A Weekend in the Life of Olivia (a.k.a. Olivia, the spider and the Iron Man Gang)

On Friday night, while babysitting for some friends, Olivia walked unsuspecting to her car in order to get her pajamas from her bag. She was talking to her friend Andy on her phone at the time when she noticed 1’ from her face a large house spider on the ceiling of her car. She yelped and hit her head on the doorway of her car, leaving Andy to wonder what was happening. After treating him to the delightful sounds of the spider dance, she explained hesitatingly to him about her fear of spiders. I say “hesitatingly” because she also has a friend named Sean who is afraid of frogs and his pals waste no opportunity to throw frogs on him. Andy’s advice was to use the can of air freshener in the car to kill it. He may have meant to use the can to bash the thing but Olivia sprayed it instead. The spider didn’t like this of course and set about the death act. Olivia was shaken but triumphant that she has defeated the spider.

On Saturday, she spent part of the day with us at Anastasia State Park at the beach. We had planned a ‘September” birthday celebration. The day was perfect with the exception of all of the dead fish lining the beach, courtesy of the shrimpers just off the coast. Thanks guys! I digress. Unfortunately, Olivia had to return early to finish some online homework before going back to her babysitting job.

On the way home, Olivia noticed a large group of men on motorcycles complete with leather jackets that proclaimed them the “Iron Man Gang.”

From I-95 to Hastings, Olivia played a sort of ‘cat and mouse’ game with the gang passing and looking at her bikini clad self through the open window (no A/C). There was one particular member who stood out because his leather jacket appeared newly stitched with the gang’s logo and he was riding an ape [ ]. Somewhere around Federal Point, Olivia decided to pass the gang thinking to be rid of them but homeboy” broke formation and rode up behind her to tailgate for a quarter mile before pulling up along side her. After a few attempts at communication on his part, Olivia freaked out a little, checked her rear view mirror and seeing no one close behind, hit the brakes. He braked as well, throwing his arms up in the air as if to say ‘What the #*@@? and went back into formation. Shortly after this, Olivia made to turn off onto Cracker Swamp Rd followed by homeboy, who had ridden up behind her again. She was thinking of calling Dawn, pulling a ‘U’ie and heading back to the Murray house where the guns are ready and loaded, when he pulled back in line with the rest of the gang who passed by waving at her. She said she was shaking so back she has to use her left foot to control the gas and brake.

Remember the spider she killed the night before? Right! Well, on Sunday after church we were all loading up to go home when Olivia ran up to me and asked to drive the van home. I thought maybe her car was giving her trouble so I said I would. She was following me back to her car however and midway pulled off one of her heeled sandals, handed it to me and said “You might need this.” The spider was back. She noticed the spider on the ceiling over the back seat when she turned around to back out of her parking space. She didn’t panic at first, ‘only squeaked a little’ she said, then pulled back into her space before coming to get me. She did admit, however that she forgot to turn the motor off and unbuckle her seat belt before getting out of the car. After getting that sorted out and coming to get me she stood off to the side in a pretty sun dress and one shoe while I made like I was going to do away with it once and for all. She told me the spider was on the ceiling but I didn’t see it at first so I stuck my head cautiously into the car looking around and eventually found it (approximately the size of the palm of my hand) directly over my head, at which point I banged my head on the car, whipped around and ran into the car parked in the next spot. Following a good 5 second ‘spider dance’ accompanied by Olivia over on the sidewalk, I blindly banged her shoe onto the ceiling missing the spider. I tried a few more times not realizing that we had drawn the attention of a few of the other church members who were also leaving. Jeremy Hawkins drove by and gallantly allowed himself to be persuaded (he didn’t actually volunteer) to kill the spider. With shoe in hand, he banged repeatedly on the ceiling muttering something I couldn’t quite catch. The only word I understood was ‘FAST’ and yes, it was. I am happy to say the spider is well and truly dead now and Olivia was able to drive herself home without incident.

Don' shoot a nigga!

Palatka is an entertaining place to be if you just have the right attitude and pay attention. Mostly I don’t like living here but occasionally I am reminded that in other places where higher culture abounds, people like the man my daughters and I met tonight aren’t as prevalent.

Kelly is home visiting for the weekend and had decided she was starving, she usually does this after everyone else has eaten but since I don’t see her as much and since we had been out most of the evening I relented and stopped at a local pizza take-out.

We were sitting in the parking lot talking to our friend (who had the same idea for dinner) and waiting for the pizza to finish when a black man on a bicycle pulled up quickly next to Kelly’s open window and said “Don’ shoot a nigga!” To which I calmly and brilliantly replied “I can’t, I don’t have a gun.” I suppose , if we had possessed any common sense (which I now doubt) we should have been frightened but we just burst into laughter. The man lifted up his shirt and said “I don’ either but dat don’ stop you fum callin’ da Poh-leece and dey’ll shoot a nigga!” I shouldn’t have but I cracked up even more.

He spouted on more about the perils of being a black man much to our delight and at the end of it all he left with $3.25 (our total combined worth) and we were offered a blessing of safety and a good night.

My friend, thankfully, had the good sense to stay until he left and I noticed she had her cell phone out, ready to call in the “Poh-leece” if needed.

Dawn

My friend Dawn is going to have her baby today. She is four days past her due date and is in Flaglar Hospital to be induced. I should be with her but I am waiting for everything to get started. Actually her parents are there and I have low tolerance for them so I am waiting until the last minute to head over. For a little while now I have been hoping little Blake would hurry up and make his appearance but today is Open house at the school and College night at the high school and I am torn by my obligations. I promised Dawn I would be there and I will...I just wish I knew what time to go over. The pitocin drip (meds to start labor) won't be given until noon maybe so givien the fact that I didn't have a baby until 12 hours later myself, would it be ok to assume the same for Dawn and go to the kids schools or play it safe and be there anyway.

I am a person who believes in having cake and eating it. We'll see.

September 2, 2009

I have had a very busy last few weeks. My kids have started school and so have the early mornings. Ben, bless his heart has taken the early morning shift and I feel like such a lazy good for nothing. You know it is bad when your 8 year old asks before she goes to bed if you will make it out of bed to say good bye to her. YIKES!! I told her I would make it this morning but I didn’t. My problem is that I didn’t marry a man who snored but I am married to one now. It is funny because he doesn’t snore loud. If I fall asleep before Ben, all is well and the snoring doesn’t wake me but if he falls asleep before me it is better if I just get up and sleep elsewhere otherwise I’ll never get to sleep. I think I made it to sleep about 1am. Oddly enough, I can sleep through Ben snoring but not the cats. They wake me up at 5 every morning to go outside. I don’t know why they can’t wait until 5:30 when Olivia and Stephanie wake up but I don’t dare chance it. After getting up to deal with that I suppose it would be better if I just stayed up but I don’t. I try to go back to sleep and lay there listening to Ben snore. He gets up about 6 to get Stephanie on the bus and I fall asleep then. For some reason at that point, I sleep like the dead and cannot wake up. I am tired all day and have started trying to go to bed early. The problem with that is that I am a night owl so going to bed early doesn’t feel natural to me.

The kids are doing ok in school, I suppose. They don’t like it much but they never really have. Olivia loves being a senior but her day is finished usually around noon. Kelly likes her new school and though she misses home (and home misses her) I think she is really enjoying her time with her grandparents. I am going to Trenton on Friday to pick her up. It will be the first time we’ve seen her in about 3 weeks. Stephanie will be 14 years old on Friday. I think the girls are planning on going to the high school football game Friday night with a birthday party for Steph on Saturday.

My friend Dawn’s baby is due on Sunday. I think because I have so much to do on Friday and Saturday, baby Murray will decide to put in his appearance then. Why not, right? I am excited and honored to have been asked to help coach Dawn with her labor. She will do great though. She has practiced telling me to ‘shut up’ and saying ‘I hate you’ I shutter to think what she is training her husband Chad to hear. I am very proud of how Dawn has cleaned up her language in preparation for her motherhood but have teased her that I won’t be the bit surprised if her baby comes out cussing.