One of the many Lindsey stories.....

Just a rehash of a spring 2012 Facebook post.

I was just sitting here watching TV with James and a commercial came on about Dr. Suess.  It reminded me of my favorite books growing up.  Lindsey is always sharing the..... um.... odd things that darling Maizie Moo does so I thought I would share the memory that popped up during the Dr. Suess commercial in hopes it might shed a little light for Lindsey about where Maizie may have gotten her proclivity for eccentricity.

When I was a child (a million years ago apparently) I was a voracious reader.  (One of the few things about me that hasn't changed in the last million years)  My mother, being the wonderful woman that she is, ordered for me, a subscription to the Dr. Suess Book of the Month club.  Once a month I would get a box with TWO, yes that's right TWO large Dr. Suess books!  Nothing could have made me happier as a child.  These were books like Yertle the Turle, McGelliots Pool, The Sleep Book, Scramble Eggs Stupendous and If I Ran the Zoo, Etc.  I LOVED these books!!!  Loved them.  Did I mention that I LOVED these books?

So when I ignorantly got engaged at 17 and married at 18 and then pregnant with Linz who was born when I was 19… (yes, in that order and no I wasn’t known for my ability to make smart decisions) I left the books in Cincinnati with my parents for safe keeping.  We all know that ‘traveling with the military’ and ‘cherished possessions’ do NOT mix.   However, when my little angel turned 3 and had demonstrated a deep love of reading and books I asked my mother to unearth the books for me to bring back home to our house in Auburn, where we were to be stationed for THREE WHOLE YEARS!!! WooHoo!  I carefully packed them on one of our trips home to see Mom and Dad and carted my most prized childhood possessions back to Auburn and promptly unpacked them and neatly stacked them into the newly acquired bookshelf in Lindsey’s room.   I stood back and looked at them and sighed.  The books had come full circle.  First read by me and now by my daughter and someday, perhaps, by her own daughter.  Yes, I was tickled pink to have the books again.  That night I put Linz to bed and read several of the cherished books to her before she fell asleep.  The next day Lindsey spent most of the day in her room “reading” and playing.  Or so I thought.  Yes, I was about to learn a very valuable lesson.    Any possessions that I truly love and cherish should be treated one of two ways: 1. Leave them at Mom and Dads until the kids move out.  Or 2. Lock said possessions in a safe, dig a moat around the safe, install at least three hungry alligators into the moat.  Dig another moat around the first moat and fill it with oil and set the oil ablaze.  Then hire several ex secret service agents to stand guard around the flaming moat with orders to show no mercy and never turn their backs on my children, no matter how cute and innocent they appear. 

So what you ask, happened to the precious Dr. Suess books.  Well…… Lindsey ate them.  And I know you are saying “What do you mean, she ate them”?  You might have gotten the wrong impression of my lil darling.  When I say “she ate them”, what I really mean is, she ATE them.  She put the books in her mouth and spent the majority of the day chewing on them.  Then she came out of her room to ingest some human food, tell me she loved me, and went back to her room to eat the books some more.   To say I was upset would have been a gross understatement, but perhaps this little story might not only shed some light on Maizie’s unique personality, and Lindsey’s errant habits, but it should also explain a lot about what happened to me.  Over the next several years Lindsey would go on to eat many things that made my eye bulge, steam escape from my ears and my hair to fall out in large clumps.  Lindsey’s room was like a child themed house of horrors by the time she was 10.  Barbie dolls with their legs chewed off, half eaten books, pencils, pens, markers and crayons that look like they had been used to tease a pit bull.  Bits of clothing that had been chewed up until they looked like faded out scraps of old paper. Weeble wobbles that no longer weebled or wobbled.  Cute little baby dolls with missing arms, legs and/or heads and sometimes hair.  ( I was expecting Ryan by this time and to say I was worried was like saying Mt. Everest is a hill)  But don’t get the wrong impression.  Lindsey didn’t chew all of her toys.  No, some of them she would break apart using things she had quietly and covertly pilfered from the kitchen.  For instance, my meat tenderizer was very useful in dissecting an electronic alphabet talking toy.  And oddly enough, after Lindsey was done with her mad scientist experiments, most of her toys would still function, just not the way the manufacturer intended.  For instance, that talking alphabet toy still made noise, but instead of saying “A, A is for apple”, I’m fairly certain it was saying swear words (A, A is for @@@hole), but it was so muffled I couldn’t really decide if my daughter was really an evil genius or just a product of my various dysfunctional issues.  :o)  When she was younger I told myself she was just super curious and precocious, but now that I have three kids and a grand kid, I can no longer support that philosophy even in my own warped mind.  Definitely Evil Genius.  Sorry Linz.  Hate to sell you out like that, but if it makes you feel better, my next reminisce will be about your dear brother, Ryan.  :o)