A Modern Day Tale Of The Tortise And The Hare (Revised)

Have I ever brought to the forefront of the picture the fact that when you add us all up there are EIGHT of us?? Eight. Including babies.

Of course, we're not always all in the same place at the same time, so we can fool ourselves quite often. However, the fact remains there are EIGHT of us.

The reality was never so clear as today's three ring circus:

I awoke this morning with a full house. The whole gang. Egads.

Bethany and I decided early it was a great day to spend making cookies. Before we could begin, I had to send her down the road to the little corner store to pick up a couple of baking items. As an afterthought, I attempted to call her to tell her to add flour to the list. She answered her phone as she was returning to the driveway. *sigh*

Now I enlisted Tiffany's aid. "Will you run down and get a bag of flour, Tiff?"

"Sure, Mom." She dilly-dallyed, and I finally had to exert some shoo-ing pressure. Of course, it had begun to rain.

Tiffany and Aubrey lined up at the front door, umbrellas wide open, staring through the window.

"Boy. I have to go out in this big ole thunderstorm . . ." Tiffany stated wistfully.

More than once.

I reached around her and her big umbrella, and opened the door latch. "Go!" I demanded.

As she and Aubrey attempted to manuever the open umbrellas through the door casing, the DellDog [heretofore known as the HARE] saw his golden opportunity, and highjacked the whole process by forcing himself an opening between tennis shoes. Off he ran, with great glee, into the downpour, as though he were entered into the Indy 500. Running circles in the rain, he merely glanced my way as I called to him. Then he spotted the Umbrella Brigade headed for the car. Of course, the dog cannot resist a good trip going bye-byes, so he made a beeline for the car, only to find himself woefully shut out in the rain.

Undeterred, he hung around, waiting to be let in, while I, from the front door, continued to call him. Tiffany began honking her horn, and backing up about two feet at a time repeatedly, with the hare hot on her tire tracks.

Enter Israel into the scene: Israel grabbed Dell's leash and dashed heroically into the torrent, undeterred by the drenching. The hare proved to be sly, wriggling out of his reach time and time again, now on the road in front of the house.

Tiffany suddenly acclerated and shot away like a thief in the night, leaving the hare in the dust and Israel unscathed. Dell, in sheer panic at having been left behind, ran into the path that runs parallel to the road, with Israel at his heels. All the while, I'm in the front door, calling the dog, and now shaking a bag of treats to get the dog's attention. (To no avail, I might add!)

Enter an unexpected turn of events:

A white pickup truck pulled around the corner. The driver spotted Israel at the side of the road and stopped. Loudly, he began wildly calling and pointing to the floorboard of his vehicle. Israel didn't move an inch.

The man repeated his statement several times, and then in exasperation, reached down to the floorboard, grabbed a TURTLE, and hopped out of his truck, placing said such turtle on the ground. He then scurried out of the rain, back into his truck and began to pull away.

Well, from my post in the doorway, I could see that the turtle was about to be murdered by a big black tire. I was determining whether or not I should keep watching or avert my eyes. {Steady . . .steady . . .}

As if by an unseen force, the man in the truck miraculously craned his neck to take one last look at the turtle before he sped away . . .and saw the error of his ways. He slammed on his brakes, jumped back out of the truck, grabbed the turtle, tried one more time in vain to give it to Israel, jammed it back on the floorboard of the pickup, and sped off, still shouting loudly: "I wuz tryin' to give you a TURTLE!"

Israel never flinched. As soon as the pickup was out of sight, Dell emerged from the tall grass, and moseyed over to the boy. Snapping the leash on, Israel brought Dell, looking like a wet rat, er, hare, back to the house.

I was completely humored by the entire scene. As he once again graced the doorway, I said, laughing, "Israel! That was a TURTLE! Didn't you want it?"

To which, my utterly dismayed, disgusted, and annoyed young man replied, "MOM!!! Don't you know I was just about KIDNAPPED?!?!?"

"Huh? Israel . . .! It was a TURTLE!"

"MOM!" spoken this time with much more force, and a look of angst on his face. "I was being LURED . . .!!!" He was trying to LURE me!"

Now I couldn't keep back my laughter, which of course, only served to make my son angry. All the while, thinking, "Gee. I never even thought that. Good job, son!"

I managed to get those words out between sputters. And it took Israel quite a while to calm down.

While I'm hardpressed to think my son was being ployed by a sex offender with me standing in the doorway, (and caused some of my readership to be aghast at my laughter) I'm in awe of his ability to think quick on his feet and keep a level head in the presence of what he percieved to be danger. In the pouring rain. With the dog loose.

Way to go, Israel.

So, my three ring circus day continued. It's barely just ended, twelve hours from "the incident". Everyone is safe and sound, I'm still chuckling over the crazy chain of events in the torrential downpour, and the cookies were terriffic.

All in all, a great day for a fairy tale. :)