The other night the beau and I were fast asleep when  we heard a loud SHHHUNK.

We both simultaneously raised our heads off our pillows; I struggled up onto an elbow. What was that?

And then: THUMP THUNK.

It was 2:29 a.m. on the dot. The beau got up and staggered around the living room for a minute before going back to bed. He was asleep again within moments, breathing audibly. Me, not so much. I moved slowly from room to room, looking around, peering out of each window. Eventually I gave up and went back to bed, too. There are only so many preventative measures one can take in one’s daily life. If someone really wants to murder us, there’s no point in staying awake for it.

The next morning, we pieced together what had happened. In our makeshift kitchen closet a box containing a handful of seasonal Yankee candles had slid slowly off of a shelf, releasing the candles from their plastic prison whereupon they loudly went their respective ways across the closet floor. I laughed, put the box in the recycling bin, and lined the candles back up on the shelf. Now that the candles are free of their scent-trapping container, the beau keeps complaining that it smells like autumn threw up in our kitchen. I don’t necessarily have a problem with that.

And we’re not dead yet.

*****

We’ve officially received our first happy anniversary card, and it’s from Beau’s aunt.1 The front has a picture of two puppy butts with tails coming together to form a heart, and it says “It takes two to make puppy love go right….” And on the inside she wrote, with blue marker:

Boopsie was sick from flea medication — had a seizure + quit breathing i gave her mouth to mouth a heart thump + she came back she is 11 1/2 stays in more + doing fine Thank you God — I’m OK: Will recharge batteries again. Bit by Black Widow in my hair. Still here —
Enjoy nature + keep on hiking — Have fun! 18 Sept 2011

Nothing. I have no words.

*****

Last night I came home from a bar to rediscover the following:

  • A Grand Funk Railroad record lying alone in the middle of our dining room table.
  • A disassembled Santa suit strewn across the spare room.
  • Underwear stashed in my handbag.
  • A tiny picture of the Canadian flag tucked inside my bra.2

All I’m going to say is that this is what happens when the beau’s rugby team puts on a scavenger hunt.

*****

I have this well-worn habit of feigning collapse at well-timed moments, just to try to get a laugh. Yesterday, I was perched on the arm of a comfortable old leather chair when I had one of those such moments. I let myself fall backwards dramatically and, conveniently forgetting there was another arm on the chair, promptly cracked the base of my skull on it.

Now my brain hurts.

LESSON. CONSIDER YOURSELF LEARNED.

*****

1 We also often get letters from Beau’s uncle, who shares stories from his childhood days back in Pittsburgh (“Of course, in those days the steel mills were still going.”). I never fail to think of Robin when I read these tales. Unfortunately, he is also an evangelist who sends us books by Rev. Billy Graham, so. You win some, you lose some.

2 It’s so easy to forget things inside of bras. A few years ago, after a red eye flight back from Maui, I arrived home bleary-eyed at 7:30 a.m. and began peeling off my clothes to go to bed when a $20 bill and two quarters fell out of my bra. That’s probably the most lucrative personal bra recovery to date. Even counting the little plastic army man I once found in there.