It Looked Different on the Model - Laurie Notaro [55]
“A Skittle wouldn’t crawl in my ear or into my mouth and lay eggs,” he countered, as I whacked the tiny spider and grabbed the carcass in a tissue.
“Is it all right if I flush this, or did you need to incinerate it?” I asked.
“I think you’re overreacting,” he informed me.
“Oh,” I said. “Oh. Well, let’s see who overreacts when they have to wear the same hobo shirt until their mother gets here with her credit card.”
The next morning we headed out to the Trees of Mystery, a roadside attraction featuring a mile-long trail through the redwoods called the Kingdom of Trees that is “devoted to the myth and mythology of Paul Bunyan.” There is also a restaurant, a gift shop, the sky gondola, and a forty-nine-foot-tall figure of Paul Bunyan and a giant Babe the Blue Ox, complete with Babe the Blue Ox giant “adornments hanging from the lower torso,” shall we say.
“Nick,” I said excitedly. “Go stand underneath Babe and let me get a picture.”
He went over obediently, stood under Babe, and smiled.
“That’s great!” I yelled. “Now just reach one hand up and touch the balloons.”
“Those aren’t balloons, Aunt Laurie,” Nicholas told me.
“Yes they are,” I insisted. “They just don’t have strings, because people would trip on them. But they are balloons.”
“I don’t want to touch the blue balls, Aunt Laurie,” Nicholas yelled back.
“It’s concrete,” I shouted in return. “They’re not real!”
“Please don’t make me touch the blue balls, Aunt Laurie,” he said. “I don’t want to touch the blue balls!”
“Every other kid in this parking lot has touched the blue balls and let his parents take a picture of it,” I pleaded. “I promise, when you get into college this will be hilarious.”
“My mom wouldn’t make me touch the blue balls,” he said forcefully.
“Your mother would be over there holding your hands to them,” I told him. “When you were three, she took a video of Goofy flipping off the Mad Hatter while you were eating pancakes at Disneyland. I bet she makes this the wallpaper on her computer. Smile like you’re having fun!”
Nicholas reluctantly raised one hand above his head and barely grazed the adornments with his fingertips, his mouth curled into a frown.
“Smile like you’re having fun!” I yelled. “There’s a bunch of other kids behind you waiting to touch Babe’s balls!”
I clicked anyway. It will be hilarious when he goes to college.
In the gift shop, we picked out several new T-shirts for Nicholas, and I will say I was disappointed when he chose the Paul Bunyan over the Babe shirt, although I did talk him into one with a profile of Bigfoot on it. We then took the sky gondola up the mountain, through the canopy of the redwoods, all the way to the top, so high we could see the ocean.
“Are we going to go to the beach?” Nick asked.
“Sure,” my husband replied. “We could go there right after we get back to the car if you like.”
“Really?” my nephew said, looking very excited.
“Of course,” I said as I shrugged. “Provided that, before we get to the car, you touch the balls again, but with a smile this time.”
Heading west in the car, I figured it was the optimum time to impart some words of warning.
“Now, a couple of weeks ago when we went to the coast, the beach had pieces of jellyfish scattered all over it,” I told Nick, because the last thing I wanted was for him to poke around at some beach blob and get it all angry. “Don’t touch it. I don’t want you poking it with a stick, I don’t want you covering it with sand, I just want you to ignore it like it was your younger brother.”
“Okay, but why?” he asked.
“Jellyfish are one of the deadliest animals on earth,” I explained. “If you think touching concrete testes was bad, that’s nothing compared to what a jellyfish will do to you. So just do not touch it. Okay? Are we clear?”
“We are clear,” he agreed.
As we pulled into the parking lot that was parallel to the beach, Nick’s face lit up.
“Wow, I can’t believe the ocean is right there,” he said as we got out of the car, and he dashed into the sand, kicking it up into the air behind him and running toward the surf.