Brags

           All I can do this week is brag about how blessed I am — and who wants to hear a braggard? Nobody! That’s who!

          “Well, Peg, if you were gonna brag, what would you brag about?” you ask.

          I’d brag about how special my friends make me feel when they make me gifts. And how happy it makes me when they love the things I make for them in return.

          Last year, I made Santas. I don’t know how many I made and gave away. All I know is that one sat on my counter all year, in pieces, because I only cut it from the glass and never finished it. And poor Joanie never got her 2020 Santa.

This year, I finished the Santa and remembered why I pooped out making them. With all their tiny pieces, they’re a pain!

Christmas Eve, at church, I gave Joanie her 2020 Santa and her 2021 elf. Her beautiful face lit up when she saw them. You can’t fake that. She loved them. Then her face fell. “I didn’t get you anything,” she said.

          Her loving what I’d taken the time to make was all the gift I needed. “That’s okay!” I told her and meant it. “I’m just sorry you had to wait a whole year for your Santa.”

         “It was worth the wait,” she said.

          Joan doesn’t know it. Doesn’t know what a joy and inspiration she is to have in my life. We talk via morning love notes every day. She faces obstacles that would cause an ordinary woman to fall, crushed and weeping at its feet. And she always manages to come through bearing a ray o’sunshine.

          I gave this beautiful lady her elf at church, too. She was surprised to get it and I’ll tell you why. Jody stopped by in the afternoon to give me a gift. “I’m working on your elf now but I might not have it done,” I told her.

“That’s all right. I never take them down anyway,” she said.

My beautiful sister Phyllis is the same way. She leaves all of her suncatchers up all the time. Not my Miss Rosie, though. Coordinating her clothes with her shoes and her jewelry aren’t the only things she likes to coordinate. Her house is coordinated too. Down comes Halloween and up goes Christmas. Down comes Christmas, up goes Valentine's. Down comes winter, up goes spring.

 Jody and I talked.

          “I told Michael that I thought you were rushing me out the door when I stopped this afternoon.” Her husband is a Michael too.

          Jody is very astute. I thought I was being subtle, but she caught me. I laughed. “I was. I told you I was working on your elf and I wanted to try and finish it.”

          “And you wanted to make cookies for the cookie exchange,” she said. “Did you get them made?”

          “No.”

          “Why not?” she wanted to know.

          “Because my butter got too soft. It wouldn’t make a crumbly crust for the Dream Bars and I just thought if I can’t make it right, I’m not going to make it at all.” I could see a question hanging between us. “I just stuck it in the fridge. It’ll be okay after it chills.”

          I wasn’t going to take part in the cookie exchange because I had no intention of bringing cookies home with me, not even going to eat a single one at church. Then I thought I’d make them for others to take, then the crust wasn’t cooperating and I went back to the original plan of not participating. Instead, I was able to finish Jody’s elf.

          Miss Rosie and I exchanged gifts earlier in the week, when she came for exercise class. She got her elf and I’d picked up a metal farm sign with a chicken weathervane. She loves chickens but finding her something chicken themed that she doesn’t already have is a challenge.

          Friday morning, Mike and I took an elf and a pumpkin roll out to Addi’s house. She’s another one that never takes her suncatchers down.

          “We put a rod up in her window and they’re all hanging there,” Liz, Addi’s mom, told me. “All of her friends just love them.”

          “And what did you get?” you ask.

          You’re gonna be so jealous! I hesitate to even tell you all the beautiful things I got.

Jody made me a lavender scented sachet for my sock drawer and personalized it with the letter P in purple buttons. I smile just thinking about it! It smells so good! I love it!

          Addi made a cutting board in shop class at school.

          “And you gave it to me and not your mom?”

          Addi grinned and nodded.

          I felt honored.

My Miss Rosie painted a winter scene on a little wooden sled and gave me a plate of homemade cookies — but she asked me first about the cookies.

“I know you’re dieting,” she said. “So, if you’d rather not have cookies, I understand.”

“I love your Christmas cookies!” I told her and would probably feel slighted if she didn’t give me any this year. “I can always put them in my daily calorie count and just portion them out.”

“Just eat them all at once and get rid of them,” she said with a laugh.

It was my intention to just eat one or two a day but once I got started, I couldn’t stop! Even when I started to feel bloated and a little sick, my belly kept clawing at me like a hungry monster, wanting more. It took me a couple of days, but I ate them all! All by myself! Mike is staying away from sugar and I didn’t try too hard to get him to eat any. Then, when their daughters came up for Christmas, I got a pair of fancy schmancy socks and more cookies! Aside from the Honey Graham S’mores, the rest were gluten and dairy free, a sample of the cookies the girls had made for their mom’s diet. I ate those, too — and enjoyed every bite! What can I say! It’s Christmas! Tomorrow we’ll get strict with the calories again.

           I’ve been wanting to tell you for some time what I’ve been reading, then I finish the book, move on to something else and somehow, the subject never seems to come up.

I told you about reading The Four Winds and The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah and how much I enjoyed them. Jessica, one of my friends on Facebook and a gal who used to go to my church, suggested I read The Great Alone by the same author. I do most all of my reading from the two libraries I belong to and had to put it on hold. I tried a couple of other books while I waited, couldn’t get interested, and returned them. I only had to wait four days to get The Great Alone, then devoured it, returning it five days early. I started to read another of her books when a book I’d been waiting for since August became available.

I read Liane Moriarty’s Nine Perfect Strangers in thirteen days, returning it just one day early. Hulu has made that book into a mini-series.

Someplace or another the title of a modern classic came up. One I’ve never read. I searched the library and borrowed a copy of Watership Down by Richard Adams next. This book has been made into lots of movies but I've never seen those either. Besides, I often prefer the book over the movie anyway.

A long time ago, a hundred years, maybe more, I was with Momma at a bookstore. They had several discounted copies of a book that was supposed to be along the same line as Watership Down. I don’t know if she told me that she liked Watership Down or I just assumed it by the way she snagged the book.

If she recommends it, I’m sure to like it, I thought and bought a copy, too. But I couldn’t get interested in it and didn’t read much of it. I can still see the cover with a badger on it and I think it was called Cold Moon, but I won’t swear to it.

Based on that, I didn’t think I’d like Watership Down.

Surprise! I’m really enjoying it. One thing from the book that sticks with me, something I didn’t know (how would I?), and something I don’t know if it’s true or not (but I suspect it is), is that there are no aborted babies in the rabbit world. If something happens and the mother is sick or there’s not enough food, the babies are simply absorbed back into her body.

“Do animals spontaneously abort?” you ask.

We had a cat once that did. I went out in the morning and there would be these mostly formed kittens laying there, still in their embryonic sac and she wouldn’t be pregnant anymore. It happened several times. I don’t know why she couldn’t carry a litter to term.

Halfway through Watership Down, my turn comes up for another book I’ve been waiting a long time for. I placed a hold on Where the Crawdads Sing by Delila Owens back on March 18^th!

Now what am I gonna do! I wanna finish Watership Down but I’ve been waiting a long time for Where the Crawdads Sing, too!

I decided I could get Watership Down back a lot easier than Where the Crawdads Sing so that’s what I’m reading now. I’ve only had it since Christmas Eve and it didn’t take me long to get totally wrapped up in the story. I have a feeling I’ll be returning it early because all I want to do is sit and read it.

I think we have time for a critter story or two of my own.

Bondi has this game she plays with me. Every night, when I take the litter pail out to clean the litter from the cat room, I change from my house shoes into Mike’s boots, which I keep conveniently stationed there by the door. Because I have to walk through the often wet and muddy back yard to scatter it in the weeds, I track stuff in with me and it’s bad enough the back hall looks like a barn let alone dragging it through the whole house.

Bondi waits for me.

I’m standing outside, taking her picture through the door. She heard me come out of the cat room and close the door but can’t figure out what’s taking me so long, so she comes to look.

I open the door and Bondi immediately goes for my shoes.

“HEY!” I mock scold. “Those are my shoes!”

“Grrrr,” Bondi says.

I shed the boots and put my foot in the unattended shoe.

“That’s my shoe!” I tell her and get a toe in the other one. I continue to mock scold her as she holds onto the heel, and I drag her out of the utility room into the kitchen.

“Peg, those shoes look like they’ve seen better days,” you say.

I know, right! They really have. I’ve worn the heck out of them, hot glued ‘em back together, and Bondi had her way with the insoles. But I wear them anyway, for two reasons. They were my favorite and they’re the only pair we can have our game with.

Needless to say, I was quite surprised when I came back in one night and she wasn’t waiting for me. I go around the corner and see a wet spot. She had peed and just like any guilty party, she was hiding. It didn’t work though. I found her, took her back to the scene of the crime, scolded her for real, and put her outside.

She still has accidents sometimes but not very often.

I was cleaning the bathroom the other day, down on my knees Pine Sol-ing around the base of the pot, when I hear a soft thump and look up in time to see the roll of paper towels rolling out of the bathroom. I grabbed ‘em, the roll stopped, the sheets kept going. On the other end was this little imp, Blackie witness to the whole escapade.

“HEY YOU!” I often find her antics amusing. “Give me those!” I got them away from her before she could make too many small pieces out of them.

I would say that Itsy and Ginger pretty well had us hoodwinked as to what a real dog is like.

And this guy! Blackie has been splashing in the water bowl lately. This time it’s Bondi sitting back and watching.

By the way, if you happen to notice that Bondi’s food is all over the floor, it’s because she like free-range kibble better.

 And that’s really all I’ve got for you.

“You could’ve skipped this week,” you say. “It’s Christmas weekend and no one would blame you.”

I thought about that. I really did. I could sit back and do nothing but read and drink coffee. But then, I wouldn’t want you to forget that you are loved.

Until next time, y’all are in my heart.