I’m going to be quietly reeling from this day for quite a while, it was totally runuluck, but different than any I’ve experienced before in that Alex was with me for a good chunk of the day {and he don’t nap no more} and so much of what happened was through his lens or in aid of his needs, more accurately.
They picked me up at 6 and we proceeded down the road the way we normally do. We were on the bridge when we first noticed the atmospheric effects which honestly I thought were mushroom flashbacks. Finally I broke down and said something to the effect of “That looks fucking weird and like noctilucent clouds except it’s on the ground and mostly purple and white and orange (but pale… ghostly) and Alex noticed the ring around the moon, announcing loudly that there was a rainbow around the moon before going back to his game. The phenomenon can best be described as stable air ground fog iridescence, because it occurred in the following places: between 50 and 200 metres; with a row of white lights behind it (as happens in a couple of places along the highways on the way to Tsawwassen Terminal) and the fog had to be sort of the right texture, I don’t know how else to describe it. At one point there was an enormous eye of the stuff leering down the highway because one part was denser than the other so the iridescence only worked around the outer edge. Freeeeeaky shit, man. It was weird enough that I had to dial myself down from feeling scared. Then I realized that the daysigns were starting and I needed to be calm, and so I PROJECTED A BOW WAVE OF GRANDMOTHERLY CALM IN FRONT OF THE CAR which was about as freaky as the rainbow since I could see the white wave extending in front of me.
Alex calls out from the back seat NOTE note NOTE and Katie says are you reading the Not In Service announcement on the bus? and I said, “While your grandmother is in the car?” and Katie and I get snerfly derfly.
Everything uneventful and orderly at the Terminal, Katie gets out of the car and I’m scowling like a motherfucker because it’s pretty damned dark and SHE’S NOT REFLECTIVE at all and she’s the fucking safety officer at work and HOW DARE SHE and then a thousand starlings leap as one out of the two trees next to her and murmurate like anything. She gives this adorable lurch, not having expected a thousand cloacae to HUP fly over her (telling me afterward that all she could think was do not poop do not poop do not poooop) and then she has to turn around and come back because the ferryman has called everyone back to their cars.
She was fucking dying for a coffee and had to wait, like 20 MINUTES she was about ready to bite the dash, until we got onto the ferry. I sprang for the buffet and told Alex to stay put and watch my purse, which he kindly agreed to do.
We watched the clouds. The clouds over Vancouver continued to be weird and they looked like they were painted on, with white circles around them like a frigging kid’s drawing. Katie was standing next to me, she saw it too.
And then she saw a seal; Alex’s consulting animal.
The sun came out. We left the horrible weather behind, it was wonderful.
Two adult bald eagles came to roost in a tree at the same time (as it, folded their wings at the same time) as we drove past them on the Pat Bay Highway. I’ve never seen that happen except in a nature documentary.
Then we stopped at Thrifty’s and I stayed in the car with Alex, remembering to call mOm so she didn’t think we’d phone-poled ourselves.
Then we got to the folks’ place and unpacked all the goodies and drank tea and Alex reacquainted himself with his favourite sun room toys and hummingbirds and THE FATTEST FUCKING SQUIRRELS I mean chonk style, absolute unit, massive fucking squirrels, and you think fuck that’s a big squirrel and then the other guy shows up and it’s how can you jump up that high you look like your thigh muscles should just say yeah, no, sorry, I am dead now. Fat squirrels.
Alex and I worked our way through the disco light, the rocks that glow and the rocks that do not glow (when held up to a lamp), the reason that your shadow is not over there is because it is there and you are here. Nope, that won’t work either. Seriously Alex, you know this. Light on one side, you in the middle, shadow on the outside. This is truly hopeless.
So I read favourite books including Hop on Pop.
And something that has Knapweed in it. And I say Knapweed is a funny word because you have to ignore the K. Alex says “The K is silent” and I’m thinking yes that is a strong reading readiness sig-a-nal.
I had one of the strangest and yet most wonderful experiences as a grandperson yet. Out of a clear blue sky – we were between book readings – he tells me that when he has a scary dream he imagines me running among the scary things with a broomstick beating the crap out of them.
I’m honoured, of course, that he would think of me in those terms, and I assured him that I would indeed be only too happy to kick the snot out of any scary things that have the nerve to come into his dreams. The conversation, as it does with lively youngsters, shifts.
On the way home in the car (it was a flying visit to my fOlks who continue to be adorable and I’d say that even if they weren’t assisting me) I ask his mama about this. He’s conked out in the back. She tells me that when Mars Attacks scared her that’s what I said to her, that I’d beat their big ugly heads in with a broomstick. I had no recollection of that.
Now I’m home safe and intend at some point to sleep.
it was quite a day
