It’s interesting some of the things that you can store away in your brain.  My wife always looks at me weird when I spout out a proverb that fits into a discussion.  We’ll be talking about decisions and I’ll say “fish or cut bait”.  She’ll look at me and say “what?!”  It’s not my fault, really.  I blame Ms. Schwartz, my high school English teacher (all 4 years…plus 8th grade, too)  Every Friday was devoted to cramming in a bunch of stuff that required memorization.  Mythology, Proverbs, Idioms, vocabulary.  I liked it because it was kind of like story time…and I didn’t have to diagram any sentences.

So here I am, 16 years after the first time I walked into her class.  I was thinking about this past weekend and one of her phrases came to mind “comme il faut.”  (I always thought it was Latin, but the Googles tells me that it’s French.)  The phrase is roughly translated “as it should be” or “fitting.”  Allow me to explain:

Saturday morning  I woke up with a mission.  I needed to do some work on the house and I figured that I’d better get started first thing before the sun heated the roof up to 750 degrees (F or C - take your pick).  I walked outside and this amazingly cool breeze rushed through the air.  Some people would classify this as the beginning of fall.  My muscles tightened just a little because my bones could feel it…I could smell it…football weather.

After playing on the roof (and surprising myself at how well my project turned out), we piddled around with some music and then had lunch.  Kelley sprinted off to watch a movie, and I spent the next couple of hours entertaining my two biggest fans.  That evening, we went to visit Rickie and Sheri again.  The girls love the pool, but they really love Mr. Rickie and Ms. Sheri.  We were able to enjoy supper with them and play with some of their plastic fruit.  Sure, they have toys, but plastic grapes are hours of fun.  Mr. Rickie has made so much of an impression, that Ladybug will now run up to him with open arms when he’s approaching.  I got to sit back and watch her pick him out of the crowd on Sunday afternoon and run to play with him.  He didn’t seem to mind occupying her.

Sunday afternoon, I got to spend some alone time with Butterfly as she “helped” me set-up some sound equipment at our church.  While I was untangling cords and finding music stands, she sang into the microphone and played the piano for me.  After about an hour I was done, but Butterfly insisted that I play my guitar “like rock and roll” so that she could dance.  I obliged and then we headed home.  The only detour was to stop and get Butterfly her slushie…a treat that she spent more time playing with than eating.

So many little things were crammed into the weekend, but it was one of those that just hangs in the air…like the smell of popcorn drifting onto the gridiron on a cool friday evening.  Coming in to work this morning was a little tougher than normal.  I got an extra kiss from Ladybug and hugged Butterfly just a little tighter.  Weekends like this aren’t anything extraordinary.  It’s just plain ‘ole living…the way it should be.