365: Body, Mind, Spirit | Week 30

Last week was so bizarre that it seemed fitting it would be the week I found a cardboard boxed wrapped in various patterns of duct tape, a doormat (which sounds normal but there were 4 of them leading up a very wide and deep staircase, so they actually looked like graphic lily pads), a newspaper blown apart in a front yard, the most creative crosswalk restriping I have ever seen, an abandoned chair, and the letter A.

The pink roses were normal, but Tuesday’s child is full of grace so I should have known it would go easy on me.

I don’t need to tell you that the crosswalk takes the cake. Weed abatement?! Pourquoi? Not necessary! I can almost picture the team who came up with this plan, sitting under the heat, looking at the weeds when one of them says,”You know what? We don’t need to pull these weeds out or have this road fixed. We’ll just paint over them like the Navy SEALS do with face paint. Now you see them, now you don’t!”

Patriotism, my friends. Some neighborhoods hang flags, we have weed camo.

This reminds me of the time the Mister and I were dual income newlyweds living in our first home. About a year in we had a TV cabinet made for the media niche. On the day of install a group of guys in their early 20s showed up with varying levels of experience. The loud, short one built like an ox was the most experienced and the tall, lanky quiet one was, funny enough, the new guy. There was a third guy, but I can’t remember a thing about him.

I sat on the couch and pretended to read a book. Everything was fine until I noticed the new guy trying to make the trim pieces fit. He turned them this way and that and scratched his head. I couldn’t blame him; the pieces were inches too small because someone made a mistake with their cuts. He turned to the Ox in that quiet way you do when you’re new. You don’t want to get anyone in trouble but…

The Ox grabbed one of the trim pieces, flipped it like a baton, and slammed it into place. He spent two seconds appraising the size discrepancy before he waved the new guy off, pulled up his sagging shorts and said, “Sheet, man. That’s what the caulking’s for!”

At this point I no longer pretended to read a book. I took my position next to the lanky new guy and voiced my concern. Exactly how much caulking were we talking about?

The Ox pushed us back with a flick of his hands the way a street performer shoos away pesky street urchins cramping his style. Then he grabbed his tube of caulk and began filling that media niche with towering mounds of silicone. He was a sculptor. A magician. A world famous cupcake froster.

But only in his own mind because the end result proved he was an idiot. To this day, well over a decade later, we still say “Sheet, man. That’s what the caulking’s for!” anytime one of us tries to convince the other to do something extraordinarily stupid and lazy or when we see something extraordinarily stupid and lazy. It’s what I whispered to myself when I walked up to the crosswalk and saw the painted weeds.

Three years later we had more work done with the same company and discovered the Ox moved on to greener pastures. I would not be surprised to hear he works for the city.

Song of the Week

On Top of the World – Imagine Dragons