We ARE That Family

The #1 son was invited to tonight's Cardinal's game by one of his friends. There's a local boy whose father died last year working construction on the Mississippi. So some folks bid on the chance for him to throw out the first pitch. And some Hillmomba denizens have a whole block of seats for the game. It's gonna be a scorcher. If you watch the game on TV, maybe you'll see #1. He'll be the seventeen-year-old boy in a red Cardinals shirt and red Cardinals cap. ;)

Last night, when he informed me of his impending jaunt to Busch Stadium, I asked #1 if he needed any clothes to wear. You know. To save him from telling me a half hour before departure: "SOMEBODY really needs to do the laundry!" Of course he assured me that he had everything planned. No outstanding clothing needs.

Until this morning, at 9:30, when he said the Cardinals shirt he wanted was in a pile under the laundry room sink, The sink I never wanted to begin with, that Farmer H salvaged from a cow pasture or a roadside ditch, and was heck-bent on putting in my brand new laundry room, because a free laundry sink is a terrible thing to waste. But Laundry Sink can stand clear, because like Rooster Cogburn told Farrell Parmalee in True Grit, "I've got no interest in you today."

The thing with most of #1's shirts is that I hang them to dry. Not on a line. What do you think we are, hillbillies? I hang them on hangers in the laundry room. Especially those cotton shirts that like to shrink shorter, and become faded and threadbare with repeated wearings. I had seven hours. Not exactly enough time to wash and hang dry that shirt. I immediately started improvising. Like a laundry version of Chopped.

I dug through that pile of lesser-worn dark shirts. Tossed nine of them in the washer. Set it on a quick cycle. Scouted out a big fat plastic hanger. Scoped out my outsides. When that shirt spun out, I hung it and hit the front porch. I put it on the clanger of a ceramic wind chime shaped like a miniature clay oven. It fools the hummingbirds all the time. They flit around trying to feed from its underneath parts.

Juno was not happy with my improvisation. She ran up on the porch the minute I got back inside. I'm sure she was looking for me. But she went to that Cardinals shirt and hopped up to touch her snout to it. I wonder if she likes Tide Mountain Breeze. I hollered at her through the front window, and she settled down. That shirt flapped in the hot breeze, slinging the wind chime to and fro.

The Pony and I made a trip to town for my 44 oz. Diet Coke. When we returned, the flapper greeted us from the end of the driveway. Anybody driving by could plainly see our wash whipping in the breeze. Red, too. Eye-catching to bulls, and rural neighbors. "Oh, no," I told The Pony. "We've become THAT family. The ones who put a couch on the front porch. And maybe a washer."

Actually, the only appliance we've put on the porch was a refrigerator. And it was the SIDE porch. So there. We're civilized enough.