Family

First of all, a brief follow-up to last week’s column. Just in case anyone may have been concerned, I do not sort my M&M’s by color if I happen to be driving while I’m eating them. Such behavior would definitely go beyond quirky and might even be considered a teensy bit obsessive.

That’s why, when I was traveling this afternoon, I didn’t check the color of my M&M’s.

By the way, a regular sized package of M&M’s, eaten two at a time with sips of coffee in between, lasts for approximately 35 miles along I-90 in western South Dakota when one is driving the speed limit.

But on to other things. As all politicians and their advisors know, one of the crucial factors in being a good spin doctor is getting your version of the story out first, loudest, and most often. In that spirit, I just want to share the following:

First, I categorically deny that there was any deliberate intent or malice involved when I showered my mother with dead flies. I was merely trying to help. In fact, I was only following orders—her orders.

But when you are standing on a rickety wooden stepladder, removing the flimsy plastic cover from the fluorescent light fixture in your parents’ kitchen, accidents can happen. I had snapped off one side of the cover without disturbing the dead flies that littered it. The whole purpose of the exercise, you see, was to get rid of the bodies.

But when the cover came loose on the second side, it twisted sideways and slipped out of my hands. It crashed to the floor in a cascade of dead flies, bouncing off my mother as it fell. True, she was standing right underneath the light fixture at the time in order to hold the wobbly ladder. OSHA would not have approved of her being so close to an overhead maintenance project when she wasn’t wearing a hard hat or any other protective gear. Come to think of it, OSHA wouldn’t have approved of the ladder, either.

But at least a flimsy plastic cover weighing approximately five ounces is not a dangerous object, so she wasn’t hurt. More surprisingly, the light fixture cover wasn’t hurt, either. Even better, by the time I picked it up off the floor it no longer had any dead flies in it. So I gave it a cursory swipe with a dust rag and snapped it back into place.

The rest of the project took a bit longer. It required cleaning fly bodies off of the table, the counter, and the window sill, sweeping the floor, and combing several corpses out of my mother’s hair. I’d never had occasion to practice that particular form of primate grooming before.

Among the pleasures of visiting my parents is hearing them tell and retell family stories. One of the things we talked about during this visit was how accurate some of those stories are, especially the older ones. Different family members remember things differently, and memories fade over the years. Maybe, sometimes, what we remember is more about what the “official version” of the story says happened than it is about what actually happened.

The incident of the falling flies is one very small family story that will probably only be told a couple of times. But just in case it grows or changes in the telling, here is my version. In writing. Spread all over the Internet.

When it comes to getting there first with the spin on a story, there are no flies on me.

When he grows up, he's probably going to be the kind of Christmas shopper who buys all his gifts just as the stores are closing on Christmas Eve.

Sylvan Lawrence, due a few days before Christmas, didn't make his appearance until December 28.

To be fair, his late arrival wasn't for lack of trying on his part. He spent more than two weeks working at being born, giving his parents a series of "this has to be the real thing" false alarms. But since he was facing forward instead of backward, he wasn't in the best position to complete the journey. It finally took induced labor, a very hard night's work by his mom with serious help from his dad, and the assistance of an intimidating but effective vacuum pump to get him here.

But he made it. He's healthy and eating and growing, and he's still looking face forward at the world. We're not sure whether he approves of it, though. He resembles Winston Churchill even more than most newborns do—mostly because of the "don't bother me, I'm thinking" scowl that he shares with the great man. Fortunately, so far, no one has given him a cigar.

He's grandchild number 13, but the first one to live within spoiling distance. Not, as any of the older grandkids would probably tell you, that I am a spoiling kind of grandma. I plan to take Sylvan hiking up Harney Peak as soon as he's sufficiently ambulatory, but he's going to have to carry his own lunch.

His name, chosen by his parents because of their love of the Black Hills, means "someone who lives in the woods." As the child of actors, he'll probably be on stage at the Black Hills Playhouse before he hits his first birthday. Given those two factors, it's a good bet that the kid will spend his teenage years in a windowless basement playing video games and will grow up to be an engineer.

But given his forward-looking perspective, he may well invent or create or discover wonderful things that no one has even considered yet. Of course, in common with many other visionaries, he'll probably continue to need a little help with the practical details. Like having someone around to take care of the vacuuming.

We moved the Christmas party this year. Having outgrown the hunting lodge where we've been meeting, we held our annual family Christmas weekend in a new location.
It gave us a chance to explore a different environment and enjoy some new activities.

On Saturday morning, we woke up to the sound of rain on the roof. Later in the day, after the sun came out, several of us went for a long walk on the beach. We skipped stones across the water, followed animal tracks, and browsed the shingle for flotsam and fossils.

Meanwhile, another group went off in a different direction to explore the local landscape and do some serious bird-watching.

A few serious partiers were up late on Saturday night, listening to the singing of a local band and making some noise themselves.

Wait a minute. This doesn't sound like a typical white Christmas in South Dakota. Did we blow years of family tradition, not to mention all our family budgets, by taking ourselves off to the Caribbean or the Gulf of Mexico?

Not exactly. We were in the Buryanek Bay Bunkhouse, close to the Missouri River just off Highway 44. But everything I've stated so far is absolutely true.
I just forgot to mention a few details.

The gentle rain left sidewalks, parking lots, our cars, and even the gravelly beach glazed with ice. The walk on the beach, in the face of a sharp north wind, featured mittens, winter coats, and long johns rather than swimsuits. The tracks we followed were in snow, and the stones skipped across the water so well because they were bouncing off thin sheets of ice near the shore.

The birders, of course, were out with shotguns rather than binoculars, hunting wild turkeys.

The late-night partying featured the music of a local band of coyotes. From the volume of their singing, they were only a few yards down the hill from our lodge, and they sang rather more encores than anyone requested.

Most of the partiers singing along to the coyotes didn't have the full appreciation of their audiences, either, since it was long past their bedtimes. These revelers were some of the five great-grandkids that were aged three and younger. It's too bad we couldn't have given them their own room and let them party.

As the family members who are attorneys, engineers, or parents of young children can appreciate, it's the details that make the difference between the truth and the whole truth.

But details aside, we enjoyed spending time with the people we love.
And that, truly, is what Christmas is about.

It's incredible that a perfect human being can come in such a miniature package. But there she is, complete in every detail right down to fingernails, toenails, and eyelashes. Kendall Kathryn, grandchild number twelve.

I was fortunate enough to get to meet her when she was only eight days old, and it occurred to me as I was watching her sleep on my lap that she may be the tiniest baby I've ever had the privilege of holding. Her six pounds and five ounces, while certainly a normal and healthy weight, was downright petite compared to her cousins. Most of the rest of the dozen tipped the scales at eight or nine or even ten pounds.

Kendall is a dainty little person, with long slender fingers and narrow feet. Her head, with its delicate tracery of brownish hair, is too small for even her newborn sized hats. She seems much too tiny to hold her own in a household that includes a lively big brother and two opinionated beagles.

So far, her brother, just past babyhood himself, seems to find her mildly intriguing but not all that significant. No doubt he'll show a lot more interest when she gets old enough to pull his hair and grab his toys.

The dogs tend to regard her with a similar mild curiosity. One of them, the nervous type, has already conceded her superior position after she scared him into submission by getting the hiccups. The other one, whose heart is reachable via a direct line through her stomach, will become a devoted follower as soon as the baby is old enough to drop edible bits onto the floor.

She may be tiny, but my guess is that Kendall will more than hold her own. Her dark blue eyes are direct and clear, and there's a firm chin beneath her dainty mouth. Big brother Jack and the beagles had better make room for her. Kendall is clearly an alpha baby.