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I just made one of those phone calls that had my hands shaking prior, and my hair pushed up towards the ceiling by the end. It’s the kind of human interaction, born of challenging circumstance that disrupts sleep. I didn’t want to call, but it was important. It went for twenty six hair pushing minutes. The main take away for me is that I felt better after the call than prior to the call. So, if you’ve got a call to make. Make the call. It’s the right thing to do. 
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On Thursday night at dinner my 4 year old son repeatedly dropped from his chair and lolled happily under the table. Garlic bread crumbs followed him and slowly piled on the floor of his grandparents’ apartment. I told him to come back to his seat and eat at the table. He did for a while (with his hands in the pasta) then off he’d cheekily tumble in accidental mimicry of the lanky sauce covered spaghetti in his bowl.
This is frustrating behaviour. My wife and I looked at each other and sighed. The boy giggled from the floor. Some times are painful with a little person, they’ve got their own ideas about how to interact with bolognese. For us on this Thursday night though we were full of gratitude that he was safe and home. On Monday night he slept in the hospital and on Tuesday he had surgery. It was scary and confronting. He was home quickly and things went well. By Thursday we were still simply happy to have him home. I wonder how we’ll feel next Thursday, and the one after that? It’s hard to stay grateful all the time. Also, eat at the table boy. This is from Chapter 3 of the memoir I've been working on about Stacy. She would have been 40 years old on Thursday. Stacy’s birthday party started at little Leila’s house. Leila or ‘The Little One’ was an informal protégé of Stacy’s, tonight though she was the girl hosting the pre-party with the jungle juice. The house vibrated with Leila and other friends gathering and giggling about life on a Saturday night. Stacy loved these girls, who she felt a level of responsibility for ever since hiring and managing them at a clothing store called Elle Would, two years earlier. Motivated by a strong urge to see the best for her charges, she would probe and provide advice. Across the music I heard Stacy say, ‘You just need to get rid of that guy’. When returning to the jungle juice I noted, ‘How long are you going to keep doing that for, Sweetie?’ As the rise and fall of party voices filled and retracted from the space, words drifted across the room to my ears, ‘You know what you need to do.’ … ‘I love you honey, but that isn’t good enough.’… ‘Skooch a cheek, what’s going on with you, babe?’ Stacy was in her element and was only interrupted by a timely move to somewhere that Stacy was also in her element, a dance floor. Like a herd of brightly coloured sheep, and partly flushed with jungle juice, we wandered up the street towards the light and sound of Stacy’s 27th birthday party. “Captain Courageous!” yelled the small group gathered in the cocktail garden. Stacy surged forward into the crowd from the Starlight Children's Foundation. “The party’s here!” responded Stacy, immediately matching the new volume of the night. Captains Sparkles, Giggles, Sunshine and Silly were in the pub and living it up like only a group of professional attention seekers can. There was dancing on the tables, joke telling on the dance floor and impromptu skits in most bathrooms in the building. With enough Captains in one place the night quickly ascended into a real life performance piece, in which volume and action compete for precedence. ‘Elle’ girls mixed with Captains, family mixed with friends and Stacy stitched us all together with a big smile and more kisses on the cheek than there were cheeks to kiss. It all escalated until Stacy found a long, rolled up umbrella in a corner and brought it to the dance floor. “Hey, I’m going to do a routine for you,” she blasted to the room and anyone who was listening. “Watch this!” With the red umbrella intermittently swinging around her head and then forming the centre of Stacy’s broad, swinging dance arc, she ruled the dance floor. To Stacy there was no difference between people making a little space to watch her dance, and people making a little space to avoid being hit by an umbrella. The point was people were making a little space, and into that space she poured her joy, enthusiasm and pretty fun dance moves. She pulled her friends into the act and the umbrella had the most populated dance card in the room. When security staff became involved in the interest of public safety, Stacy met them with charm and cheek. “Hi guys, it’s my birthday,” she smiled. With the umbrella offered handle first, she had the last word “Wanna dance?” They didn’t, but Stacy didn’t mind. She partied her finest, calling all to her with love and energy. Stacy knew that her friends were a part of her life force and a great source of energy.  Alright so Acrisios is the king of Argos, a Greek city or city state type place. Everything is going great for him until a prophetess tells him that if his wonderful daughter Danaë ever has a son, that boy will kill him. Rough. Acrisios panics and puts Danaë in a dungeon so she’ll never meet anyone. This is a strong plan except that Zeus (king of the gods) works out that if he turns himself into golden rain he can just casually drip into the dungeon. So he does. Zeus likes Danaë, Danaë likes Zeus and months later Acrisios can’t believe it when he hears a baby crying from the dungeon. This baby is Perseus and he is no joke. Acrisios continues to make shocking decisions and puts his daughter and grandson in a timber chest and throws them into the ocean. Because this is a Greek myth, instead of sinking the chest floats to a different island, Seriphos, and a real first class citizen called Dictys opens it. He finds Danaë and Perseus. Danaë is amazing and Dictys offers to marry her and raise her son as his own. This goes great for quite a while. Multiple years later Dictys takes his incredible family to meet his brother, who is also the king of Seriphos - Polydectes (this guy is no good). Polydectes agrees that Danaë is sensational and decides to attempt to steal her from his brother. The only issue is that her son is a demigod. As a complete set up style, impossible mission, Polydectes says something like this: “Perseus, as king of Seriphos I command you to find and slay the gorgon Medusa” (this is dangerous because a single glance at a gorgon’s snakes-for-hair head turns you into stone). Perseus is into it though, so he goes. Using craft, a shiny reflective shield and old world brutality Perseus waits until night, sneaks in backwards while looking at the reflection in his shield and severs Medusa’s sleeping head. He tosses it into a sack and gets back on his ship. Ok there are only 3 or 4 new characters and names to remember. Let’s keep going. On the way back to Seriphos, Perseus noticed there was a brilliant young lady chained to a cliff. This was Andromeda and it was not going great. Andromeda looked amazing and her mother Cassiopeia was so pumped that she started telling people that Andromeda was more beautiful than all the nymphs in the sea. This was a problem because the sea nymphs and their dad Poseiden heard this and they were not pleased. Poseiden sent a flood and the sea monster Ketos to terrorise Queen Cassiopeia and King Cepheus. Cepheus consulted an oracle who said the only way out was to sacrifice Andromeda to the sea monster. This was going on when Perseus sailed by. As I said he thought she was brilliant and so he charged in and killed Ketos (a giant sea serpent). Filled with gratitude, and probably still some pride, Cassiopeia and Cepheus enthusiastically agreed to the marriage Perseus and Andromeda had decided on. When Perseus made it home, with a new wife and a gorgon head in a sack, there was turmoil. Danaë (mum) and Dictys (cool step dad) were hiding in a temple because Polydectes (King, uncle, greedy bastard) had organised some guys and they were coming to steal Danaë. Perseus didn’t approve and pulled out his gorgon head which turned Polydectes to stone. Job done. With the king gone, Dictys and his wife Danaë become the king and queen. Things were good. People started to hear about how great Perseus was and he began getting invites to travel around the Greek world. One time he was competing in some Olympic activities in Thessaly. He threw a discus and shanked it into the crowd by mistake. It hit Acrisios (remember him from paragraph one?) in the back of the head and killed him. Hectic.  |
AuthorHigh school teacher 
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