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A Story: The trip to the liquor store.

April 21, 2016 / Michele Minehart

I needed tequila. It’s an ingredient in the sangria I’m serving tonight (hashtag, book club problems) and it’s a tad more than what I could borrow from a friend, though I tried. It became clear I would have to make a trip to the liquor store, which I hate. For some reason, such places heap shame on me, as if only dirty men wearing flannel would go there.

I carefully chose my outfit. I opted out of the yoga pants I really wanted for my more mature, functional adult looking jeans and t-shirt. Only the most decent for such an occasion. I briefly considered putting on office-y clothes, as if I were running an errand on my lunch break instead of buying alcohol mid-morning so I could immediately put it in the sangria, so the flavors could dance as long as possible.

The multi-tasker in me decided that I needed to rearrange the large pile of clothes to purge from the house and my ingenuity said, “hey! Just take them to the consignment shop uptown!” And so, I decided this must be completed ASAP. Because the store is right down the street from the liquor store, it just made sense. Both stores opened at 10am and it was well past 11. Perfect. Stars aligned.

I carefully decided that I would get the tequila first. I told myself it was because I could park on the correct side of the street for both stores, which is a big deal because it was raining. Really, I think I just wanted to make sure that I wasn’t that mom who sold her children’s clothing and took the cash to buy booze.

We made the first stop. I had the toddler with me and he held it together pretty well for a room full of glass. He even scored a piece of candy from the friendly Alcohol Man. Then we headed to the consignment shop. Lo and behold, a handwritten sign on the door: Closed. Will open at 12:00 on Thursday. (Friendly reminder: this would be a great message to include on your up-to-date Facebook page. Just sayin’.) Noticing I didn’t have the preschooler with me, I confirmed: it’s Thursday. We had twenty minutes to kill.

So in midst of our wait, belly full of sugar, the toddler decided he needed a nap. This is not advantageous for afternoons. I would NOT have the dreaded 20 Minute Nap ruin my day. So I tried tickling. Teasing. Playing. Finally, I resorted to outright bribery. We walked across the street for a yummy treat.

We indulged in a few donut holes and things went south from there. He wanted more, or a cookie. And then he knocked his hand on the table and started screaming. The older women meeting at a nearby table switched their, “oh, how adorable” looks to the “get him out of here, I cannot hear a thing” looks. So we bailed. It was 12:02. And the consignment store still had its lights off.

I gave up and loaded him in the van. I tried to drown out his crying with a favorite song, to which he began screaming, “I hate this song!” Turn the radio!” By the time I reached our driveway he was full-on meltdown. Tired, sugared yet hungry, and – come to find out – with a splinter under his fingernail (ouch!). “Carry me in!” he wailed.

This, my friends, is why liquor stores should not be open during the day.

The end.

Laura’s Sangria Recipe

AKA: The reason you should keep tequila on hand

(*I had to quadruple this to use the full bottle of wine. Because, book club.)

8 oz. red wine

4 oz. orange juice

4 oz. pineapple juice

4 oz. tequila

2 oz. fresh lime juice

Chop apples, pineapples, oranges, and lemons and let them mingle in the mix. Chill and serve with a “splash of sprite and sugar.”

In a day’s work

April 20, 2016 / Michele Minehart

It was a long day. Often, it was a hard day. The youngest is breaking into his Threes, showing us all of his unwillingness to be cooperative, fighting off help and refusing instruction. I realize this is the plight of most parents. The Threes are terrible, and we learn to pour a glass of wine for one another.

Having a Three at home all of the hours of all of the days brings its own challenges. (Mind you, this is not a comparison of “which is harder, managing up your CEO or negotiating cup colors?”) My job, essentially, is to show patience and boundaries, love and direction, to this small human who might be diagnose-able on the DSM 4 if he were scaled as an adult. It’s maddening. And, really, the only other tally in the Productive Column is the sorted laundry that has sat in your room for no less than a week.

But you take the girls on a run. You watch as one of them half-prances through the less-than-one-mile turn-around while the other powers through and rolls her eyes when sister needs to stop and rest. You hear them talk about their strong muscles and how fast their shoes are.

Then, you go out to eat. You drink a margarita on the patio with your family and no one screams or spills. You smile at your husband.

And then you get in the car for a quick trip to your mother’s house. She eases your mind that your children do NOT have head lice. (Let’s not discount the ease of mind this brings.) Your childhood friend who now serves as your household audiologist (what? you don’t have one?) drops off BRAND NEW hearing aids. You sit out on the back porch, watching children tumble and climb and run in the sunshine.

Finally, you come home. You tuck in the children and you sit out on the front porch to watch the sun finish its work. You hear the goats from half a mile down the road. You take in the last sips of your Pinot Noir. And you bask in the blessings.

It’s not perfect, but it’s good. It’s a really, really good life. Far from magazine quality. (Child number 3 has the bite marks to prove it.) But so brilliantly, delightfully good.

There’s nothing wrong with wanting the most from life; planning, dreaming, visioning, wishing, working and trying. As long as you’re not ignoring the beauty sitting right in front of your pretty little nose. Today was a day of that. Seeing the beauty in the struggle.

That kind of family

April 14, 2016 / Michele Minehart

I keep vivid memories of the experience of loosing my grandparents when I was 13 and 17. I remember the hospital room, the waiting. I remember watching the shoulders of grown men rise and fall as they cried. Mostly, I remember love. I remember the intense feeling of love for a person, and for one another.

In the days that followed, I remember more sadness, but mostly an experience of my family coming together. The cousins practically slumber partied for three days as we endured the funeral process. When it was all over, dad handed the keys of the van to Tim and we went to a matinee and out for Pizza Hut. (Brief sidenote: we thought we were hilarious when we sent Kevin in to get a table, as the hostess asked “Just one?” and he responded, “no, 11.” It really wasn’t that funny, but we rolled with laughter in the parking lot.)

Growing up, we had plenty of opportunities to be together. We spent countless hours at the lake, we had holidays, overnights and even family trips to watch the horse races. We weren’t strangers who suddenly bonded together. The ties that had held us were pulled tighter, like the shoe wedgies of 6th grade.

The moments of grief taught me: this is the kind of family we are. This is how we deal with hard stuff.

As children and even young adults, at funeral moments in life, we were carried and cared for. We helped choose the music and looked through pictures, but the adults did the heavy lifting up of one another. They bore the weight of loss together. The children were able to simply be sad and move through the grief; the adults were living a different reality, accepting a new way of life without someone they loved so very much.

Now, we find ourselves at a new place. With the passing of my Uncle Bill, we have the first of the next generation to leave us. This time, there’s no even ground. With grandparents, the adult siblings make the decisions and the kids come along for the ride. Now we have adult siblings and adult children and adult cousins and, by the way, none of us feel ready to be those kinds of adults..

When I arrived at the hospital on Sunday night to say farewell to the orneriest man to walk the streets of Ridgeway, everyone was there. The cousins and spouses who weren’t tending children were beside our uncle, holding up our cousins and our fathers. We just showed up. (And, ordered pizzas.)

This is the kind of family we are. This is how we deal with hard stuff.

I don’t like that we’re suddenly in this place. I don’t like seeing people I love in mourning. I don’t like my own sadness in missing my uncle. I don’t even really like the idea that I’m a grown up in these situations.

But I love my family. I love that we’re here, no matter what. I love that when we hurt, we hurt together. And I love that when it comes to this new phase of life, this place where we grieve on uneven scales, we’re still doing it as a family.

Michele Minehart

Page 27 of 312

A Story: The trip to the liquor store.

Laura’s Sangria Recipe

In a day’s work

That kind of family

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