Just a typical Thursday ( part 1)

I was greeted home last night by a house full of teenagers.

Downstairs in the kitchen were a gaggle of 14 year old girls who were drinking hot chocolate after coming in from the snow.  After, " Hello Mr. Flick" I pretty much lost the plot.  They talked non stop and despite me knowing it was English, I couldn't understand a thing in a sea of acronyms, high pitched babbling and snorting laughter.

Then the three boys rolled in from sledding.  Somehow the figured out a way to get a days sledding out of one inch of snow, but failed at any time during a the day off to shovel the driveway or put the trash out.  They flew through the door in an explosion of hats and gloves and headed right for the refrigerator smashing into everything on their way across the house.

It was 4:15.  I'd never make it the whole night.

After setting the boys upstairs with a video game, and the girls downstairs with a couple of bags of popcorn and a teen movie ( Pitch Perfect, and apparently its not about a baseball pitcher....omg Dad you're soooo weird !) , I got the hell out of dodge.

I headed directly to Schwartz's house.  Schwartz's house is the set of Leave it to Beaver as painted by Norman Rockwell.  The boys are well mannered and calm, his wife, looks like she just stepped out of a Lands End catalog and is always smiling..... smiling !, and Schwartz is a pipe away from being Ward Cleaver in slippers and a sweater doling out sage  advice in earnest tones.

Upon diagnosing my condition, Dr. Schwartz took me out to the garage for a game of washers.  Washers is both an amazing horseshoe style game of dexterity and finesses, and a very good excuse to go into the garage to get drunk. We played a lot of washers.  And if that wasn't enough to fix what was ailing me, on cue Mrs. Schwartz then called us in for a bowl of ice cream.

"Chocolate syrup ?",  she asked rhetorically.

I stood in the Schwartz's kitchen and I knew how Eddie Haskell must have felt.  Wally and the Beav sat at the counter politely enjoying their ice cream , Schwartz ate basking in the glow of his recent washers victory, and Mom doted over all of them in soft lighting and the quite hum of holiday music in the background.  At any moment I expected us to fade to commercial for Tide.

I contemplated the possibilities of conking Schwartz over the head and moving myself in caveman style, but dismissed the idea as I always do, out of a deep seeded love for Schwartz and the fact that I can't seem to figure out how to get away with it.  But, eventually, and after staying my standard 10 minutes too long, I had to depart my island of tranquility and head back home.

Driving home, I hope that a few hours would have things settled down, and at that the washers and ice cream would leave me better prepared.


 ( part 2 to come)