This now 23-year-long
holiday letter tradition seems more appropriate than ever. Here is the premise:
Unlike those letters that share extraordinary milestones and celebrations,
we’re here to tell you how hard & humiliating life can be. For example,
after working for over two years, full time researching and writing, editing
and re-writing, I signed a contract with Rowman & Littlefield to publish
the “bible” of women’s sports history ONLY to learn that the 315,000-word
masterpiece had to be brutally gutted to 150,000 words. I had actual stomach
aches over deleting some of the amazing women from history.
On
the subject of books, Kerri (daughter) started a book club for, I believe, the
sole purpose of forcing me to read dark, deep brooding stories in which serious
contemplation and self-reflection is required. It’s awful. Only because I love
fellow members do I stay on. What I didn’t know was that Kerri began writing
down things said in jest to hold against us. As it happens, I said something so
wildly inappropriate that I cannot print it here and when everyone was asked to
guess “who said it,” 100% of the group knew it was me, yet Michelle (sister)
says something equally inappropriate and no one knows! This was my
childhood!
It was Michelle! Michelle said that!
You know how there
are always those spoofs in a movie when there’s a graduation ceremony and a
teacher is late, running down the hallways, gets to the big doors and can’t get
the door open so she bangs on it, makes a scene rather than actually just
pulling instead of pushing the doors open? No? At least Michelle could take
solace in knowing the school year was over. But when she went to the pharmacy
mid-summer with a full- on migraine in nothing but her pjs and oversized
sunglasses (non-prescription so she was legally blind), she heard a voice. “Mom,
this is Ms. Powe! Hi, Ms. Powe. Hey, why did you bang on the door like that at
graduation?” She still has no idea who was talking to her.
The good thing
about being a teacher is the following Fall offers a fresh start which is why,
she inexplicably decided that two individuals (there with their own children) were
a couple and – long story short – everyone left her room a little confused and
very uncomfortable.
I tried my hand at darkening my own eyebrows. Picture Uncle Leo from Seinfeld ... only angrier. This cheered Michelle considerably.
Robb (husband) had to go to the dentist and, for those of you new to this letter, the dentist is a major deal. See http://allredgreetings.blogspot.com/ where Robb’s feelings about dentistry are documented in 2004 and 2012. Most recently, he walked into the kitchen looking agitated.
Robb: Walk me through what’s gonna happen when I go to the dentist? What do I expect?Alex: I just told you. He’s gonna look at your tooth. [for a tooth ache]
Robb: But you didn’t tell me what to expect.
Alex: [sigh] He’s going to check your tooth.
Robb: Yeah. But..
Alex: It’s not like he’s going to sneak up on you. He’s a dentist!
Robb: I wanted to have a check-up and then, when I’m in there I could say ‘oh, and I have this
tooth…’ I don’t want them to think I only call when I have an issue.
HE'S A DENTIST! sheeeeesh!
He’s lucky
he doesn’t have to see a surgeon. His determination to eat food despite it
being bad (“I don’t waste food!” will be on his gravestone) was neatly summed
up by Kerri who said, “You don’t have to test all the organs in your body to
see if you can handle food! Just because you have an appendix doesn’t mean you
have to test it.”
Katie (daughter) decided the way to let us know that she cracked her head open while doing a back flip into a pool at a pool party was to send a text picture of her bloody head from the ER. She had to get staples in her head and had a concussion. But she still managed, when she resurfaced – water instantly turning red as she bled profusely – to ask, “Did I nail it?” to the horrified onlookers.
Yes, you nailed it.
Meanwhile,
Tommy (son) has made the biggest change this year following in the footsteps of
Col. Marc Powe. Tommy joined the Army and – get this – loved bootcamp and the
drill sergeants, who were “hilarious!” (Yeah, that’s him up top dressing down
Ella’s teddy bear). With such songs as, “My drill sergeant helps me learn, I am
just a lowly worm. He commands the sun and rain. I am just a human stain!”
drumming through his freshly shaved heard, the boy excelled and is now in
Monterey, California at language school.
I fell off
a ladder and broke my finger while trying to save my titanium knee; Kerri &
Kyle (son-in-law) exist on five hours of baby & toddler sleep; Robb
continues to “see” celebrities who aren’t there – pretty sure he has
prosopagnosia, a neurological disorder characterized by the inability to
recognize faces (which might be why dentists terrify him so much) and,
curiously, Remi (blue/red heeler) continues to bark at Robb every morning so
loudly that saying ‘good morning’ is pointless. It just now occurs to me that
maybe Remi also has prosopagnosia. That explains so much! Both
grandbabies got really sick and Michelle and I got COVID with mine turning into
Covid pneumonia because I believed, since my symptoms were very mild, I could
still go ahead and work out at home. No one needs to say it. I know. I’m an
idiot.
Douglas (other blue/red heeler) continues to have unexplained vomiting that can only be curtailed if I make him rice every morning to coat his tummy, and Michelle ruptured her bicep tendon and partially tore her rotator cuff and continues to endure nightly attacks by one of her cats – she doesn’t know which one because the attacks happen while she’s sleeping. It is unclear if the arm injuries occurred while helplessly batting a cat away in her sleep. (Actually, they are two separate incidents, but I’m going to keep telling people Michelle got into a cat fight and lost. It cheers me considerably).
But this year’s ‘We’re the
Allreds; We Do Things the Hard Way’ Award (a family motto and distinction which
is recognized by “winning” the holiday letter write-up) goes to Katie.
This
summer, Katie ran some errands, purchased some sushi and decided that she would
take a shortcut through the state park that is behind her neighborhood because
it was summertime in Texas, she had no water and was carrying raw fish. After
about 45 minutes, she realized she had no cell coverage and was completely lost.
She nibbled on her fish and began to cry when, on the other side of a wall
(which could not be climbed) she heard a voice: Are you okay?
Katie screamed back that she wasn’t, she was lost and needed
help. The kindly woman ran back to her
home and lobbed a water bottle over the wall which sprung a leak so Katie
guzzled it like a hamster on a water feeder until help arrived by way of an
annoyed state park worker on a 4-wheeler. Later, Katie returned to the kind
woman-turned-hero’s house to offer a ‘thank you’ in the way of homemade muffins
which she (Katie) only discovered to be un-edible after she got back
home. All of this occurred before her “head injury” in the pool and is almost
as embarrassing as 3 yr old Ella mistaking Katie’s boyfriend, Grant, for an old
lady dancing on TikTok!
....as for the women's sports history book, you can pre-order today!
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