Predicaments and Ponderings Blog

It began on the morning of January 8. I woke up to an email from myself. Yes, I emailed myself. Go figure, or at least that’s what I said when I saw the email. And then I noticed it was from my website. What? The next words from my mouth—“Oh, crud bucket!”

Did you even know crud bucket was a thing? Well, if not, join us in the Sproles household for a few days, and you’ll quickly learn we don’t curse when something goes wrong. We…mountain curse. Crud bucket. Tomato squarsh (yes, squarsh – ‘cuz that’s what my grandmother used to say). Fiddle dee snot, and there are assorted variations of other words, but I digress. Just note that none are foul/fowl. So, I messed up. Last week I started a blog post. This blog post and I typed in WHAT I THOUGHT was the right day, but to my dismay, it was a typo. So, on January 8, my website published an empty blog post. Well, sorta empty. It had a photo of a giant inflatable Nutcracker. What I’m saying here is that over 1000 readers received a blank – almost blank email from me today. Including me. Remember, I emailed myself. Oh, sigh. The things we do as aging catches up to us.

It continued when Chase came home from work, giggling. When he giggles, his voice rises a notch and gets squeaky, which makes us laugh. Anywho. I asked. “What’s so funny?”

“I messed up the road sign at work today.” He began to stutter. “Well, I…I…caught it but…”

“But what?” I asked.

“I was trying to spell oranges, and well, I messed up. I put orgy.”

I spit Coke across the living room floor. The prince and I burst into laughter. “But I caught it. I fixed it.”

“Oh, law, I hope so.” We wondered if we needed to drive to Ingles and double-check the road sign.

Having realized that whopper of a mistake, I realized emailing an empty blog post rated low on the embarrassment pole. Well, sorta. Because things just keep cropping up or down. I thought Chase had the blooper of the day until the prince and I went to our grand’s middle school basketball game. It got worse. Not the game… well, they got beat 48-8, so it couldn’t have gotten much worse for the kids. But our son and DIL were sitting at the top of the bleachers. I stood at the bottom, dreading the climb to the top because it’s hard when you have neuropathy in your feet. You don’t always feel where your feet are. Add on that I have no equilibrium from the brain surgeries I had in 2017. Climbing Mount Bleacher wasn’t exciting.

But I made it fine. We watched the game, and then when it was over, we started the thousand-mile descent. Well, okay…maybe it wasn’t a thousand miles. More like thirty steps, but I’m allowed to share what it looked like through my eyes, and a thousand miles was probably too short.

I went down about seven or eight steps, stopped, and waited for the prince to pass me so I could put a hand on his shoulder for balance. I did great until the last step. One step from the gym floor. That was it. One step. I let go of Tim’s shoulder and, with all the self-confidence I’d mustered coming down, I stepped. My ankles buckled, and life went into s-l-o-w m-o-t-i-o-n. My arms flailed, my feet easily touched my forehead (maybe that’s a stretch, but accept creative liberty here), and I folded into a perfect U before my butt hit the gym floor.

Now, I’m sure it was comical, but here’s what got me. There were fifteen or twenty people sitting next to where I fell, and not one of them offered to help. My head even banged against a woman’s knee. HELLO! Old lady on the floor! A man from several feet away rushed over to help Tim get me up. What’s the world come to? I do rest assured that I am on every one of their twenty or so phones. So, if you see me falling in slow motion on Facebook, TikTok, or Instagram, please tag me. I’d like to view the incident from a comical standpoint. To that, I say...tomato squarsh!

Okay, so Chase, in my mind, was knocked out of the blooper first place, though I’m sure he keeps that spot, according to any cars that passed by the “orgy” sign on Wednesday. Ingles probably had a run of patrons that day.  

All right. Chase wins!

All that leads you up to the empty post.

So, since he was little, Chase has loved Christmas. He loves Marvel Comics, too, thanks to the prince, but Christmas is our eyesore. When you drive by our house, it’s like passing by the Griswold’s’ house. There are Christmas blowups everywhere.

Before the days of blowups, our front fence and house had tons of lights, albeit they were poorly installed; we’ve always stood out in the neighborhood. The prince and I never complained because lighting the house up at Christmas gave Chase a real thrill. 

We enjoyed that he enjoyed decorating.

Then came the days of Christmas blowups.

 At first, they were basic—a snowman or a nutcracker. We had the six-foot nutcracker in the front yard. Stand him in the yard, plug him in, and he stood tall, saluting the cars that passed by. My neighbor called once, laughing hysterically. “Cindy, look outside at your nutcracker soldier.” I opened the door to find my nutcracker, who saluted with one hand, using his free hand to do pushups in the yard. The wind had blown him forward, and he lay face down on the ground with the free hand extended, doing pushups as his fan tried to straighten him back to standing. I wondered why cars were driving by tooting their horns. Our nutcracker looked like he was doing military pushups in the front yard. Anyway, you get the drift.

Every Christmas, it’s a real challenge to keep Chase from buying Christmas inflatables. At one point, we had ten in our yard. We have since issued the Buy-One-Get-Rid-of-One ultimatum, and it’s slowing his obsession. This year, when we went to Lowe's and Home Depot, the inflatables were not only as big as our house in some cases, but the cost had rocketed to $500 or more. Even Chase choked and coughed, so I thought we’d actually miss a year of purchasing yet another gaudy inflatable. Until we drove to Johnson City to enjoy a meal out.

On the way home, the prince said he’d like to stop at Home Depot (since he is the king of Ryobi tools, he needed a new battery). As we pulled into the parking lot, a huge sign swayed in the wind. 75% off all Christmas Décor.  Chase nearly came out of his seatbelt. I just leaned against the window and hoped there were no inflatables.

All the way into the store, Chase jabbered about a huge sale and that it was the perfect time to purchase a new addition for his collection. We walked into the store, and Tim took an immediate left to the Ryobi tools (the coward), while Chase and I made a right to the Christmas décor.

To my delight, the only thing left on the shelf was several bottles of pine spray for that wintery scent of Christmas tree.

“Oh, shoot, Chaser. No decorations. Well, there’s next year. You had a nice display this year,” I said. I could see the smile on his face droop. “Maybe Kingsport’s store still has some online.”

To that, I felt a sigh of relief, and we headed to find Tim. I needed to run to the restroom, so I left Tim and Chase sorting through the vast array of green tools. When I came back, they were in the Christmas décor where all the empty shelves were. The prince, of all people, located the ONLY Christmas inflatable in the entire store. It was boxed on the floor at the end of the aisle. Chase stood smiling from ear to ear. “It’s on sale, Mom!”

Tim leaned toward me to whisper, “It was $199.99, and we nearly missed it. It’s $47.87.” What do you say to a sale like that? Chase snatched the huge box up and heaved it onto his shoulder. “It’s mine. All mine!” He reminded me of Daffy Duck rolling around in Aladdin’s gold. “It’s mine. All mine.” (evil laugh)

I glanced at Tim. “Oh, no. Olaf!” The prince just chuckled. Don’t let him fool you. That innocent smile will get you every time. He’s sneaky!

So, Chase paid, picked up his purchase, and pranced out of Home Depot like he’d won the lottery. And what do I have to look forward to next Christmas? A giant Olaf from Frozen. All I could think of was, “Olaf! Oh, no!”

Don’t get me wrong. I know Chase loves the inflatables, and honestly, I say very little when he drags them out and plugs them in. After all, he pays the power bill! But it brings Chase great joy. Our home may look like the Griswolds, a bit tacky, but it is fun to watch Chase walk outside at night and observe his creation. He is proud.

It made me think about the pride we place in the things we do. When I teach at writers' conferences, one thing I tell writers is to take pride in their work. That doesn’t mean being prideful or bragging, but it means doing your best. Put forth a good effort. It doesn’t matter if someone else thinks your work isn’t clean and neat. The effort we put forth is what our Father in Heaven looks at. Perfection isn’t what He seeks. Instead, it’s the desire to serve, the love of doing what He has gifted us to do.

Our approval shouldn’t come from earthly people, but from the Father who has given us a touch of His creativity. Our yard may look a bit tacky, but when cars drive past, they always slow down to take a look. Chase’s work only has to convey the joy of the gift. He’s done all he can do to make his work the very best it can be, and that is what pleases the Father—our best. Olaf or not. Our best, be it perfect in the eyes of others or not, is what gives great glory to God.

That said, one last blooper. This morning, our ladies' Bible study cranked back up. Before class, one of the ladies asked if she could say something. So, I obliged her the opportunity, and she began to tell us about some people trying to scam her on the phone and how none of our ladies should ever give out personal information. It was a good thing to share, and I backed her up on that little announcement. In the meantime, I had passed around a notebook for the ladies to sign. I led prayer, gave a few opening remarks, and then said, “I’ve passed around a notebook. Please be sure to write your name, email address, and social security number down.” The entire room burst into laughter. “No..no. I don’t want your information. I mean, I do want your information, but not your social security number. Oh, for Pete’s sake.” A more perfect remark couldn’t have followed an announcement about being careful of scams.

As my Mamaw used to say, “You missed every sheep pile and found the cow piles.” I doubt my escapades will outdo Chase’s sign blooper this week, but I made a gallant effort.

So, I thought I’d close with today’s evening prayer.

“Lord, I know you want me to always do my best at all I do, but I don’t think You intended that to be grabbing my Bible study ladies’ social security numbers. Besides, You’re a numbers guy. You already got them on file. You don’t need my help. But Lord, (I smiled a real toothy grin right here). I did my best!”

Photo 1- Image by Tumisu from Pixabay. Photo 2 –Image by K Lonsford from Pixabay. Photo 3 &4 –  cindysproles.com