Stick a Needle in Your Eye

I'm here to complain.

My resident hummingbird seems to think I'm an intruder on my deck, but then he has the audacity to get agitated when I take his feeder inside to replenish his sugar-water. He chases away the other birds too. Their crime was to take a leisurely bath in the terracotta saucers I fill for them. If size weren't at odds, I might think that my boy was a hummingbird in a previous life. My boy is taller than I am now and hairy, but he does that same thing now and then, fluffing himself up and coming at me with his chest out as if I'm in his way. It's a good thing hummingbirds come in small packages. They'd be a menace if they were larger.

Lots of things are like that. The Japanese have magnified moths, ants, and lizards to great effect, but does anyone think about how that needle beak would look if it were six feet long? And those wings? A hummingbird could probably make a Vietnam helicopter vet look like an amateur.

There are lots of things that are like that, creatures with voracious appetites whose small sizes keep them from being terrifying. And hummingbirds would fit in there with the best of them.

As it is, I actually like his audacity, chasing off birds ten times his size and making me, a regular behemoth, take a step or two back on occasion. Maybe it's the red jacket I'm wearing with my yellow shirt underneath. Maybe I look like a giant red flower.

Ha! I feel about as much like a flower as a rhino feels like a flamingo.

More complaints. I have a clogged tear duct. No big deal, right? Not really, except that I've got one great big bag under one eye and a zit where I might otherwise put eyeliner. I'm supposed to sit with a warm compress over it until it clears. Since I'm almost blind without my glasses, I can do nothing while I sit holding this thing over my eye. And since it takes a whole hand, I can't type or write. I can't read. I can't watch TV. I can't safely walk around. It's ridiculous and the damned thing hasn't popped yet. Oh, it oozes when I'm done, like a slow drain, but it's not clearing. This is going on a couple of weeks and I just don't have time to sit staring into the middle space in front of me for a couple of hours every day while I cook my eyeball under a hot wash cloth.

The alternative?

Do you really want to hear the answer?

One time, I ignored one of these little suckers. It zitted out my lower lid for about three months, looking rather contagious and oozy. Still, I managed to ignore it as long as I wasn't blinking or looking in a mirror.

And then I went to my eye doctor, who proceeded to tell me about the perils of an infection in the eye. That man immediately scheduled me for more time on his docket. I should have paid attention to his enthusiasm. I have a different eye doctor now.

He numbed me in the lower lid, just inside the lid, with a shot! Yes, I had to watch this man come at my eye with a needle. Plus, there was some horror-movie contraption he used to keep my eye open and to squirt saline in my eye periodically. Honestly, he got my eye all trussed up and I wanted to run screaming from the room. Then, though I could feel tugging and scraping and I was forced to see every move of the scalpel, he cut that clogged tear duct right out of my lower eyelid.

Did you throw up yet? I almost did, except I kept thinking of the perils of an infection in the eye.

And that's why I've been sitting out on my deck, being harassed by my resident hummingbird, with a hot washcloth pressed against my eye.

Hey, you asked, didn't you?

Didn't you?

Thank you for listening, jules

Sunny Mornings, Graduations, and Too Much to Do

There isn't a cloud in the sky. Most people love when there isn't a cloud in the sky, but I have to be different, crabby about good weather, a curmudgeon. Why does it seem like there are more obligations when it's a sunny day?

"A good day for a walk," someone might say.

"I'm trying to catch up on my yard work," someone else mentions. My yard has weeds that are two feet tall and theirs looks like a golf course.

Oh, my only problem is five and a half hours of sleep and too many obligations. I have a meeting this morning, Nick's physical therapy this afternoon. The roofing guy is coming soon after that, and Nick has karate tonight. No time for a break. No time, even, to make a decent dinner, not that I have anything planned for dinner.

Tomorrow, on a morning when I should be sleeping in, Mike is going for a hike. That will involve extra morning noise. And Nick is supposed to meet a friend for a movie. Who goes to the movies in the morning?

See what I mean? Curmudgeon. I can't even enjoy going to the movies at this point. I'm not sure what I need, but it isn't going to the movies. It isn't taking my son to karate or talking with a roofing guy or going to a meeting.

I also have the problem of the too early dawn. This is the time of year that it's light out at 4:30 in the morning. I need black-out shades or those little silk blinds for my eyes. I know there's a word for that, but I can't think of it. It's too early, not even 6:00 am. I wake up before I need to. I wake up crabby and tired and there's a hectic fizz to the days.

Next week will be better, I tell myself. Next week isn't as busy. But I need to call landscapers, schedule the roofers, get notes from Nick's doctor and physical therapist for football, buy dress pants for Nick's middle school graduation, go through my pile to see what I missed. You do have a pile, don't you? I'm sure I've missed something.

And why the hell do they have a graduation from 8th grade? Sure he's going to a new school next year, but it's with the same kids he's hanging out with this year. And he's not done with school. He's not nearly done with school. What's the big deal?

I'm not a big fan of fanfare either.

See what I mean?

Curmudgeon.

Thank you for listening, jules