Two Sentence Tuesday

My father - in - law used to work for Meredith Publishing, aka Donnelly Publishing, and retired in the late '90s due to osteo - and rheumatoid arthritis. But, it never fails, they still send him copies of books to peruse and read. My mother - in - law, aka mother preTzel, then passes these books on to me to peruse and read. My favorites are the hard - bound Reader's Digest collections. I love that they are still wrapped and new when she gives them to me. I love that she knows and admires my love of reading anything I can get my hands on. I love that mother preTzel is a mother to me just as she is to her three sons.

With me feeling under the weather and unable to really do a whole lot I've been cracking the spine on the latest Reader's Digest that she gave me back in December. I know you're wondering what took so long but I couldn't read it so long as I had Patricia, Janet, Tami, and other wonderful authors calling to me and demanding I read their stuff first. So with these shingles and the cellulitis kicking my ass and throwing me in to a major fibromyalgia flare I decided that I would read the newest book.

The second story is by Lee Child called Bad Luck and Trouble. The story is about Jack Reacher and from the beginning I was hooked. You know what this means don't you? It means that I have to go out and purchase all of the other books that contain anything to do with Jack Reacher. I'm going to buy them and devour them. Of course I'll have to wait until I can walk with out crying out in pain but I will have them all.

I found myself surprised, to be honest, that I actually enjoyed reading it. I'm so not in to military novels; I leave that genre for Teen to read and talk to me about them while I sit there with a blank stare on my face. Every word my eyes caught drew me deeper and deeper until I found myself back to chewing my nails because I was so engrossed I didn't realize the damage I was inflicting on my poor hands. (Only two fingernails were harmed in the reading of that book.) If you're interested you can read an excerpt of the book and see if it draws you in as much as it drew me in.

Here is one of the lines that had me chuckling and feeling envious at the same time:

"Same as ever," he said. "We find them, we take them down, and then we piss on their ancestors' graves."

Can you imagine being so close to someone, a friend or co - worker, that you would want to find the person who harm that friend, take them down, and then piss on their ancestors' graves? The only way I can relate to that is to think what I would do if someone harmed one of my preTzel boys or Mr. What would I want to do? I would want to "find them," and "take them down," and then go and "piss on their ancestors' graves." Yeah. That's what I would do.

Yesterday was Mr.'s birthday. He turned the ripe young age of 44. He's feeling a bit sad and melancholy and I don't blame him. I'd be more than sad and melancholy if it was my 44th birthday and I had to make my own dinner, take care of the kids, a sick spouse, a cat that is feeling her oats, and a dog that wants to run hither and yon while barking her fool head off. I'd be upset if I had to field phone calls and make phone calls to demand my wife be better taken care of then she is. I might even pout and throw a bit of a fit. Mr. didn't. He smiled and told me not to cry because

"preTzel, when I married you it was in sickness and health. We'll get through this and I love you so don't worry about any of this."

Then he gently held me as I cried in pain. I feel so guilty and awful that I could not bake or buy him a cake. I did not have a gift for him. I didn't have any cute cards from his preTzel boys to present to their father. Instead I wallowed in misery and pain and cried because I failed, this one time, to surprise him with a delicious dinner, gifts and cards, and hot sex. Sometimes life throws us a curve ball and we hold our glove up and catch it and other times we forget to catch it and it smacks us right between the eyes and knocks us out. That is how I feel. That I forgot to catch that damn ball but it's okay because I have my husband to catch it for me this time. I love that crazy man and love his mother for giving birth to him in 1964, unmarried, and dealt with all the stares and gossip to give life to a man that would become my lifemate. Here are two sentences that I'm going to write just for him:

Thank you for being my spouse and loving me as much as you do. Thank you for 16.5 years of love, comfort, children, fights, sex, and marriage, Happy Birthday Baby!

For more Two Sentence Tuesday please stop by The Women of Mystery.