Saturday, August 04, 2007

Weird stuff flies from DH's mouth-

And it's not swearing!

Last Friday, DH picked up our next door neighbor at the ER, and took the man home. Twelve hours later, the next door neighbor expired.

This freaked DK out. He asked me if I wanted to go to the store with him, and mentioned that the last person in his front seat was dead. "Uh, no, honey, I don't want to go with you, but why don't you take Mr. Pain-in-the-Ass-at-work out to lunch?" DH spit coffee out laughing.

Mr. Pain ended up in the hospital this week. (Uh oh!) I didn't wish it, I promise.

Last night, we went out to dinner. I crawled up into the passenger seat. "Oh, honey, when did your travel charm break?"

The safe traveler's charm came from Kamakura years ago. The print is now a grey ghost, and the navy brocade sunfaded to silver. The harsh sun dried out the cord which hung from the rear view mirror, and now, the charm rests in DH's cupholder. The Buddha at Kamakura was one of my earliest memories. I remembered the green, green park, and steps. I remembered a looming disembodied bronze head-but I didn't know where I saw it. Chicago's Chinatown? I dunno. It was a mystery. Five years ago, we were in Tokyo. My little brother fussed about making plans and checking train schedules.
"Where are we going, Dean?"
"To Kamakura."
"What's that?"
"A big Buddha."
"It's really green there, isn't it?"
"Yes."
"I've been there."
So we went again. While I was there, I lit a candle to bid farewell to a miscarried child. I sent my brother and his friends around the prayer wheel twice (because they needed extra piety to save their souls) and bought charms at the little vendor's booth. One was the little brocade and pewter safe traveler's charm that traveled in Mark's truck.

"It broke in the middle of last week. We were all going out to lunch, and it broke. I told the guys it probably meant some bad Buddhist ju-ju. Then I drove next-door-neighbor around Friday night."

I was floored-he always teases me about superstitions!

6 comments:

Joan said...

Whoa, way creepy! Please sit in the back seat until he replaces the charm!

junior_goddess said...

Joan, I think it's creepier than that. While I was there, I bought a charm for having healthy babies. I sent it to DD in the summer of 2002, who had recently miscarried. Jan 2003, she had DGD. I can't keep DGD's birthday straight in my head because I miscarried the weekend before.

THAT's creepy.

Enid said...

wow. Remind me not to piss you off.
Sorry you had to go through all that.

LisaW. said...

as the late great Yogi Berra would say "some things are too much of a coincidence to be a coincidence".

smariek said...

I hope you can get another charm in the truck. Maybe just replacing the cord and putting it back up on the mirror will do?

junior_goddess said...

Marie-I've written my little brother. He agrees that I might need a new one (ok, secretly we are a bunch of peasants) and will contact his buddy. I think I can affix a new cord.