A Slightly Sour Sweet Sixteen

As birthdays go, sixteen is a much-anticipated milestone.  Don’t get me wrong, being able to legally buy scratch-offs at age eighteen is a thrill but nothing trumps being handed the keys to the kingdom.  My daughter Sydney recently turned sixteen and, as usual, we pulled out all the stops to celebrate.  She began her special day with a batch of buttered birthday toast.  I meticulously planned her mid-day meal of a Lunchable and mini grape soda pop.  To prevent the debacle that inevitably accompanies any important outing of which I participate, her father picked the birthday girl up immediately after school to take her to the Department of Motor Vehicles.  Sydney had been practicing up by taking the DMV’s online quizzes.  She was surprised to learn that under no circumstances is a driver to cross the double yellow line.  “What if your driveway is on the opposite side of the road?” she asked. 

As father and daughter left, I suddenly had a premonition as I remembered my last trip of this kind to the DMV.  I quickly scanned their helpful and informative website to discover that the social security card is a must-have document.  “You just realized this,” older daughter, Savannah asked incredulously, “we went through this less than two years ago.”  She is still holding a grudge from how I screwed up her own attainment of a driver’s license.  To the great annoyance of my husband, who thought I had my act together (c’mon folks, shouldn’t he know better by know?), I waylaid the trip to Warsaw with a carefully-worded cell phone call.  I then talked them through the search for the needed document.  I can’t explain how to play Crazy 8’s to eleven- year-olds so you can imagine how well that went.  I drove home to make the search myself and naturally found it in the last possible place. 

Brad and Sydney again hit the road.  Unfortunately, the documentation delay resulted in their arriving too late for Sydney to take her permit test.  “Let me buy you a Frappe,” Brad said to our disappointed daughter and off they went to McDonald’s to discover an out-of-order drink machine.  “Well, don’t forget you’ll be having homemade ice cream tonight,” he said consolingly. 

Yeah…about that.  Made the mixture, packed it in ice and salt, turned on the motor and listened to the most horrific grinding sound ever.  I employ the same diagnostic procedure across-the-board to all scary or unusual noises.  I ignore them.  Brad, however, felt compelled to directly address the issue.  Dismantling.  Adjusting.  Fiddling.  He reattached the apparatus and plugged it in.  It now sounded like a dropped transmission.  “It’s fine,” I said optimistically, now actively ignoring the slender spiral of smoke rising from our ice cream machine.  Suddenly a new sound filled the air.  No, not the smoke detector.  If only we were so lucky.  Our new puppy, who voraciously and enthusiastically consumes shoe laces, fabric softener sheets and coffee table legs, chose this exact moment to empty her stomach.  Entering the kitchen, Sydney said, “Mom, Juno threw up.”  My sixteen-year-old stood by silently as she watched her parents battle flames in order to rescue the ice cream mixture, our home, and our very lives (in that order) before she grabbed the paper towels and disappeared back into the other room.  With the clever application of a monkey wrench, Brad hand-cranked the ice cream in the manner of our forefathers and forty-five minutes later, we ate our homemade cajun peach ice cream.  Sydney had, by this time, inexplicably lost her appetite and was more than happy to just go to bed.  Sweet dreams, Sweet Sixteen. 

 as published in Warsaw's Country Courier

http://www.mywnynews.com/arcade_warsaw/