Saturday, February 2, 2008

Pass the sunscreen

Several years ago my mother showed me a photo of my grandmother and some of the neighborhood farm wives. They were staging a pretend wedding. I can't remember if this was before I had children, but I am pretty sure I was working at least part time.

"Is it Halloween?" I asked of the picture.

"No."

"Well, what are they doing? Was it for a fundraiser or something?" I wasn't getting it.

"No, I think they were bored, so they had a wedding."

Now I am a girl with a vivid imagination, but this was really beyond me. A pretend wedding? Whatever for? Wasn't there important work to be done on the farm?

Well, cabin fever was especially bad around here this week with the highs being below zero, so my sister and I went on an imaginary email trip to Naples, Florida. We chose a hotel, restaurants, resort clothing. We went pretend shopping and ordered fruity drinks from the bar. We had spa treatments -- lovely. I cannot begin to tell you how far this went in cheering me up this week. One night (in real life) the power went out all over town, causing us all to huddle in beds with our children wondering how well our houses were insulated. It's just a hard thing to be in the middle of Minnesota in January. (Thank you, thank you, thank you we are not living in a sod dugout. Thank you. Again I say, thank you.) A little imagination to the green eternal summer of Florida was a blessing.

My apologies to my grandma and all those fine neighbor ladies, long since gone, who knew life is too short to be housebound and bored.

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