A Wurpee at the 10-11

So spring has arrived here in Provo. The bulk of student activity on campus and the roads I travel most is at its annual minimum (at least until the terrifying, thunderous herds of minivans descend on campus for women’s conference tomorrow). I won’t even mention that the ladies are using my basketball court for a service project. (What are they thinking?) I had my first Slurpee of the season this week and am now addicted to the sugar rush and obsessed with the purple specialty cups in all of their rolled aluminum purple glory. When our boys were little we used to take them to 7-11 often but I guess not often enough. One day Alex asked in his little boy soprano voice, “Can we go get a wurpee at the 10-11?”

So for the first time in weeks (months?) I feel like I can write something positive. If I had blogged before this today, you would have heard a lot about our cat dying unexpectedly, my back going out painfully, and a lengthy and gloomy laundry list of why life was pretty sucky. So you and I have both avoided that bit of unpleasantness.

All of the gloom of late winter reminds me of a story of another dark day a couple of decades ago. I was driving our gray Toyota Camry on the road that circles around the south end of campus. I was feeling pretty low and actually had the thought in my head, “Can it get any worse than this?” At that precise instant, a fist-sized blob of bird poop hit the car’s windshield right in front of my face, obscuring my vision and answering my rhetorical question to the heavens. Yes, yes it can. This particular answer lightened my mood and I actually began to smile, then laugh, then count my blessings. In place of self-pity, suddenly there was gratitude, especially the thought that I come from a family with a history of depression coupled with a healthy sense of humor. Despair can be covered with poop but poop can be erased with laughter.

With leaves on the tree and a fresh blue sky (sans poop), I feel a little more optimistic and am really trying to enumerate life’s positives. We have a new cat named S.C. (slender cat) and/or Rescue Panther. While this strange auburn-black creature does not replace the eight years we had with our gray puddle of cat, Ixi, this new one is another feline source of amusement. Today my back is well enough that my opponent in noon basketball remarked that I was trash talking during a play (not just before and after, as is usual). My Celtics made the finals when, at the beginning of the season, they were really playing poorly. And a few hours ago, I got a text with four of my favorite words in the English language, “Clair box on porch.” I highly recommend liking the same sport, same teams, and growing to be approximately the same size as my big brother. Such stature and predilections have some truly cool benefits. I did have some trouble deciding to go with classic Jordan Bulls red or modern Celtics green for our trip to the 10-11 tonight. Decisions, decisions.

And, biggest blessing of all, in just one week, I will have been married to the love of my life for 25 years. And I can tell you right now, the first 25 years are the hardest. (And if you get that joke, you understand that it can extend to 40 and beyond.) Here she is in the place I found her, somewhere near 5th North, just a few years back. A tall drink of water, not a wurpee, . . . but cool and wearing purple.