Just Not Into Today

As a matter of fact, I am so not into today that I am even playing around on my blog.  Since I haven't been here since April, and it's now October that should be a fair indicator of where my mind is currently at.  Not even sure what I want to blog about.  Nothing intelligent anyway.  I'm just kind of in a blah mood.

Yesterday was a pretty good day.  I went to Frankenmuth with the fam and we had a Zehnder's family style chicken dinner.  I've got a whole box of butter noodles in the fridge at home just waiting for me to fry them up.  (don't judge-yes I used the term fry in conjunction with butter noodles.  It's my heart)  We spent some time walking around Birch Run.  Spent some money I didn't have to spend on stuff I didn't need.  I did it for the economy.  It's the American way.  Soooo.

Today is the opposite of yesterday.  I couldn't care less if I tried.  I was ready for today to be over at 10 this morning,  And I'm happy to report at 10 tonight I plan on it being lights out.  4 more hours of blech to get through.  Let's hope tomorrow is a more promising day.

Sentimental Journey

I woke up this morning with a song stuck in my head.  I don't know why.  I don't normally wake up to my own personal soundtrack but there it was stuck in my head this morning.  Sailing by Christopher Cross.  And it wasn't going away.  I tried humming.  I tried singing another song.  I tried listening to something else.  Nothing worked.  So when I got to work I YouTubed it and sat down to give it a good listen.  And than I listened to it again just because I could.  And thus started what became my sentimental journey.

My mother was a musician.  I grew up listening to her play the guitar, the piano, the banjo and ultimately the organ.  It was with the organ that she finally felt comfortable in her musical skin. She had found an instrument that she loved and could do all the things that each individual instrument could not.  It was on the organ that she could play every instrument that she wanted to and put everything together into her own private symphony.  I grew up with a big Hammond Concord Organ in the front room and a front row seat to my own personal concert.  Every.  Single.  Day.  My mother became so proficient at the organ that she taught lessons at Grinnell's in Pontiac Mall and was the church organist for our church.  And man my mom could rock that organ.  She played all the cool songs of the 70's.  She played the Bee Gee's, Barry Manilow, John Denver, Crosby Stills & Nash.  With her slider she could even do the muskrat in Muskrat Love.  My sister and I used to dance to Copacabana and The Girl From Ipanema.  Actually we were considered really not cool for being able to dance to Copacabana and The Girl From Ipanema so that is kind of a mixed memory.  One of our favorites she played was The Streak by Ray Stevens.  And with that slider she nailed that streak every time.  My dad used to lean on the door jamb and listen to her play.  And as soon as she noticed him there she would roll out some Kenny Rogers, Loretta Lynn and throw down on some Stand by Your Man by Tammy Wynette.  My daddy was a country boy and she would play just to him.  Although he would whistle the opening to Can't Smile Without You and she would roll that out too. My mom could play anything either by note or by ear.  If she didn't have the music she would spend hours walking through it.  Sometimes if she forgot where she was at she would call one of us kids over to sing a part for her.  And we would sing.  Over and over and over.  The same line.  Until she got it right.  And than we would move on to the next line.  Sometimes she would have a tape of the song and would about wear out the player rewinding and playing, rewinding and playing until she nailed that part.  When she got stuck on a song we would hear the same tune over and over again for days on end.  She was tireless about about getting that song down.  But when she finally, finally got it perfect it was added to the repertoire and we got to hear it in all its glory as part of her daily practice.  And sometimes if my mom was in a really good mood she would take requests and play just for us.  And my favorite song for her to play??  Sailing by Christopher Cross.  It was one of the songs she had learned to play by ear.  And she had worked for days to learn that song because it was one of my favorites on the radio.  So when she was in a really good mood and asked what she should play I always pleaded with her to play Sailing.  And I would always have her play it twice.  Just because she would.

I'm the Mom Who Cried Wolf.

I've got a really good excuse though.  You see??  I'm at work??  Yeah-and my daughter calls but I don't answer because I have people in the store and I can call her back.  So my daughter sends me a text.  But I don't look at it because I have people in the store and I can text her back.  So the people leave.  And I read the text which indicates she can't find her brother.  The brother I left in front of the tv when I left for work.  And so I call her back.  And she doesn't answer.  And so I text her back.  And get no text in response.  I call the house phone.  No answer.  I call the neighbor to check on them.  And she says she will as soon as she drives the 30 miles back to her house from her current location.  So I call and text and call and text and call and text a few million more times.  All with no response. 

Those of you who know me on a personal level (like you help me keep the bones polished on the skeletons in the closet) know I don't go to the emergency room for a hangnail.  So you know the bowel loosening panic I was in when I finally broke down and called...thepolicetogocheckonmykidsbecauseIwasscaredoutofmymind.  In my head I knew everything was probably fine.  In my gut I knew I was probably overreacting a wee bit to the fact that both my children seemed to have disappeared off the face of the earth.  {Now would be a good time to remind everyone that one of said children is a female teenager who is capable of texting in her sleep and whose phone may have actually fused to her hand and her children will most probably be born with communication devices already imbedded in them} But...in some elemental soul ripping portion of my being I was already feeling the mind numbing panic and grief of a parent of missing children.  I was putting up flyers and doing press conferences pleading for their return. So I called the Grand Blanc Township Police Department and asked for them to send an officer by to check on my children.  I apologized.  I said it was probably nothing.  I mentioned I was concerned.  My husband called me while I was on the phone with the dispatcher and I fairly calmly shouted at him that I was on the phone with the police trying to ensure our missing children were ok and "I WOULD CALL HIM BACK IN JUST ONE DAMN MINUTE".  But it actually is pretty much a bit of a blur.  I heard the dispatcher sending a car to our address to check on "an 18 year old female subject and 8 year old male subject".  After getting off the phone I waited to find out what was going on with my kids.  I called my husband who shared with me the same bowel loosening panic so I didn't feel so alone.  The dispatcher called back when I had a store full of customers to ask for a physical description of my son.  OH MY GOD....I instantly pictured him floating in a pond, flattened in the road, stuck in a garbage can, abandoned in the woods.  And I tried not to panic because I had a store full of customers.  I didn't even ask if they had found him.  I froze.  I couldn't ask.  I focused on his hair.  On his recently cut hair and his inch long curly tail that I make him keep because he has such beautiful curly blond hair.  And I hung up.  Without knowing if they had found my son. Because if he was fine they would have told me.  But they asked for his physical description which meant he wasn't fine and beyond that I didn't want to know.  They asked for a physical description of my son.  If he was in my house and if his sister were available they would not need a physical description of my son.  And I couldn't bear to hear why they would ask for one.

There is a part of me that knew all along that my kids were probably just fine.  I knew that this was simply some stupid little thing and that my kids were perfectly ok.  On an intellectual level I knew as soon as I made the phone call that it was going to be something supremely stupid and we would laugh about it someday down the road.  But there was a part of me that also knew that if...if I didn't make that phone call and have them checked that this would be the one time that there was really something very, very wrong and I would live to regret it for the rest of my empty and worthless life. 

So in the Perfect Storm of mis-communication it turns out that my son was in the basement hiding.  My daughter assumed when she didn't hear back from me immediately that I had her brother with me.  She had left her phone upstairs when she went to get her breakfast so didn't hear my calls or see my texts.  She had just discovered her brother in the basement when she came upstairs to discover a police officer at the door thus inducing her own bowl loosening moment when she (unaware that she and her brother were missing) assumed that a cop at the door meant someone was dead  and knew it had to be me or her dad (so ok-maybe we are a family that overreacts a touch).  She called me to let me know that they were ok at which point I completely lost it.  And we quickly determined no one was in trouble for anything since no one had actually done anything wrong.

I've been a mom for 18 years.  And in 18 years there have been some pretty scary moments.  I can't tell you why this particular moment on this particular day struck in this particular way.  I do know that I am ever grateful to Grand Blanc Township Police for ensuring that my children were safe.  I'm sure they deal with things like this on a daily basis.  This is a first for me.  Hopefully also a last.  I can't even begin to imagine the possibility of something really happening to one or both of my children.  I have learned through this I will not handle it well.  I will panic.  I will fall apart.  I will act and react stupidly and inappropriately.  And this may be something we laugh about someday down the road but from where I sit it is going to be a long long way down that road.  My heart breaks for the people who make the phone call I made today and never get the "it's ok" call back.  Lucky for me all is currently well in Book Ladi land.

Spring Cleaning.

Ah.  Signs of spring.  Not robins.  Not flowers.  Not green grass and blue skies.  It's books.  Wonderful, glorious, abundant and bountiful overflowings of books.  I love owning a used bookstore.  I especially love owning a messy used bookstore.  I'm not being overly sarcastic or facetious when I say that either.  Although I would dearly love to see a robin I am seeing signs of spring every day.  People I haven't seen since the fall are coming in to see me again.  Book collections that went away for the winter are coming back in.  The Plum Series.  Carly Phillips, Sandra Brown, Jennifer Crusie.  Not to mention newer titles that were purchased when my snowbirds ran out of books.  On the surface this does make us look messy and unorganized.  Underneath it all is a whole new inventory outlook.  Messy means I am getting in treasures.  People are doing their spring cleaning.  I'm getting in boxes of old and unique books. It is almost a whole new store every week.  So when I wake up in the morning to 2 more inches of that white stuff that keeps plaguing us or a bright sunny morning that segues into a wintery mix in the afternoon.  When there is nary a robin or flower or hint of green in sight.  I come to work and surround myself with signs of spring.