but the things you do for love

Do very very little. Lay around in your bathrobe, if it’s cold enough to bother with a bathrobe. Eat some cookies. I’d recommend the new ginger ones that mom makes. They are sharp but chewy and they have delightful crackly bits where little clumps of sugar turned molten have cooled. Sleep. A-lot. Check your e-mail. Upload some photos. Curse at Flickr when your uploader crashes. Think a little bit about what you’re going to do with your life. Sit in the kitchen and surf the internet. Move to the living room and surf the internet. Sit on the toilet and surf the internet. Meditate. Get distracted. Fidget. Spend 20 minutes trying to decode the slick looking box that pipes NPR into every room in the house. Curse. Master the box. Do a little victory dance. Banish NPR from the living room. Meditate. Get distracted. Eat some cookies. Sit in the hot tub with your parents pondering the terminal velocity of a squirrel. Do some yoga. Come to the uncomfortable realization that a month of sickness and traveling does not a limber body make. Feel a little bit sad about it. Laugh at yourself.

Read the Gleaner. Pause at the headline: “A busy weekend: From mud bogs to wars modern and civil, there’s plenty to do.” Read the first sentence: “If you’ve got some spare time on your hands and are looking for entertainment over the next couple of days, Henderson is the place to be.” Think about that for a minute. Decide that by the weekend, you’ll probably be ready to change out of your bathrobe. Smile about canons and monster trucks and fried pickles. Hug your dad. Take a shower. Make a list. Surf the internet. Find a health food store. Spend an afternoon driving to the health food store. Get a warm fuzzy feeling. Buy some organic produce. Eat an apple. Drive home. Love the fact that you’re in Kentucky driving a pick-up truck. Go to the gas station. Hate the fact that you’re in Kentucky driving a pick-up truck. Wonder if the massive shuddering that happens when you try to brake on the bridge means there’s something wrong with your pick-up truck. Scan the radio. Shake your head at the 9 religious stations you find. Settle on 89.1 “The Bash”. Call your sister to tell her that you’re listening to “The Bash”. Heh heh. Stop at Audubon park. Go for a walk. Pause for a moment, taking in the twinkling light in the trees and intricate lattice of shadows they cast on the forest floor. Walk on. Crest a hill and grin at a sea of spring beauties and some other flowers you can’t name. Call your mom and describe the wildflowers to her. Marvel at her botanical knowledge.

Learn how to use three of the remotes in the den and that weird box with 25 buttons that controls all two of the lights in the room. Join the 21st century: get a lesson from dad on how to Tivo. Relish in your own endearingly bad taste in television shows. Tivo all 4 of them. Schedule a slumber party with your grandmother. Feel a little bit pathetic when you realize that your grandmother’s schedule is far more hectic than your own. Think about doing your taxes. Sleep some more. Watch some lightning. Smell the rain. Sit in a lawn chair in the driveway and read while your mom spreads mulch around the yard. Go to the mud bog. LOVE the mud bog. Tear yourself away from the mud bog. Go to the civil war reenactment. Feel slightly disappointed by the civil war reenactment, but energized by the canon explosions. Spend an afternoon picking up sticks in the yard and bonding with your dad.

Have breakfast at Denny’s with 25 little old ladies. Gain an intimate understanding of our nation’s obesity epidemic. Go to Garden Club with your grandmother. Go to the zoo with your grandmother. Go to Book Club with your grandmother. Listen to a 90 minute presentation on Peter Bergen’s “The Osama bin Laden I know”, complete with homemade crayon colored maps of the middle east. Consider engaging in political discussion over quiche and cheesecake with your grandmother’s Book Club. Bite your tongue. Escape unscathed. Stop at the Sureway for ice-cream. Watch “Paradise Now” with your grandmother. Drink some ginger tea. Wonder how your grandmother gets any sleep with her grandfather clock broadcasting deafening dongs every 30 minutes. Chat with your grandmother over breakfast about her life, your life, life in general. Feel blessed to have this time. Drive to the land of super strip malls. Think that grandma cars drive pretty well. Realize that you’ve passed not one, not two, but three Christian superstores. Help your grandmother pick out a shower for her new bathroom and roses for her garden. Sit in the kitchen with your grandmother and read the Wall Street Journal aloud. Try to understand the proposed immigration bills. Scratch your head. Make dinner with your mom. Watch golf with your dad. Find yourself actually getting into watching golf with your dad. Scratch your head. Schedule a slumber party with your other grandparents. Try to get up at 6:30 to do yoga. Sleep until 9am. Do some yoga. Do your taxes. Write a big check. Feel dirty. Take a shower. Vow that you’re going to focus and actually finish one of the 4 books you’re reading. Read for 30 minutes. Get distracted. Read another book for 30 minutes. Wonder if maybe you have ADD. Rub your belly. Think a little bit about what you’re going to do with your life. Eat a cookie.