walked past my morning-nap recliner on the way to feed his fleabags before embarking on his daily journey to the salt mines.
"It's a day of firsts," I told him.
"Yeah. It is. Genius starts his senior year. It's like the first day of the rest of his life."
Okay. I did not call Hick out on his deep philosophical observation. He would never understand that each day is the first day of ANYBODY's rest of his life.
"The Pony starts high school. And you haven't even showed him how to use his shaver."
"Aw. He'll like going to the first day of high school with chin whiskers."
"Today is my 25th first day of teaching."
"Your 25th birthday of teaching? How's that?"
Sigh. Hick just cannot navigate that tricky context sea.
I'll take Hick with me the next time I go fishing in a little boat on a sea of context.
ReplyDeleteHey there, Mama Val, I feel your melancholoy. I'm thinking maybe our guys were separated at birth.
ReplyDeleteBoil some eggs and just quit trying to communicate. Hell, even I didn't think what you said was right, Val(meaning I usually take your side). But it was apparently very early in the morning when you were trying to hold a conversation with your beloved.
ReplyDeleteJust to make myself clear - just tell him you have been working for 25 frakking years!!!
ReplyDeleteMost men have trouble navigating anything if it doesn't involve breasts (women's), gas (theirs) or their little world of delusion, where they think that Reese Witherspoon WOULD marry them...she just doesn't have their address, so she can't find them.
ReplyDeletePoor Hick. Another clueless male married to a woman with a calendar.
ReplyDeleteStephen,
ReplyDeleteI appreciate that. Maybe you can get a good deal on a boat from a guy named Frank.
*****************
Linda,
Well, mine hasn't yet thought a dog story was about him. But he DID think James Carville was guest-speaking over by the chicken pen.
*****************
knancy,
If you didn't think what I said was right...you must be like those kids, thinking, "Mrs. Val is WAY to young to be having her 25th first day of teaching." Yes. I'm sure that's it.
I'd tell him that, but he might confuse "working 25 years" with "chugging 25 beers." Which is kind of a lot for that time of morning.
**************
Sioux,
Sadly, my Hick lives in a pop culture vacuum. He'll have to put the Reese/Hick nuptials on hold.
**************
Leenie,
And I can't even draw him a map, because we all know that men won't read maps.