Some of my Facebook friends and I
were having a discussion about ticks the other day. For one thing, we were
saying how we used to play in fields or in the woods when we were kids and
never once even saw a tick. Nowadays if we tried that, we’d probably end up
covered with so many ticks, we’d be plucking them out of our skin for the next
10 years.
“I don’t know where they all
suddenly came from,” one of my friends wrote, “but I sure as heck wish they’d
go back to wherever it was!”
“Global warming,” another one said.
“That’s what brought them here.”
“No, they hitched a ride here from
Connecticut, where they were plentiful, and then they started breeding like
wildfire,” yet another said.
As the conversation progressed, I
found myself wishing I could return to a time when I was able to go for a walk
in the woods and not have to come home and immediately strip down and search
for ticks hiding out in my body folds…especially since my body has more folds
than an accordion.
Anyway, the Facebook conversation
reminded me of another conversation I’d had not long ago with one of my
friends. She’d called on a hot summer day to excitedly tell me about Keith, the
new man in her life.
“We’re going on a romantic picnic
this weekend,” she said. “He knows a spot way off the beaten path where there
is a beautiful meadow with a pond in the middle of it, and a big shade tree
near the shore.”
“Sounds nice,” I said. “Hey, you can
do what we used to do when we were kids that was so much fun. Lie back on the
blanket and look up at the clouds and make pictures of out of them! You can
learn a lot about your new boyfriend that way. I mean, if a cloud looks like
the shape of two balloons to you, but it looks like a bra to him, well, he
could be a pervert!”
“Blanket?” she
repeated, ignoring the rest of my words of wisdom. “Are you kidding? Ticks
would be crawling all over it within minutes. I’m bringing lawn chairs. And I’m
going to wear long pants tucked into my socks, long sleeves and a wide-brimmed
hat, just to be doubly safe. I’ve heard that ticks can climb up trees, sense
when a warm body is nearby and then drop onto your head as you pass by.”
That was a new one to me. Still, as
I envisioned hundreds of little paratrooper ticks skydiving out of the big
shade tree and landing on her hat, I found myself thinking that her picnic was
beginning to sound somewhat less than romantic.
“So what are you going to bring to
eat?” I asked. “A picnic basket stuffed with fried chicken and potato salad?”
“Fried chicken and potato salad!”
Her habit of repeating my words was beginning to make me feel as if I were
talking to a parrot. “All that cholesterol? I want to win Keith’s heart, not
clog it! Besides that, poultry and mayonnaise don’t travel all that well in hot
weather, and I sure as heck don’t want to give him food poisoning.”
I giggled. “Yeah, imagine how you’d
feel if the two of you started kissing and he suddenly pulled away, grasped his
stomach and threw up! You’d wonder if it was due to your bad food or bad
kissing!”
My friend didn’t laugh. “Actually,”
she said, “I was thinking of bringing something like rye crackers, hard cheese
and fresh fruit. Oh, and a nice red wine. That should be safe enough.”
“That sounds fine for appetizers,” I
said. “But what’s your main course?”
“You have no concept of what a
romantic picnic is all about, do you?” she asked.
The last picnic I’d been on was back
in 1970, and it was with my parents, so it was pretty safe to say it wasn’t
romantic. Still, I’d never pictured a romantic picnic to involve sitting in
lawn chairs while wearing three layers of clothes and nibbling on dry crackers.
I mean, picnics never were depicted that way in romance novels or movies.
I decided to tease her. “So, are you
going to go skinny dipping in the pond?”
Again, her tone was serious. “No,
there are supposed to be ducks in it, so if we swam in there, we’d probably end
up with a bad rash.”
“A duck rash?” I asked, thinking she
was joking. “From what? An allergy to feathers?”
“No, it’s from this parasite they
carry. It’s called shizzy-something. It burrows into your skin when you swim.
Haven’t you ever heard of swimmer’s itch?”
“Yeah, but I thought that was from
sitting around too long in a wet bathing suit.”
“Anyway,” she continued, “I can
hardly wait for this picnic. I mean, Keith was the one who suggested it. Isn’t
that just the utmost in romance?”
“Uh, run it by me again…exactly
what’s going to be so romantic about this picnic?”
“Boy, you really are
clueless, aren’t you! What can be more romantic than just the two of us, alone
in a meadow, sitting next to a duck-filled pond and feeding cheese, crackers
and fruit to each other?” She paused for a moment. “Do you think the fruit will
attract bees? I’m pretty sure Keith said he’s allergic to them.”
Visions of her boyfriend, puffed up
like a balloon and scratching duck pimples as he whispered sweet nothings into
her ear, immediately popped into my head. I stifled a laugh.
“Well, have a great time,” I said.
“Call me and let me know how it went. And don’t go getting any mosquito bites
in painful places now!”
“Mosquito bites!” Parrot Woman once
again repeated my words. “Thanks for reminding me! I almost forgot to buy
repellent! I don’t want to end up with the West Nile virus.”
Listening to my friend rattle off
diseases as if she were a medical encyclopedia made me realize two things: (1).
she probably was a hypochondriac and (2). picnics obviously weren’t what they
used to be.
Personally, I think she would have
been a lot happier if she’d have had her picnic under a big beach umbrella on a
slab of concrete next to a swimming pool loaded with chlorine…with a guy who
was a doctor.
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