FROM LION TO LAMB

STAFF ON CALL:

Bonnie, but who came late due to tire troubles, thus missing most of yet another Magnificent Mother-Daughter Debate. 

I came downstairs after not a very good night (5 hrs sleep) to find Peg putzing around her office, ostensibly picking it up but in reality just moving piles about, making new piles, turning one pile into seventeen and so on. I scooted past into the kitchen and made a coffee, saw that two screens had been removed from the window that faces onto the dog pen, and had been left sitting on the floor in front of the stove. Went in to find Peg.

"Mother? What are those screens doing on the floor in the kitchen?"

I said this twice. Three times.

"Oh," she said, remembering. "I took them off. We only have them on in the summer."

"This is summer, Mother. It's July." 

Well, yes, it was chilly this morning. Maybe that threw her. Anyhow she thought about it for a moment, realized her mistake, then qualified it by saying you can't see into the dog pen with the screens on (!) like everyone's been squinting for the past two months trying to see sweet FA because the dog went back to the breeder's in May. Anyhow I put them back on. And turned down the heat. 
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She then decided to have another panic about her Convention Scripts. The gist of this being she doesn't want them in two boxes (nicely organized and alphabetized) in the cupboard by the couch in the den, SHE WANTS THEM IN HER ROOM WHERE SHE CAN SEE THEM GOD DAMMIT. I hasten to add that they are in the den cupboard because I spent a week sorting them last April and if they go back into her area, where they take up valuable space, all my work will be undone within the hour. Even though she has no pressing need to get at any of them. She has got it into her head that I am hiding them and will be ferreting them away to Oregon, nightly, while she sleeps. In any event, this discussion led to me crouching in front of her chair, taking her hand, and pleading with her to please please stop attacking me all the time for doing nice things for her. She claimed all I do is attack her.  

This led to another discussion. Actually to about five hundred discussions--down-sizing when one should have, tidying one's life, responsibilities to one's children not to die and leave a fucking mess for them if you profess to love them so. And so on. We were just having a friendly chat about "that goddamned lawyer!", a lovely lady named Virginia who will help me with the will and tying up Odd's estate, what's left of it, and who Peg refuses to "pay one goddamned nickel to"--when Bonnie arrived and conversation abruptly switched to faulty left rear tires and a reminder of Peg's urology appointment at 12:30.
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Which I took her to. Since Bonnie only had 3 tires on her car. I then took Mama to Friendly's for a hot dog and milk shake. Then to the safety deposit box where she went through the "jewelry bag" while I searched for her marriage certificate (needed to get Odd's life insurance), twelve hundred other documents, and a slew of bonds, all which look alike and you have to study the serial numbers closely i.e. is this M11110899 7567683 or wait, M11110899 7567693, which won't mature until November, and where is D 3343 4678904 587? Did I just have that? Or was that the 589? And was that the EE bond or the H? Fuck! Have to go through them again! All the while Peg's oohing and ahhing at forgotten treasures (unfortunately not worth as much as I'd hoped) and finally I had to ask her to keep quiet.

On the way home, after a quick hop into Price Chopper for fish for fish cakes for Saturday, Peg, now full of hot dog and wearing her emerald ring and in an excellent mood, says there's only one thing missing in her life, do I know what that is?

"A dog."

"Yes."

She then suggested that if I could grow a tail, she'd like me better.
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10:20 PM. No sign of her. She went in for a nap at 3. Still sleeping. I assume. Maybe I should go check. I'll bark if there's a problem.