Monday Mimisms ~ I Just Wanted A Can Of Coffee

So, I'm looking pretty sassy brown corduroys tucked in brown suede boots, a baby doll top and huge gold hoop earrings. My mission? A can of coffee. And a bag of Cheetos.

The Inauguration is Tuesday and I must be prepared for serious vegging on the couch.
The phone. It's my mother.
"It's snooooowwwinnng! Did you see it snoooowwwing??!"
I look out the window. There is no snow. Not even a flake. Of course, she lives 20 miles away so maybe it's headed this way. I brace myself for the big storm of the century (the last time I did that I got stuck in a tree) and prepare to go to the grocery store.



I stop at Taco Bell for a Gordita on the way and eat it in the parking lot, looking for flakes in the rear view mirror (Can my life get any more exciting?) Checking emails, dripping cheese. 'Cept the dumb thing won't work. I hate technology!

I SEE your emails. I can't read them or reply.
I try to call the HELP line. The CAPS sign is on. I can't call anyone. This is the 5,298th time it's happened with this stupid phone. Their advice? Take out the battery, wait 20 seconds and reset.

I think not.

WHO in AMERICA has TIME do THAT??? Like we carry around butter knives in our back pockets at all times. I search the glove compartment, the purse, the backseat for sharp objects. I find a nail file (of course) and reset the phone.

Grocery store: I see no flakes, mother, none. And the entire population of 2,000 people in this one-horse town is at the grocery store buying Cheetos. Why did I listen to her??!
I push the teeny-weeny cart 'cause I'm prissy like that and carry on.

I decide I'd better take my dad a pack of diet cokes so he doesn't have to get out in the big storm, frail as he is......he could break something just standing in the aisle. They're on sale.
Yippee.
I buy 2 cartons.

Pay attention. This is where I go astray.
I call my son. He is starting a new project tomorrow in sub-zero degrees and I thought he might want a few cans of hot soup or something to take with him. And grapes. I'm always buying him grapes and apples. He needs to eat better. Anyway, he said "Yes, I'd love some mangoes to take with me and a couple cans of Progresso chicken and rice soup for lunch."

K. I hang up. The stupid phone goes bonkers AGAIN.

MANGOES? He wants MANGOES?
He wants me to find mangoes in this southern conservative grocery store? (Don't ask me why I think mangoes are liberal....I just know they are.)
K. I look. I find them 'cause he's important and needs his mangoes.

The phone rings. I cannot answer it.
I hear it . I see it. It is my son. The light is on. It will not work. And the nail file is in the car.



I power it down. Turn it back on. By this time I have picked up a million other things for too grown for his mom to be buying him groceries son. But I can't help it. I decide that he needs chocolate fudge ice cream too.
Just because.

There are things falling OUT of the teeny-weeny cart and rolling down the aisle. First the fruit cocktail, then the stuffed ravioli, and of course, the mangoes. Like a newly formed sports team, they rolled lopsided towards the fish refrigeration. So I have to go back and find fresh ones for my precious one. He can't eat dirty mangoes. What does one DO with rolling and now soiled liberal fruit once it's been tainted in the filthy grocery store aisle?
You don't want to know.
Let's just say, the next person who buys fresh lobster will have a rude awakening.

The phone rings.
"My car broke down. Please come and get me," said the Mango child.

So there I am. The snow storm is approaching, the fudge is melting and my purse is hidden under twenty-five cans of chicken noodle soup that were so on sale I couldn't resist.
I need to get out of the store.
SuperMom to the Rescue. I pay. (You didn't think I'd leave without the mangoes, did ya?)
I run to the car. He NNEEEEDDDDSSS me.

The phone makes a noise. A text message. From cute guitar-playing guy who wants to know if he needs to come rescue me from a snowbank or something equally dangerous.
NOW? NOW??!

I get a chance to flaunt my cute in a make-believe disaster (which I am soooo good at) and be all Scarlett O'Hara in the same day and instead I'm on my way to deliver fudge and fruit? Why me?Scarlett would not be proud of me today. I looked at the text flirt. I looked at the pile of melting groceries. I caved.
Boots or no boots, Mango child needed a ride home and he was counting on me. There'll be another day to teeter on the edge of delicious disaster. I had to tell him we'd meet another day. No sooner had I sent the sorry news than the phone rang.
It is Mango Boy. "Never mind, Mom. My friend got here first and I'm on my way now.
But thanks!"

You do not want to know what my pencil brain said to my only child.

So I find the faulty demon-possessed red phone and prepare to bat my text lashes.

I type, " I can meet U. B there in an hour."
You guessed it. The phone will not work. The NUM sign is on. Then the CAP sign is on. When I try to type numbers, I get letters. When I type letters, I get numbers. The "radio signal" is gone. Huh?

I deliver the Diet Coke. My dad is thrilled that he doesn't have to go to the store. My mother is apologizing because there is no snow and she is "not God, ya know." I deliver the boy groceries. He is happy about the mangoes. I am happy he is safe. He is so cute and I adore him.

"Thanks, Mom. You're the best. I love you."

On the way home I noticed the most beautiful sunset I've seen in a while just over the horizon. It was misty with an ethereal blue hue and perfect - sinking behind a small mountain range.I had to capture it. It made me feel - at a glance - all the love and trip-over-myself-to-find-it-joy I sometimes know in this haphazard pencil skirt life of mine.....days full of missed opportunities, surprisingly sweet hugs from frail parents and insane serendipity; the kind of days I like to think of as ordained by something or Someone bigger than myself, when I don't have a clue what the outcome will be and I'm standing in a puddle of melted fudge and hand-picked mangoes. So I chase the big ball of red sun through winding country roads and finally find a place to pull over.
I step outside. Frame the shot.

And the batteries die.
It took two seconds for me to break out in hysterical laughter standing right there in a half-muddy field of fast approaching darkness and a disappearing glory of nature. Fitting for a day like today. I trudged back to the car, buckled my seat belt and smiled. Time for a hot bubble bath, a snuggly warm couch and a cup of piping hot....piping hot.....

One of you could have told me.







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