Thanksgiving and Lisa's birthday and all the racket this day brought has now come to an end

Thanksgiving Day, 2012, has just come to it's end. So has Lisa's 27th birthday. Really? 27? My youngest child? What does this do to my narrative that I remain a young man of 39? Still able to pitch in the World Series!?

As you might suspect, I took many pictures. I have some stories I want to tell. It has been a great day. But I am very, very, tired. I do not want to edit all these pictures I have taken. I do not have the energy to write the stories. I barely have the energy to head to bed. So I have skipped to the end of my day's take, to the moment when 27-year old Lisa gave her mom a hug goodbye.

I will tell just one little story. About mid-evening - maybe a bit after 7:00 PM, the turkey and all the Thanksgiving trimmings I had eaten overwhelmed me with sleepiness. I sat down in the recliner Jacob and Lavina gave me after my return from the hospital and I reclined a bit. I was just feet from the fire and the wood heat felt wonderful. I closed my eyes.

My entire family here in Alaska - including all my children, their spouses and significant others and my three grandsons  - were all present, spread across the living and front rooms. It was chaotic. They were making lots of noise - little feet were running, pounding the floor; little voices shouted, big voices told jokes and stories and laughed loudly. It was not the kind of environment one associates with a good nap.

Yet, I napped. It was so wonderfully pleasant to nap, engulfed by the racket and noise of family, enveloped by the heat of the fire, engulfed by love.

I felt pretty damned thankful.

Oh, hell. One more pic...

What the heck. Still one more...

I can probably manage still another... 

...I suppose I cannot fail to mention the fact that Lynx is starting to take a step now and then...

...or that right after Lisa entered the house carrying her "Feminist Casserole," I noticed that both she and Bryce had somehow wound up with a cracker in their mouths...

I reckon I should prove that we really did eat...

Having taken you to the table, I must relate a bit of the story Melanie and Charlie are telling right here:

Monday morning, at 2:00 AM, they were woken from a sound sleep by a sudden, loud, violent, banging at the front door. This scared them badly - they thought maybe theives were trying to break in, or drunks perhaps. They did not know what to do. They thought about calling the police. By now, some other, less gentle folks would have picked up and cocked their guns.

Their fingers would have been on the trigger.

They cautiously peered out toward the door as the banging continued. Now a loud, intimidating, angry voice shouted out that it was the police. Melanie and Charlie did not know if this was true. The guy flashed his badge in the window. They saw a police car outside. They heard one cop tell at least one other to check the back. The next day, they would find footprints in the snow of their back yard.

The cops wanted in, but Melanie and Charlie wouldn't let them in, because they were afraid and felt these cops had no business to come barging into their house at 2:00 AM. Apparently, there were a couple of runaways in the neighborhood. The loud cop rudely told them they got a tip the runaways were in Melanie's house. They wanted to search the house but they did not have a warrant.

The cop had a radio and reported to whoever he was talking to that he had encountered, "a scraggly dude." At least three different times, he described Charlie this way... "a scraggly dude." Apparently, one of the runaways was named Shyla.

Knowing they had no runaways here, Melanie asked the rude cop what address they were supposed to be at. He brusquely told her the cops were the ones doing the investigating - not her. After after what felt like about ten minutes, the cops finally determined they had come to the wrong house.

They left - without a hint of apology. It took Melanie and Charlie hours to go back to sleep after that. One of their friends suggested they start a new rock group and call themselves, "Shyla and The Scraggly Guy." 

Well, more than an hour has passed by since I said I was too tired to edit or write and was going to bed. I meant it, too. I still haven't looked at most of the day's take, but this is it, the last pic I will include, so as to end this post and Thanksgiving Day with a smile.

Later today, after I get some sleep and spend several hours being lazy, drinking coffee, sitting by the fire and reading on my iPad whatever damned thing I feel like reading - it is a holiday, after all - I will return to Barrow fall whaling and post part 3.

Comments

[Shoshana]

Glad you had a wonderful Thanksgiving!

[twain12]

Me too, just love your Family and the Cop was moire than rude !!