The case of the missing pumpkin

Monday morning our pumpkin was missing.

Having been recently the victim of thieves, I assumed the worst. Our happy little inflated jack-o-lantern had been kidnapped and was being held for ransom at an undisclosed location, probably a spooky barn.

I called my husband who laughed, blamed the wind, and had to take another phone call. Clearly I was on my own.

Given that Jack, as we called him, was just a ten dollar inflatable, (not the one in this picture, which is probably a relative) I couldn’t imagine the ransom would be much. But it would be much more satisfying to track down his kidnappers and bring them to justice.

I’ve been a traditionalist when it comes to pumpkins. We’ve always gone out, way too early, and bought pumpkins for carving. We’d think up wild designs, like entire scenes from movies as we drove home with our orange spheres. Then, after an hour of scraping out the innards of three pumpkins, we’d scale back.

No wonder most pumpkins only have eyes, nose and a mouth.

At the end of the process we’d have a trio of pumpkins with various grimaces. We tossed in a few tea lights, invariably turning at least one set of teeth black. The trio then started to decompose so quickly by Halloween they were very frightening in a viral kind of way.

Jack, on the other hand, hissed quietly, glowed without issueing black smoke, and did not decompose. The kids loved him.

How would I break the news to them? That some terrible people, had kidnapped sweet, hissing Jack? Would they freak out and refuse to sleep?

Of course I could use this as a teaching moment. We could discuss the problem of crime, and how it’s important to turn the other cheek, or veggie, as it were. Or since no ransom note was appearing on our mailbox, we could go all CSI on the case and look for clues as to where Jack had been taken, study soil samples, tracks and do a little research.

That was it. I knew what I had to do. I had to go to the store and buy another one of those things.

Fortunately as I was headed out, I spotted a pile of orange nylon. It was Jack, who apparently had been blown there by the wind.

Or, he had escaped his kidnappers. We’ll never know.

Can I Have a Word?

As a writer, I spend an inordinate amount of time selecting the just right word. Many conversations with my daughters will grind to a halt as I try to pick the right metaphor to demonstrate an otherwise simple point.

“Being a good sport is like being a … a… a good friend. Well, no, it’s more like being a good dog trainer, because even when your dog doesn’t do the trick, you still have to be positive… Actually, no, that doesn’t work. Okay, how about…”

“Moooom!”

Or “You know, that was a good story, and it’s true, you don’t want others to define you. You can’t let them tell you if the music you like is the right music. It’s like being a bird… no, a coach or a trapeze artist, for example…”

My daughter, whose eyes had been glazing over, suddenly springs up. “Oh my! I totally forgot. Did I tell you about how I had to change desks on Friday and now I’m sitting between two BOYS?”

Sigh.

See, when I type up this column I’ve got a little more time to work with and I imagine that I’ve got at least one person’s attention. (For all I know everyone heads over to the jumble, but hey, a woman has to dream.)

So I spend quite a bit of time sweating over every little word. Which is fine, until I hear my husband read to the kids.

Let’s just say that no author’s work is safe when Daddy gets a hold of a story book.

Here’s the scene. They’ll all settle in for a bedtime story. The lamp light is glowing softly and the story is unfolding into the night air. Then, there are a few blips. Silly pronunciations. Mixing up of characters. Before you know it, princess are burping and horses are passing gas and entire communities burn down to the delight of his audience who giggles through it all, correcting him every time.

Writers all over the world can sense, I’m sure, the havoc being wrought on their work. Their carefully paced sentences suddenly flying apart like some sort of Three Stooges routine.

I’ll tell you one thing. He’s definitely not reading them any of my stuff… er… work.

At least not unless I’m there for the corrections.

Marketing Royal Purple
(This is a Classic Crib Notes)

There are times when my former career comes in handy when dealing with my youngest child, Mireya.

Recently turned four, Mireya has days when she subsists largely on oxygen. She refuses to eat anything and all of the old standbys – hotdogs, crackers, oranges – are left untouched.
Well, I liked the oranges. Especially sliced really thin.

Anyway, this is generally not a problem at home where somehow I'll find the one item that she'll eat. A pickle. A cheese stick. A bowl of green beans. You just never know.

But on the road, visiting with other people who are living with far more civilized eaters, it gets dicey.

Fortunately I've been trained for this with years of experience marketing piles and piles of things no one needs. I can market swimwear to seals, leggings to snakes. I know how to create a need where before there was nothing but a misplaced sense of satisfaction.

Recently we were on a play date when Mireya had rejected all food items I had brought as well as those of our wonderful host. There was one last hope. There were grapes.

Unfortunately, they were purple grapes. Mireya eats only green grapes. I had brought home gorgeous purple grapes just a few days before, grapes so sweet that butterflies were dancing around me with great abandon and bees made me promise I'd toss a few out into the garden. Grapes so beautiful that I just wanted to line them up and take their picture for a cooking show audition.

You get the idea.

Mireya wouldn't touch them. I believe her exact words were "I no like PURPLE!" but it was hard to understand her as she fled in horror to her room.

But now we were a long way from home, a long way from green grapes and cheese sticks. So I reached into my bag of tricks and pulled - the princess card.

Mireya believes fervently in all things princess. She understands the power and glory of being a princess and has enough gowns to attend a different ball every day for the rest of the year.

I looked at the purple grapes and, with what I hoped was an incredulous expression, I said, "Mireya – look at this! Do you know what these are?"

She began to scrunch up her face, so I rushed ahead. "Remember on the Princess Movie? These were the grapes they had there." I lowered my voice, lest the peasants overhear us. "These are PRINCESS GRAPES."

Her eyes grew wide and she reached for a purple grape. It was all over. Then, the next day, she was downing the previously distained (but now re-marketed) Royal Purple Grapes like there was no tomorrow.

Yes, I feel a little bad about it. After I left my life as a professional marketer, I swore I would only use my powers for good. But, as she ran off that day, her cheeks filled with sweet purple grapes, I decided that in this case, the ends justified the means

My new favorite baby shirt

The Pomegranate Fairly. Under appreciated, overworked. Sound familiar?

Recently I heard that a fellow mom and writer's son had a pomegranate seed removed from his ear.

The mystery for his mom was that he had never, to her knowledge been near a pomegranate, let alone figured out how to peel it and stick a seed in his ear.

Of course I knew what was going on. This was the work of the pomegranate fairy.

If you haven't heard of the pomegranate fairy, you're not alone. She's often overlooked in the news because no one really eats pomegranates anymore and the tooth fairy has more extensive marketing.

The tooth fairy's fame is in large part thanks to major contributions from dentists in an ongoing effort to bring some positive publicity to the loss of a tooth. But that's another story.

(the overly hyped tooth fairy accepting a golden toothbrush award from the American Academy of Dentists)


Anyway, the legend of the pomegranate fairy goes way back to medieval times when mother, in a fit of exasperation, pleaded for divine intervention while eating a pomegranate. Her children had, for the 384th time forgotten to pick up their plates from the table, and, quite frankly she had HAD it. She hurled the pomegranate through the window, beaning a passing fairy.

This fairy, rather than fluttering on to a quieter neighborhood decided this was a sign that things were getting out of control and somebody better start listening or else!

Thus the first pomegranate was planted. Pomegranate fairies planted pomegranate seeds in children's ears so they would develop the ability to listen to their parents. Like so many things of singular importance, modern science has not determined exactly how this works, although the theory around our dinner table is that it probably has to do with the sticky, red juice.

(the pomegranate fairy, captured on a postcard in 1902)


Whatever the mechanism, the great news was that for generations children were listening to their parents, eventually leading to the birth of the greatest generation of all.

Unfortunately, with changes in fairy legislation in the 1980s requiring adherence with 13 international treaties and 94 new FDA guidelines referencing pomegranates and their use in the outer ear, fewer than seven PFs (as they are known in fairy circles) are working in the US today.

Those valiant seven are overworked, under appreciated and just plain tired (sound familiar?) and, as with most people with way too much to do, they blow it routinely.

As a result, some of the seeds, instead of being properly planted, are slipping into the ear canals causing distress to the recipients, freaking out parents, and sending children to ENT doctors for pomegranate seed extraction.

Of course, they don't teach about the pomegranate fairy in medical schools these days, so when a seed shows up, everyone is astonished. Mothers search their gardens and children don't listen to a word that is being said until they hit their 20s.

Which explains a lot, don't you think?

Autumn’s early preview

I had almost forgotten what the world sounded like without air conditioning.

On Saturday night we went outside on the deck and couldn’t bring ourselves to go back indoors. So out came Sierra with the blanket, the BINGO game and a few extra lights. Which was a relief since we’d been playing “pick the card” with Mireya, which is not nearly as challenging since it only involves picking from two cards – over and over and over.

So we settled in on our Bingo marathon. Bingo is always a marathon at our house because we always have to play until everyone gets a chance to yell Bingo. Boy, are my kids in for a surprise when they go to their first game at the Bingo hall. I can just see Mireya stomping up to the ball machine operator, demanding he continue calling out numbers until she gets her Bingo.

I feel for him already.

I am a big fan of Summer, but there’s nothing like that first break in the air when Autumn peeks around the corner and blows a cool breeze onto your neck. Sure, it’s just tease, a quick wave while Summer had her back turned. Then the heat is back, the plants wilt as Summer pulls out the blow dryer one for one last time.

There are a dozen little rituals of fall that our children bring alive.

There is the vain attempt to save brilliant red and golden leaves that turn brown in just a few days.

There’s the figuring out when is the absolute last day you can go outside in flip flops without your toes freezing.

There’s the extra fun waking up in the dark and then, eventually, eating dinner in the dark.

We also have to relearn how to deal with zippers on jackets and learn to accept that gloves, like socks, will only occasionally match.

And my favorite: diving into piles of leaves and forgetting, for once, that you’ve got a thing about bugs that hide in piles of leaves.

For once our cabinets will be filled with clean towels and the smell of chlorine will disappear from our house and hair. We’ll have soup again and no one will complain that the ice maker is broken again.

And everyone will get a turn to win at Bingo.