LauraCatoe.com

That’s what I’m calling it when you add a movie to your Netflix queue accidentally. Not like I hit “add title” on accident, but that I added The Wedding Date because I thought my TV boyfriend was in it. (He’s in The Wedding Crashers.)

It turned out to be a happy accident, cause it meant I had a girl movie to curl up under the duvet (and Frodo) with while I rode out the cramps. Stoopid ovaries.

You know that convention in romantic movies where one character says to the other “I don’t know anything about you” and it’s the cue for him/her to rattle off a list of quirks that ends with something poignant?*

“I’ve bared my soul to you here, and I don’t know anything about you…”

“Well, I’m allergic to pumpkin, I collect Hot Wheels, my cat has six toes, and I die a little inside everytime you look at your ex.”

Yeah, well, this movie had one of those. Only the character was allergic to fabric softener, hated anchovies and said “I think I would miss you even if we’d never met.” Aww.

*Under Romantic Conventions, see also List of Attributes I Can Name About You to Prove My Love.

(Incidentally, it is Chris Wood who is allergic to pumpkin, Kenny Nelson who collects Hot Wheels, and someone who lives downtown who lost a black cat with six toes. I’m not sure which one of you is dying a little bit each time the ex is around, but you know who you are.)

I am so tired of trudging next door every day to paint. Kris is so tired of putting on his painting clothes that he’s vowed to throw them all away when we are done.

But so as not to be Whiney McComplainsalot, I will say that though my long weekend didn’t feel long or weekendy, I did get to do some fun things. We went on a walk, we sang along with the radio, we saw Walk the Line, I made that pecan pie…

And apparently the holiday weekend was long enough (or my brain needs a real vacation enough) that I forgot my employee ID number this morning. Five years I’ve had that number… and I just blanked. (Thankfully, it came back to me before I had to track down my editor.)

Another five: this is the fifth holiday season Kris and I have celebrated. We started dating in October of 2001, so there have been 5 Halloweens, Thanksgivings and Christmases. (Christmasses? Christmasi?) We discussed this the other night and it just didn’t seem right.

“We’ve been together five years?”

“Yes! Well, no. This is our fifth Christmas coming up.”

“How long have we been married?”

“Three years in May. And still your parents are listed as the beneficiary on your life insurance!”

“Five years?”

“Four. But five holidays seasons. Only not Valentines or birthdays or Easters…”

There was a lot of counting on fingers.

My mind categorizes it better like this: one corn maze, one road trip to Nebraska, three halloween parties, a bunch of pies that only grandmothers are allowed to bake, one shindig at 711, one at 313, one at 202, one at 204 and this year at Jaimie’s place.

Time flies.

I know Mike and Jennifer Evans from church. (I even took a picture of her tattoo for my X-treme Expression series in 2003.) Their baby was born in March and he never even got to leave the hospital.

We found out on Sunday that the doctors had done all they could and the Evans were basically waiting for Joshua to drift away. It happened the next day.

Sometimes work and home and church all seem like different worlds. They collided this morning while I read the paper. There is Josh on page B2, under the heading Funerals.

I could not help but cry. He was so small and fought so hard for so long.

May an abundance of grace and peace be with his family.

Graveside service will be at 1 p.m. today at Deerman’s Chapel for Joshua Mitchell Evans, 8 months, who joined his buddies, Chesten and Eli, on God’s playground, Monday, Nov. 21, 2005.

He is survived by his parents, Michael and Jennifer Evans, Attalla; grandparents, Charles and Pat Evans, Attalla, and Jack and Paula Brewster, Gadsden; great-grandmother, Beulah Riddlespurge, Gadsden; godparents, Uncle Terry and Aunt Debra Gulledge, Webster’s Chapel; many adoring uncles and aunts (some by blood and some by love); and many cousins and friends.

I swear, woman, I am not dealing with this next year. When you call me and tell me when to be there for Thanksgiving dinner (yes, I know it’s noon, for the 27 years of my life, it has ALWAYS been noon! Even when you say “get here when you can,” I know you mean noon and that YOU WILL CALL ME TO SEE WHERE I AM if I am not there at noon) - when I get that phone call, if you try the pity dish, asking if I will make something? I will say no.

Does that sound harsh? That I will refuse to make a dish to take to Thanksgiving dinner at my grandmother’s house? Well, it ain’t. Because she’s a control freak and the only way she will actually let you make something is if it’s (a) something she herself has no clue how to make and (b) you don’t tell her beforehand that you are willing to bring it.

A PECAN PIE, people. That is what I asked to bring.

I got out the recipe, I consulted my pantry, I went to the store. I have pie shells and pecans and Karo syrup at my house.

She called me today (to remind me to be there at noon, and to pick up my other grandmother) and said I didn’t have to make a pecan pie because she already made one.

Silence.

Am I surprised? No. Did I see this coming? Yes and no. I expected to get there tomorrow and she would have made one. Did I expect the sudden hurt and anger at being told that I need not bother to bake? No, that part was a surprise.

Does anybody remember Thanksgiving as we were taught it in elementary school? The pilgrims and indians, coming together, each bringing something to the table and giving thanks? The shared celebration? The community?

It’s a ruse. A sham with no yams.

I guess I’ll save my pecans for Thanksgiving with Kris’ grandparents. At least when my pie goes uneaten there, it will be because all the grandkids were looking forward to MawMaw’s banana pudding and didn’t want to bother with something from the unknown kitchen of an in-law. I imagine that sting won’t be quite the same as my own flesh and blood subtly saying mine is not good enough.

Do I sometimes wish I had the phrase-turning powers of Sars?

“He’s a hard worker, Midkiff, but he makes his living in TV movies, and the guy never met a nuance he couldn’t grind into paste with a hammy grimace.”

Yes. Yes, I do.

But I also wish I was making art good enough for a gallery show, and that I wasn’t letting my guitar-playing calluses go away, and that I was re-mulching the hosta that Debbie-dog dug up, or finally trying out that recipe for Southern Scones…

I will settle for making it to the grocery store today, because we are out of caffeinated coffee. And cheese.

I had a good time at the Harry Potter party last night. It seems that kids of all ages (even the pre-teens who tried so hard to look aloof and failed) had a good time. Word to the wise: origami owls? Hard.

When I got home, I just wanted to veg out with my recording of the Gilmore Girls. Instead, I discovered the clock on the VCR had never been instructed to “fall back.” I ended up watching The Simpsons and listening to the drugplex throw a bump-and-grind party on their lawn.

How does one go about getting a house condemned?