Nancy Bartholomew

I am blissfully dreaming of which roses I will soon plant along the new fence-

When the Eldest Unnamed One calls from his off-campus apartment.   "Hey, babe," I say.  "What cha doin'?"

"Enjoying our new fountain," he says.

I am a mother.  We know when our children are enjoying a fountain and when they are sitting on top of a geyser.

"Your new fountain?" I echo. 

"There's a gap between the crown moulding in the bedroom and the sheetrock.  It's about 4' long and rain is streaming down the wall like a fountain." 

He sends a video to my cell phone and I am horrified.  It sounds like the creek up at the cabin should sound- if it were full of water and flowing along at flood level.  In the video Lovey is holding a blue bowl up to the wall and it is water fills it at an alarming rate. 

When the Eldest calls thirty minutes later, they have placed every bowl they own beneath multiple leaks and the ceiling is splitting at the seams- but only, he assures me, in the bedroom.  It's under control, he says.  They've managed to move the bed out into the tiny apartment's only other room.  Their landlord has called and breezily assured them "Someone will be out to fix the ceiling tomorrow."

Tomorrow?!  It's pouring down rain.  What about tonight?

"Do you want to go to a hotel?" I offer.

"Nah," he says.  "We're okay."

Then I remember.  When you're 19, it's cooler to stick around your apartment awaiting the advent of unknown catastrophy than it is to play it safe.  After all, when you are young, you are invincible.  Life is full of glorious and dangerous possibilities.  

When you are young, you think of the stories you will one day tell your children... "We rode out a tornado!" the legend will begin.  "The roof caved in on top of our heads but we survived.  It was a miracle!"  The adventurers will shake their heads, grinning wistfully as they recall the audacity of their youth.

Their children will beg to hear the story again and again, staring up in wide-eyed adoration at their larger-than life, heroic parents...(I'm not saying Lovey and the Eldest will be getting married, mind you. I'm only making a speculative illustration for the sake of the story.  It's called fiction for a reason...but I digress.)

Tonight the Eldest and Lovey will brave the elements - "Man vs Wild" and "Xena, the Princess Warrior."  But tomorrow they will face down the soggy reality of stinky carpet, mildew and a cold front that whistles through the 4' gap in the ceiling.  

Life is just one big adventure after another.