Unwelcome Surprises

When you are in the moment of the unwelcome surprise, you think you're not going to live through it. Then when a little or a lot of time passes and you start remembering some of them, most of them are quite funny. I asked Donald the other day if he could think of anything like that and at first he couldn't think of one. Then he started reminiscing and several came up between us. One of his analogies would be a turd in the punchbowl.

We were living in Houston when Derrick and Dori were both small children. Donald and I had gone to a ballet in downtown Houston and then to "the" restaurant across the street (it's still there.) We were dressed in sparkly gowns and suits and ties. We had ordered our drinks and were relaxing after the ballet (for me, getting over having to go to the ballet) and were looking at the menus, when from behind I heard a crashing sound and then wetness flooding my beautifully coiffed long blond hair, then down my back saturating my sparkly gown, all the way down to my panty hose and shoes. You can imagine what a strawberry daiquiri looks like on very natural, very blond hair. The only thing I could think about was making the waiter not feel so uncomfortable. Needless to say, our dinner was paid for which turned into a welcome surprise.

We were moving to Houston when Derrick was 5 and Dori was still in my belly. Our shipment of furniture and belongings hadn't arrived yet, so we had to stay at a hotel. Since we hadn't counted on that, I hadn't packed for this event. The hotel had a swimming pool, so to occupy Derrick, I let him go swimming - I don't remember why he had his bathing suit with him. I didn't. Derrick has always been pretty tall, but when he waded out farther then he was tall (still shallow water for me) and didn't know how to swim yet, my only choice was to wade in and save him. This was a most unwelcome surprise because that was all the clothes I had and I was saturated. It's one of those times when you want to both cuddle and punish your child at the same time.

Donald and I live in a very small and modest cottage with no halls and just rooms leading to other rooms. You would think we wouldn't be able to lose each other but we do quite often. There is a pass-through linked by a bathroom from one bedroom to another and each has its own door, so you do have privacy in the bathroom. Most of the time the doors are open and since the house is carpeted we move around pretty quietly. We are often surprising each other as we round the corner. The other day Donald was carrying his week's worth of pills in his hand when we both rounded the corner and he was so startled that he shook the container out in front of him towards me. Well, you can imagine how the rattling medicine man startled me. At the time, we were just getting over the surprise. But the other night when we were camping in Arkansas, we got to talking about that moment and both laughed so loud and hard for several minutes, re-enacting the scene, I'm sure we disrupted the campground. Neither one of us could breathe. And each time we died down, Donald would imitate his rattling the bottle again and we were once again with bellyaches from laughing. It's one of those "you have to be there moments" to appreciate the humor and I think we'll be recalling this unwelcome surprise a few times in the future.

My daughter, Dori, is not to be left out of one of my unwelcome surprises. It actually came in the guise of a nasty neighbor who was always tattling on the kids. We lived in a neighborhood that was still being developed and there were several houses under construction. Dori had a very mischievous friend, Robin, who was always coming up with new and better things to do to put their lives in jeopardy. Dori was about 9 years old when old Mrs. Windbag knocked on my door and asked if I knew (like I would just let Dori do things like this) my daughter and her friend were jumping off the second story of the uncompleted house to the ground. I didn't know, but by the time I got down to that house, the two curmudgeons had disappeared. I don't remember chastising Dori, but I think I probably explained she probably shouldn't do that anymore. And now 25 years later, I hear stories from Dori that make that leap off the second story sound like milquetoast. But it took her 25 years to come clean.

I have lots of other unwelcome surprises like these - they are the kind that you laugh at through all time.