Saturday, April 4, 2009

the sky is falling

no. really. I got up this morning to find part of the kitchen ceiling on the floor. The ceiling does not belong on the floor. However, a square foot of it fell onto a chair and shattered. Pieces were everywhere. I heard it in the night, like someone rattling a door with glass in it, but I told myself it was the wind blowing branches against a window so I did not have to get up and check the doors. Nope. It was the ceiling falling.

And I knew it was coming. Not exactly, but Jess and I wondered what would happen this time. He is in Chicago right now, attending the MPSA conference. He's gone for the last nine years, except for when we had a two day old baby, (David). Every year, something happens, something odd, something out of the ordinary, something that takes us by surprise. The first year, I went with him. I was four weeks pregnant with Sarah and did not feel well. We stayed with cousins twice removed. On our drive we kept noticing ants in the car. Odd. As I straightened our room the first morning, I kept killing ants. Surprising. I traced them - to Jesse's computer. I ran it out to the patio and sat and stared in amazement as an entire colony of ants moved out of Jesse's computer to find a new life in the suburbs of Chicago. Another year our cottage was infested with swarming termites, looking for a new place to call home. Hundreds of thousands of termites flying in your living room is out of the ordinary. Then there was our salivating dog. At the time we had Kasey, our Golden. She came in drooling like mad. The poor thing kept pawing at her mouth as her head lay in a pool of saliva. The not so smart emergency vet thought maybe she was stung by a bee and gave me motion sickness pills for her. The knowledgeable nurse said she'd heard of this happening to dogs when catching toads. Both out of the ordinary and scary. The only other time I went with Jesse we stayed at a not so many starts hotel and David and Sarah were with us. I again was tired and VERY cranky (or bitchy, whichever you prefer). We discovered a month later that I was almost three months pregnant with Leah. Surprise! Poison ivy, illnesses, driving on donuts, and now the ceiling. What's next?

2 comments:

Maya / מיה said...

Oh no!! I remember the drooling thing. What are you going to do about the ceiling? Good luck!

Patricia said...

I haven't heard back from our agent yet. It is actually spackling that fell. To repair it they will have to rip all the other cracking, spackling off and put new stuff up that hopefully stays stuck to the ceiling. In the meantime, I'm going to try your mother's suggestion of a sheet - to prevent more shattering, especially on someone's head.