Today, Mom and I both ate a centimeter-wide cube of some pot brownies and then - Dad in tow - watched Toy Story 3 in a theatre full of kids at 4:20pm. I fucking love Pixar. Seriously. Those folks are an American treasure and flat out masters of their craft. So it is with absolute honesty that I can tell you: nothing says, "I'm a grown man" like crying at a kids' movie in front of your folks. Enough that your Mom has to hand you tissues as the credits roll. Honestly, if you've seen that movie and sat through the ending without crying... you're not human; you're an alien from Dagoba.
When we left the theatre and drove home, it was the magic hour — there was golden sunlight bathing everything we drove past in the most perfect way imaginable. Almost as moving as the film we'd just seen, we drove past a delightful series of classic, East-coast Summer evening vignettes: folks out mowing the front lawn, moms out with baby strollers for a walk, joggers out exercising by the park, horses on the nearby farm all out by the main intersection so you could see them playing with each other, jostling, kicking up dust into the sunlight as they bucked and jumped around one another. The dust rained down on them in the evening light like gold particles.
It's was kind of night when you roll down the windows, breathe deeply of the fresh cut grass and you can almost hear the sound of the ice-cream truck around every corner.
And when we got home a surprise: Mom had saved some of her kreplachs from Rosh Hashannah and whipped up an awesome batch of soup for dinner with fresh veggies for the dumplings. Mom's soup is one of the things I'm going to miss when she's gone and I told her that. I wasn't trying to be morbid and she didn't take it that way. I just wanted to let her know that I love her soup that much. And that I hope I find a wife and have kids while she's still alive so that they, too, can taste her soup. And I told her that as well. And I told her because I wanted her to know. And she liked that. And she played with my hair affectionately to let me know. And it was a wonderful moment for a woman who's not normally affectionate... and for her son who usually is. I give my Mom credit for stepping outside of the box today. It's hard for anyone to do that, but I think it's harder when there's so much disease in your body and in your home...
So yes: today it all went to pot. But in the very best way possible. Tomorrow my sister arrives for a visit from NYC so we'll all have some time together. Next weekend: we're off to the Jersey Shore and my brother's family will join us. And we'll have a ridiculous, wild and hysterical circus for a few days and nights.
No comments:
Post a Comment