Standing on the threshold is great for earthquakes, but not such a good place to live

My girl, the force of nature, will be here next Saturday. We’ll be in the kitchen together on Thanksgiving (American that is, November 23) cooking up free range organic turkey, probably stuffed with something that cost $30 an ounce and she needs about a stone, or maybe a little more for her recipe. Is that okay? I will roll my eyes and try to say no as she drops it in the cart and I’m still calculating the American equivalent in pounds. She didn’t know how to boil water 3 years ago, but she has since become a chef. She does nothing by half measures, charging full force through grocery stores and protest marches. She has no strings attached and she offers no apologies. Thanksgiving will be all warm, homey, family time. If anyone, and by that, I mean me, tries to bring up unpleasantness, she will tell us we need an adventure and whisk us off to Mexico, or maybe just up the side of a sheer cliff, with no rope or any visible means of support. I can just see her retreating backside, face turned around to mine, “Come on Mom. It’s not that hard.”

There will be no rain while she is here, or if there is, she will somehow stay dry and in the sunshine. Right now it’s raining like gangbusters and the basement is flooded. My husband took the week off to clean the gutters and do some maintenance on the house, but he never got around to any of the chores. The pump that empties the east end of the drainage field was clogged and not running. The gutters, full of those lovely autumn leaves, overflowed and sent torrents of water down unfamiliar pathway around the foundation of the house. I moved the electrical cords, turned on all the pumps, opened the garage door to drain that area, and then got him up off the floor where he was passed out again. I don’t feel like being down in the water right now, so I’m hiding out upstairs in the computer room because, well, it’s my birthday. No big deal really because I require no brass bands, or standing ovations, just an hour away from the deluge, please.

Someone put an emergency procedure manual in my cube the other day. I looked it over because evidently there will be a test. Each section begins exactly the same, REMAIN CALM. Everything from nuclear war to bee stings will be simple to deal with if we just don’t panic, according to my manual. It included floods, but had nothing that would help me with this marital quagmire in which I am firmly stuck. I try to remember the last time I panicked in a crisis and realize that would be never. I stood in the hospital emergency room holding a significant piece of my oldest son’s scalp in place while the overworked Doc went off to look for needles and sutures. I pulled a blue toddler from a screaming mom’s arms and removed the piece of hotdog from his tiny throat. I stayed inside and called 911 when my insane husband decided to clean the gutters in a lightning storm and fell off the roof. He does tend to procrastinate, but I saw no reason for both of us to die that night. So, we’re back to the rain. It’s still falling and it doesn't show signs it’s going to let up. So why do I whine to the computer instead of packing my bags? Do I love crisis that much? Am I such a big egotist that I don’t think anyone else can deal with this train wreck? Or just maybe, do you hear it boys and girls? That high childish soprano that rings out in the background, “Sun-ul come out Tomorrow, bet your bottom dollar…” I wish I could smack that curly red wig off her little optimistic head.