The Land of Disbelief

What luck!

Here I am feeling insecure and off my game and thinking that Mom will have the emotional upper hand, and voila! She does me one better. Nothing ruins your Alpha Dog superiority like getting your drunk on, falling down, breaking your face and having to show up anyway. Not that I'm glad it happened. I'm not a sociopath, but it is poetic justice. I don't shame her. I just listen with what would surely be perceived as empathy, when really it is calm, but morbid curiosity. I wonder if the tables were turned if she would move in for my jugular or give me the same pass.

She prattles on and on about her lost tooth and how lucky she is to have packed a spare bridge (But alas, she'd been wearing her favorite one when she'd face planted. I am not sure how a bridge gets to be the favorite...a favorite bra, a prized necklace, a pair of lucky pumps...those I understand. Favorite false teeth? Perhaps we ought to get out the ouja board and scrounge up the ghost of George Washington. I bet he could explain.)

But like a good Girl Scout she'd been prepared. Planned ahead. Packed an extra set of teeth for a 48 hour trip. I suppose she's learned to expect an occasional impromptu drunken wipeout. Maybe a mouth guard would be a good belt-with-suspenders option for the next ill-fated trip. Maybe she should think about the whole goalie mask.

So, with a fresh cup of coffee in hand (I couldn't find the wine in time) and having listened to the fable of the prankster clams that trip people, I excuse myself to see if "Charlotte needs any help."

Charlotte needs my help getting dressed for this event like she needs an extra butt cheek. But it is plausible to my mother, who frankly is probably happy to see me teeter off in my heels so she can look for the wine herself.

I bump into Griffin on the stair. He's tightening his tie and rushing out the door but stops for a hug and a kiss hello. I whisper into his ear without missing a beat. "I can't believe she fell and broke her face."

He whispers back, also without having missed a single breath, "No shit."

I barge into Charlotte's room as she is pulling her dress on over her head. As her face emerges from the neck hole I can see the raised eyebrow look of sarcasm. I mouth silently "You didn't tell me she wiped out last night!" Charlotte rolls her eyes and gives me a "And when was I supposed to make that phone call?" look.

I help her pick a pair of shoes to go with the dress. I pick the wedges. She goes with the snake skin heel option I did not suggest. They are darling. Mom agrees with her choice saying that wedges aren't dressy. Mom seems to have forgotten that she is wearing wedges. I think she may have suffered a concussion when she flew her little plane into the side of a mountain. Or maybe she broke her heels on the clam, and has no choice but the wear the second string shoe choice.

Where are they hiding the wine????

We get into the car. Jack asks Charlotte to remind him to turn off his phone when Commencement starts.

"We have to turn off our phones?" Mom seems a little alarmed at the idea and has taken her Tracphone from its case. She is intensely examining it like it is a piece of fallen space junk.

"I might have to just leave mine in the car..."

Glances all around. Here we go with the remedial technology class...