As Luck Would Have It

Olivia blew chunks last night and has now declared that she must be allergic to spinach. Which is very unfortunate as she actually loves spinach and is always waiting on the boys to eat their forced bites so she can finish the rest. "Oh, boy!" she will say as she digs her fork directly into the serving bowl.

By boys I am including John because he's not exactly the best role model when it comes to eating his fruits and vegetables. And it's unfortunate that she thinks she's allergic to spinach -- not that she really is. But you know when you throw up and whatever you happened to eat last you can't help but think is what made you sick? I have that with anything grape-flavored, ever since I was about Olivia's age myself and my family made homemade grape-flavored ice cream at the park and I played on the merry-go-round and got that typical dizzy feeling in the stomach only it never went away and I blew purple-colored chunks that night and was sick for two days. A coincidence, yes. But I still don't like grape and it was years before I wanted to go on a merry-go-round again.

So I hope Olivia doesn't end up with this association with spinach because how many five-year-olds have you ever known who love spinach? And to have it frittered away like that all in one blow. Pun intended.

But I was impressed that when she got sick she made it to the bathroom in time -- even if it was my sink she chose and not the toilet. Since I don't think she's been sick like this since she's been old enough to know that the toilet is the receptacle of choice on such occasions I was more than willing to let that slide. I was just so glad to not have soiled sheets or chunks on the carpet to deal with at four in the morning.

Because then I might have actually insisted on John getting up and helping instead of his, "She did what?" then immediately rolling back over and going to sleep, not even grunting to compete with the crickets following my sarcastic, "No, no, it's all right, I got it. You just go back to sleep. No, really. I insist."

We skipped Sean-Peter's speech this morning, and I kept her from school this afternoon, even though she really wasn't sick anymore. Even though she stated, as her little brother was getting ready for his bus to come, minutes before her bus would normally arrive, "I think I changed my mind and I want to go to school after all." Like she was in charge of the whole thing.

This house was mouse-quiet when I was in the middle of that last paragraph and heard a noise so loud and destructive that it wouldn't have surprised me to look up and see the body of an airplane crashing through the wall. (Didn't something like that just happen in San Diego?) As it was it sounded like the second story fell down. I went upstairs where the little ones were still inexplicably asleep (this is, I'm sure, how humans have survived wars and natural disasters throughout the millennia) and found this:

Don't focus on those squarish holes in the wall. I can't explain those. Ask yourself instead what you should be seeing there and then look down, on the floor.Yes, the mirror.

No one was hanging on it, no one was stomping on the floor, or banging on the wall -- no one was even in the bathroom when it fell. It was completely random.

When I first saw the real cause of what had sounded like an airline disaster, I couldn't help but visualize Olivia standing right there, throwing up in that sink, mere hours ago. That's healthy, right? Focusing on how it could have been worse? Focusing on how lucky that it fell when no one was around?

Because that looks like a lot of bad luck. Seven years, isn't it? And we certainly don't need any more of that around here. Lucky, that's what that is. If a broken mirror is the worst random disaster that we have to deal with, in this age of short-notice deployments and massive layoffs. I'll take it.