Sister #2 called me Friday night asking if I would baby-sit the kidlings while she and her husband, Stink, went out for coffee with some friends. Being a single, independent, hip woman of the world, I was ready to shout ‘No,’ with much indignation.
How dare she call on a Friday and assume I had no plans for the following evening. But then I remembered that I didn?t have plans, that I never have plans. I’m like Lester Bangs in “Almost Famous,” ‘Of course I’m home. I’m always home. I’m uncool.’
So, it was either baby-sit or watch the Elvis movie on TV. After much debate I decided to trundle over to the parents? place to baby-sit, for two reasons:
1.) Cable TV
2.) Free pop
When I arrived late Saturday afternoon I was quite surprised to find my mom, dad, Sister #4, Sister #2, Stink, Jaycie, and Max all sitting there. It seems Mamala and Dad decided to close the bowling alley for the night. Sister #4 was back from the PGA hooha and well, Sister #2 and Stink, were just about to leave.
Not the original game plan, but I could deal. There was still free pop AND a bonus, free pizza. Plus there was that Cable TV. I don?t have Cable TV where I live. It’s my choice. I could get Cable, but I really don’t need more reasons to sit in front of the TV all the livelong day.
So you can see my excitement at the potential of having more than 3 channels to view. But that all came to a crashing halt when a near riot broke out upon my zealous chanting of “Book TV Book TV Book TV” made Jaycie and Max scream even louder “NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO WILD THORNBERRYS.” Since my parents obviously like them better, we had to watch the Wild Thornberrys.
Since Jaycie wasn’t all that interested in the Wild Thornberrys and I was sick of building castles with blocks, we decided to read the crayons. Really, this is much more fun than it sounds. But before we could get down to the business at hand, I had to pay homage to Burnt Sienna. It’s by far the most beautiful crayon in the entire world.
Sister #4 watched in amazement as I gently pulled Burnt Sienna from the Big Box of 96 crayons on the first try.
“You know which one Burnt Sienna is right away.”
“Yes, of course. How can you not spot that luscious reddy brown immediately?”
“You?ve got to be kidding me. Gimme that box. Let?s see if you can do it again.”
She fiddled about with the crayons for a bit and then handed me the box. I spotted Burnt Sienna right away. We did it three more times, each time she was astounded.
“Ok, can you spot Burnt Sienna when it’s colored on a paper?”
“Sure I can.”
She pulled out Brown, Mahogany, Burnt Sienna, Raw Sienna, and Sepia. She quickly made five quick scribbles on a piece of paper.
“Ok which one is Burnt Sienna?” she said shoving the paper at me.
“That one.”
“You are insane.”
“Grandpa,” Jaycie interrupted, “Keke and Grody won’t play with me.”
Yeah, my four-year-old niece just told on me, and even worse we got in trouble. So I went back to reading crayons with Jaycie. First we pulled out all the pinks and red colors Razzmatazz, Carnation Pink, Mauvelous, Red Violet, Radical Red, Magenta (my favorite of the red family) and so on.
Eventually she grew tired of holding all the crayons and dumped them in my lap. That’s when the real fun began. I dumped the entire box of 94 (two crayons were missing) onto the couch between Sister #4 and I. Then I commanded her to give me the crayons in color order, so I could arrange the box to my liking.
“You are so crazy,” she said after I chastised her for not giving me the rich oranges before the paler oranges.
“I am not crazy, I’m just creative,”I said.
“Yes, you are,” My mom said, “You’ve always been creative. All over the walls, the books, everywhere.”
“I can’t help it I have to express myself,” I said.
“Yeah,” my mom said, “but you would have gotten into a lot less trouble if you didn’t sign every creation Jodi. You could have blamed it on your sister, but each one had Jodi written on it.”
Things haven”t changed either; I love signing my name to my work.