Sliver, Uh, Silver Linings In My Clouds

A Sherry McGuinn Challenge on Illumination

“Was I deceived? or did a sable cloud/Turn forth her silver lining on the night?” — From John Milton’s poem “Comus,” The year of our Lord 1634.

I have absolutely no clue what Milton actually meant when he wrote this line. I mean, come on. Comus was written almost forty years before Milton lost his paradise and regained it.

However, I’ve gleaned from conversations with adults (when they even speak to me) it means regardless of whatever sh*t happens to you, there is always somebody or something around to clean it up.

Of course, it could also mean for every negative thing zipping around these parts, there is a positive lazily floating around somewhere in the universe waiting to couple up and get jiggy.

What?

Everybody knows opposites attract, right? Cher and Bono? Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau?

Need I say more?

But the point of the challenge is I’m supposed to remark on the changes in me and my wife’s life caused by the “name I will not mention P-word” ruminating just outside our home, waiting for us to step out and draw in a massive breath of disaster.

I’m supposed to show how everything dark and gloomy has a “silver lining” and how we’ve found ways to turn the negatives into the positives. Okay, well, let me see. Negatives, into positives. Negatives, into positives. Negatives…

Okay, we’ve got a couple. Three to be exact.

The Dark and Gloomy Negative

Our yard hasn’t been mowed a single time this year. Where it was once the pride of the neighborhood, and people stopped and gazed at the wonder and beauty, it now looks like the jagged plains of Lake Manyara National Park in the Serengeti.

The Silver Lining

If we can get the zebras to cooperate and stop running around, our guess is we can turn our front yard (maybe even our back yard — it resembles the Sahara desert right now) into a petting zoo and charge admission.

Cha Ching

The Dark and Gloomy Negative

Because of Senorita “name, I will not mention P-word,” we now have to wash our hands at least twenty times a day.

Sorry folks. A little authorial intrusion there.

What? No dear, I’m not going to change the above sentence to Senor or Senorita.

But really think about it, y’all. Everyone on the planet knows, “Heav’n has no Rage, like Love to Hatred turn’d, Nor Hell a Fury, like a Woman scorn’d.”

And no, we can’t even blame Shakesphere for this one. The credit for our current condition goes to William Congreve in his 1697 play The Mourning Bride (Act III Scene 2). He done pissed her off, and now she aims to kill us all.

The Silver Lining

Because of this, we’re washing our hands so much our fingertips look like sun-dried raisins, but the wrinkles help me grip my pens and pencils better. I can write for hours at a time without stopping. Plus, my honey hasn’t asked me to open a jar for her in almost a month.

Talk about no-slip grip.

The Dark and Gloomy Negative

Because of our current plight, my lovely wife and I can no longer see our six grandchildren up close and personal.

In the old days, we’d stand out in the yard with huge fishing nets and catch the kids as our grown-assed children drove by and tossed them out the window, while the in-laws shouted at us through bullhorns.

“We’ll be back in two hours! Oh and little Timmy’s a little cranky. We think he may have filled his diaper on the way across town!”

The Silver Lining

We don’t get to see our grandchildren up close and personal anymore.

We were really getting tired of continually mending those nets. Jeez, Louise, you’d think our children would put their tiny tub-o-goos on freaking diets now and then. Oh, and the best part is watching the faces of our children and their significant others when one of the infants sitting on their lap fills their diaper.

Last week one of the grownups actually gagged at the smell during the video chat.

Priceless.

So there you have it — moments of doom and gloom where we have discovered our unique and oh so beautiful silver linings.

Our guess is by the time all of this is over, we’ll have turned the front and back yards into a full-blown jungle. We’re thinking of naming it Barnett’s Wilderness and charging $15.75 a person for the tours.

We’ve gotten used to the perma-wrinkles in our hands, and I haven’t written this much in years thanks to the stranglehold I now have on my pens and pencils. Plus, I don’t have to lose my train of thought and open a jar of pickles anymore.

And the grandbabies? Well, the poop show starts around seven in the evening each Saturday. The missus and I even braved going to the store for an ample supply of popcorn.

Hey, let me tell you. We’re talking each time is a h*ll of a show. A body can’t have enough popcorn.

Peace Out My Writing Sisters And Brothers,

P.G.

Thanks So Much For Reading

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