Tag Archives: crazy

Butter Gall

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Butter Gall

I like to try new things and this week was no exception.

Okay, I really don’t like to try new things and this week was no exception.

My grandson and daughter-in-law invited my husband and I to go bowling.  Now, I’m no slouch at this game.  In fact, I recently beat my brother, Mike.  Did you get that, Mike?  I beat my older brother MIKE (that’s his name) at bowling.

We get our shoes and hurry to the lane.  My 9-year-old grandson is excited to get started and he throws his ball down the alley.

I’m up next.  I pause and align my feet with the appropriate arrows.  I move my ball into the optimal position and step forward.  Here’s where I tried something new.  Instead of just throwing the ball down the lane, I decide to try bowling my entire body.  I release the ball just one second late which causes me to step over the foul line where I instantly become Wile E. Coyote peddling my feet on the highly-buffed hardwood as if I’d just run off the edge of a cliff.

Observers tell me they thought for one moment I was going to save myself, but that was not the case.  SPLAT–I crash down on my tailbone and then fall back, hitting my head on the polished hardwood.  As I slowly glide, spreadeagled down the lane toward the pins, I think I hear my father’s loving voice from my childhood.  “Oh…honey…you know you’re not coordinated enough to play a sport.”

I make it to my hands and knees and crawl back to my seat.  I shake my head in attempt to bring the scoreboard into focus.  I think I see a 1 next to my name so, trying to pull some dignity out of the situation, I say, “Well, at least I didn’t throw a butter gall.”  I look around at the six people staring back at me, blink my eyes until they return to the original three people and say “Ha, ha.  Butter Gall?  I meant to say Butter Gall.  Wait, that’s not right.”  I struggle to figure out what order the letters should go in.

Just as my daughter-in-law suggests an emergency room visit I come up with the right words.  “Gutter Ball!” I shout.  “At least I didn’t throw a gutter ball!”

Unfortunately, I can’t say that for much of rest of the game, ending with a pitiful score somewhere under 50.

The good news is – there’s nothing funnier to a nine-year-old boy than watching an adult slip and fall.  Right now, my grandson thinks I’m hilarious.

I know you are, but what am I?

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Future Character

My dad was a certified Eccentric Character. A title he wore proudly. When I think of him, a little slideshow of images flash through my mind.

A young version of Dad walking into my first job.  He wore a pair of Buddy Holly type glasses but the thick black side pieces were on the outside of his ears, because “they hurt my head.”  He just smiled and waved at me as I tried to hide.

An older, much fatter, version of Dad.  My husband and I were sitting in the living room watching TV.  Dad walked out of his bedroom wearing only a t-shirt and briefs, but held a tiny hand towel in front of his chest for modesty.  He smiled and waved.

These antics of his used to embarrass me to no end.  But, I’ve begun to notice, I’m not that unlike him after all.

Current Character

Here I am in New York, staying at my brother’s apartment. He was out of town and kindly allowed me to use his place as a writing retreat. He lives in a beautiful loft with 8 foot windows. It was late and I was cold, because the window in front of me wouldn’t quite close all the way. In the outfit you see before you, I climbed up on the windowsill, and like a flannel-clad Spiderwoman, edged my way from one end of the wall of windows, to the other. Plastered against the glass, struggling to get the window to close, I looked up to see the people in the apartment building across the street watching me.   I smiled and waved.

Earlier this week I stepped out my car at the gym and realized I’d forgotten to change my shoes.  I still had on my fuzzy bedroom slippers.  I thought about going back home to change but then said, “Oh well.”  I rode the stationery bike which faces the running track. Each time someone rounded the corner they stumbled a bit as they stared at me.  I smiled and waved.

Yes, Family, it’s true.  I have stepped onto the slippery slope of Eccentric Characterdom.  Be afraid, be very afraid.