You Look Like A Monkey And You Smell Like One Too

Welcome to the blog. Can I get you a piece of cake? This year, a minor miracle occurred. M-A-D-E-L-E-I-N-E was spelled correctly (2005) B-I-R-T-H-D-A-Y was spelled correctly (My bad-2006) and the cake was sugarifically delicious.

Mmmmmmmm.

The girls cleaned up.

I didn't have a crying jag/nervous breakdown like I did in 2001, 5 days after 9/11/2001, when my sister needed to have the cake cut b/c she had to leave early and some in-law was running late and I wanted to wait to cut the cake until they got there and well, you know, 3000 Americans were still smoking heaps of ash.
No, the party went off with only minor glitches. The real drama occurred......drum roll..... after the party.

When the girls ran outside to play and a memory assailed me.....

It all started three weeks ago...

I brushed my hair from my face as I kneeled, sweating profusely, in the front yard weeding the garden and looked up to find a man standing over me. Our eyes locked and he said...

"Um...do you know where Green Valley Lane is?"

"There is no Green Valley Lane here," I replied. "I've lived in this neighborhood for 40 years, on and off, and I've never heard of one anywhere around here."

I looked up and saw that he had a gray van parked in the road. The van had white tags with red letters. I tried to see them but they were too far away to read. Van-the vehicle of choice for child abduction. Our street is 2 blocks from 2 major highways.

Something about him made me cringe. CHILDPREDATOR*CHILDPREDATOR*CHILDPREDATOR* alarms began going off in my head.

"May I ask who you are looking for?" I said, ever the gracious Southern lady, even to suspected predators, noblesse oblige, dahlin'!

"Um...some teacher I used to have..." he said, as he walked quickly to the van.

Last weekend the girls ran outside to play and I called for Madeleine to come back for a minute. I quickly shoved the Migo cell phone into a pouch and handed it to her, ordering her to take it outside with her AND PRESS THE RED EMERGENCY BUTTON IF ANYBODY TRIED TO KIDNAP HER.

One week later, the phone had not surfaced on Madeleine's bedstand, but I assumed it was in the garage with their toys.

"Where's your cell phone?"

"I...um.....um......."

I'm a lawyer, trained in interrogation.

The story unfolded: Madeleine gave it to Meredith to hold and Meredith put it on the basketball goal and then they decided to shoot some baskets so they put it on the trunk of my car in the garage and they've looked everywhere under every pillow, box, table, rug, crevice, purse, trunk, etc. AND THE CELL PHONE IS GONE, VANISHED INTO THE AGES, WHERE IT WILL LIVE ONLY IN THE HEARTS AND MINDS OF OUR GRIEVING FAMILY.

Oh! The grief! The hugs, the contrite looks from two little girls. The "Mike Brady" talk I got to deliver. I'm not mad, just sad. Very sad that you treated a serious responsibility so casually. Very sad that you begged for a phone and then reneged on the promise to faithfully care for it blah blah blah the truth of the matter is....

1. I was a sucker and
2. No 8 year old is mature enough to assume responsibility for a phone and
3. I was a sucker and
4. I was an idiot.
5. I was a moron.

So! Happy Ending time! I called Verizon and they reactivated one of my old phones and Madeleine and Meredith are forbidden to remove it from the house unless under careful supervision and I hoped THEY LEARNED A LESSON and anyway they are now 9 and 7 and much, much more mature yeah right and we all fade into the sunset and live happily ever after except.....

P.S. I have fibromyalgia.