Tabatha Deans

Dragon kites, giggles and a skeleton named Luca

DRAGON KITES, GIGGLES, AND A SKELETON NAMED LUCA

            One of the things I miss about living alone is the random opportunity to be frightened. Growing up in a family of four children, then passing the tradition down to my own daughter, it was pretty much a given that any time you left the room, when you returned somebody would be lurking around a corner, or on top of the clothes dryer, ready to pounce and yell “Boo!” Living in a trailer, the bathroom was at the end of a very long hallway, which required passing several doors and nooks that provided plenty of opportunity for random scarings.

            Needless to say, with Jessica gone I haven’t been properly scared for quite some time. Then I met Luca. With a rare break in our schedules that allowed the Good Doctor and I to have the same day off, we were preparing for an outing in the park and a day of general loafing. We had discussed our “skeletons in the closets,” earlier, and he confessed to having one, which I took in jest and forgot about. Until I came out of the bathroom and came face to face with a six-foot-tall skeleton, staring and laughing at me.

            I’m not sure how to describe the sound I made, but I will say it probably wasn’t that attractive. I covered pretty well by giggling, that giggle you can’t control when your heart is racing and you think for a moment you’re going to die, but then realize you’re not going to die. Then or course there came laughter from the Good Doctor in the other room, and I tried hard to sternly tell him that scaring a woman of my age might not be a good idea. But my scolding held no conviction. I needed a good scaring, and a good laugh. The power of spontaneous laughter and the adrenaline rush of fear made me feel alive, and wonderful, and giggly.

            We left Luca home and spent the day puttering about town, before taking our deluxe dragon kites to the park, where we didn’t have much success in sailing them due to lack of wind, but they were glorious to look at. I was all smiles as I boarded the F-Line home, and drew a few looks from other passengers when I broke into random fits of giggles remembering my delightful scare with Luca.

August 24, 2012 - Posted by Tabatha Stewart | Uncategorized