What Are People Thinking?

Last night, we had to break out our winter coats!

Our oldest grandson had baseball playoffs, so Opa and Omi made the trip to the ballpark to watch the game.  And it was cold! I’m sure the kids were fine, since they were running around and having fun, but those of us just sitting and watching were about to freeze!

When the game was over, it took M and me a while to get our chairs put away in the car and get situated before we started driving out of the parking lot – and I noticed one little baseball player walking by himself. I pulled over and asked him if he had a ride and he said yes . . . and then asked to borrow my phone. He called his mom (I guess that’s who he called) now mind you, it’s 9:30 at night by this time, and then told me his ride was on the way.

I’m sure he wished we would have driven on . . . I know I would have wanted that when I was in 7^th grade. But there was no way I was leaving that child there by himself until I knew his ride had arrived. We spent the next five minutes talking about sports, school and any other topic I could think of until a car showed up to pick him up. And when we drove away, ours was the last car in the parking lot.

We were about half-way home, listening to the radio, and my mind was 10,000 miles away from the ball field and what had happened there. Suddenly M said to me, “That just makes me so mad. Who does something like that?”

Now I’m playing catch up. What is he talking about? Fortunately, I was able to guess correctly – “Are you mad about that little boy at the ball field?”

“Yes,” he said. “What are his parents thinking?”

I just patted his knee and told him he has a good heart – and then changed the subject. Or else, he would have continued to dwell on that all night.

It’s always surprising to me what sticks with him and what doesn’t.

On the home front, we’re still working on getting our downstairs back to a livable condition. Our younger son went back to his Coast Guard post last week, so it’s just M and me at the house. We worked over the weekend, trying to get everything put back together again, but it’s harder and more time consuming that I ever imagined it would be.

The book shelves that I painted aren’t going back together again as easily as they came apart. Evidently, adding a few layers of paint has made the shelves too big for the frame, so now they need to have a quarter inch taken off the side for them to fit.

This would not have been a problem for M five years ago. Or even two years ago. He would have gotten out his circular saw and cut the boards down in a flash.

When we talked about it on Sunday, he didn’t know what the circular saw was. Or where to find it. You better believe I wasn’t about to let him try to use it. I could have given it a try, but I’ve never done it and – let’s be honest – I’m afraid of it.

So, there’s another chore that’s become something I’ll have to hire out. Or learn to do myself. Overcome my fear of cutting off my hand. It can’t be that difficult – right? Too many idiots are out there – right this minute – using power tools. Of course, you see a lot of those idiots walking around, missing fingers or in the Emergency Department. I don’t want to become a statistic.

But M has his bowling league tonight, which always makes him happy. The name of his team is “Living for a Spare” – I thought that was cute. Even though I have to point out when it’s M’s turn to bowl, and which lane to use . . . and remind him that he gets two chances to knock the pins down (every single time) – he’s one of the better bowlers on his team.

Fun, fun, fun on a Wednesday night.