Sunday, April 13, 2014

Sentences that End in Lilts and Other Mysteries

I'm not sure why leaving my house should turn into a neighborhood event, but it does every Spring. Oh, I leave my house all of the time, but once the weather warms, the locals become restless, and begin to socialize the unsuspecting.

"It begs the question." What an annoying cliche (as if one were more annoying than the next).

I'm bothered by statements that end in a lilt. She was one of three neighbors that descended on me yesterday. All nice people, and I, mid conversation with a guy with a tow truck, had been "rescued" inadvertently by local, kind, Elderly Guy on Wheels who'd gotten local, Kind Elderly Lady who was busy overseeing what tow truck guy was doing to my battery...(Yeah, let's breathe a second.) I only mention, "Elderly, because it makes me, at merely pushing 50, feel more useless than usual. Then again, I've never felt, "Usual."

  The Lady with the lilt at the end of her sentence said, "We never see you out?"She'd pulled her car over and lilted over the top of her sleeping daughter at me. I was really quite occupied, but I stopped for the lilt that, to be fair, had come after her clearing fence repair with me, and I didn't mind they needed to be on my property of course, but then I got the lilt. "Good!" I thought. My plan to not be seen is working! I really don't care about being seen, but they seem to have a curious habit of connecting the seeing with the talking.  Still, I recognized the lilt as a cue to that dark, dreadful social, "Norm" called, "Small talk."

Now, the next morning, I realize this should have been interpreted as, "I'm hoping you'll babysit my kid." as she came last year asking if  her daughter might play with my "little children," but she'd mistaken my grandchildren for my own, and didn't succeed in sending her child in my direction then. Not realizing it, I was still stuck with, "The lilt."  I was on the spot. Three neighbors plus Tow Truck Guy waited. I was supposed to give her an excuse for not being seen that was overtly friendly rather than honest, so I said, "Well I have a weird neighbor (I managed not to add, "Not unlike yourself"), and if I go out, she shows up." She answered, "Oh, I'll bet I know who it is." Which is the same thing she'll say about me to the next person she lilts at, but I had a car to deal with. 

   She left, and for reasons unknown to me, I ended up hugging nice elderly guy on wheels. I told him I had to go with the tow guy and pay him. He asked what I was going to pay him for getting help. I said, "I already hugged you." He said, "Well, it has been a while," and I answered, "I could do a little dance," whereupon I commenced to, "Shake it" in the middle of the street. 

  After getting a laugh out of the locals, I shook kind elderly lady's hand and crawled in tow truck guy's vehicle. It all ended with me escaping down the road to be deposited at an auto parts store where I procured a new battery, did some shopping and came back home, getting in my house without being seen? (<---Lilt)

   I think that qualifies as my socializing for the year. I'm spent.

tina (mysteriously unseen) jones