RDP Tuesday: EXPLAIN
One of these days we’re going to have to explain this world we’re living in now and this is how I think it will go for me:
” Where did Murder Hornets come from? ” I imagine my Granddaughter asking me one day. ” Did you ever see one? What’s it like to be stung by one? Do they really sound like hummingbirds when they fly?”
” I saw a bunch of them try to carry off one cat and then they carried off another. It was pretty awful. “
” No you did not ” my Granddaughter will say.
” Yes I did. Don’t you ever wonder why you never see any cats around here?”
” I thought it was because you’re allergic”
” Murder Hornets ” I will say darkly.
” Lola,” my Grandaughter will ask me one day ” Was there really a sandstorm that circled the world? Did it really start in the Sahara Desert? Did it really dump sand in Texas? Did you see that? Did it dump sand in Washington too?
” Do you know what it was called? I will tell her, ” It was called, “The Godzilla Sandstorm“
My Grandaughter, whose name is Jemma will roll her eyes up into her head. ” Lola that is the biggest pile of baloney you’ve ever stacked. “
” It’s true. Ask the internet-“
” Internet ” Jemma will snort ” Nobody calls it that Lola.”
” Okay, I’ll tell you the truth. It was a curse. One day someone in the Cairo Museum accidently damaged a mummy and the next thing you know…womp. What can I say, one of those Curses was bound to be real and it was bound to pay off and boy did it.”
Jemma will look at me and say, ” I knew it.”
And then one day Jemma will ask me about the Virus that swept the world when she was two years old and she will ask me if I had it and did I know anyone who died and what was it like to not be able to go to the movies or to concerts or parties and what did we do all day?
I will remember the times that I rode the train with “Fever Boy.” he was the guy who coughed and hacked and sneezed and finally he started to wear a mask- but he only wore it when he was waiting for the train. He took it off when he got on.
And then there was Crazy Cooter- he was the guy who only wore his mask over his mouth and when he was reading he would flip it on the top of his head, the way you do with your glasses when you don’t need them. Anyway, he would read quietly, out loud to himself.
He used to sneeze a lot.
The streets and trains were full of people like Fever Boy and Crazy Cooter. They made a lot of people sick. Lots and lots of people. It should have been a crime.
” Well, when we were under stay at home orders I started a new hobby.”
” What was your new hobby?”
” Head hunting. “
” Oh Lola! ” Jemma will laugh. ” That’s so silly. Everyone knows you didn’t head hunt.’
My Son will join in at this point, ” Come on Mom. Tell her the truth. You didn’t hunt for heads.”
I will look down modestly and then I will admit, ” I took up sewing again so I made-“
” Masks?” Jeamma will guess.
” Voodoo dolls. ” I will tell her.
” Best dang Voodoo Dolls in the entire state of Washington.” My son will say proudly. ” Those things really worked. But that was at the end of the pandemic when you started to make them, right?” my Son will say with a wink over his daughter’s head.
” Yeah. At the end” I will tell her.
And my son will try to laugh so that Jemma will know we we’re only kidding around.
But it won’t be a very convincing laugh.
