This, by far, has got to be the strangest dinner I have ever experienced.
It all started with a simple errand to Costco. My son was picked up from school by his father's live-in-girlfriend/fiance, who shall remain nameless. Although she is very nice and I actually like how she treats my son, she is not my first choice for getting him home from school, but he likes her and wanted her to pick him up that day. She works as a custodian for a different school in the district, so she picks him up and he pals around with her 14 year old son while she cleans classrooms. (Totally against the rules according to her job!) Since I live 20 minutes across town and didn't want to make two trips to the west side, I arranged to pick him up after my Costco errand.
While in Costco, I get a phone call from my son asking me when I was going to get him because nameless live-in-girlfriend/fiance wants to go get dinner. I asked him where she wanted to go out to eat and he said a pizza place in the mall. Since Costco is not far from the mall I told him that I would meet them there. I check out at Costco and take my goods out to the car. While loading the boxes in my car, I picked up a box (which was the heaviest damn box....obviously, the Costco person must have thought I was a weight lifter) and pulled a muscle in my back. Like an idiot, I put the box in my car (looking back, I should have made the box a little lighter first) and finish unloading my cart and take it back to the cart bay. As I am walking to the car I have this sharp, stabbing, burning pain on the right side of my back that hurts every time I breathe or move even the slightest. So, I call nameless live-in-girlfriend/fiance's cell phone and my son answers. I ask him where he is and he says that they were at the pizza place. I told him that I was on my way and to keep an eye out for me because I didn't want to get out of the car (back is killing me now). He says that they just ordered him a pizza and that I should just come in.
GRRRRRRRR! I didn't want to go in!! I park the car, figure that I am not going to cook dinner because of my back, and walk inside. Let me set the scene from here......8:00 on a Wednesday evening, large pizza place, three tables with patrons, and me walking through the door. When I walk in the door I see them, they see me, too late to back out now. Nameless live-in-girlfriend/fiance, her 14 year old son, my son........and my ex-husband (of 8 years, who is a complete and total loser/asshole) all sitting down at one of the three occupied tables. What am I to do? Do I nod kindly and stand a distance away? Do I order the pizza I planned on ordering for dinner and then sit at an empty table and read my book? Oh shit! Left my book in the car.....damn, that's out of the question! Holy awkward! I go to the line (wait, I am the line) and I ordered my 'take-out' pizza and a drink, because suddenly I was as thirsty as if I had ran a marathon in the desert. Upon filling my cup my son yells acorss the empty restraunt "Mom! Come over here and sit with me...I pulled up a chair for you!" Now what was I supposed to do. Nod my head and say 'I will stand right here?' or perhaps 'No thank you buddy, I need to say hi to my friends.' I sucked it up, put on a smile, and went and sat at their table.
It was one of those classic "keep your friends close, but your enemies closer" type of moments. They couldn't let silence encumpas the table. Talk, talk, talk, about meaningless topics. All I could think about was the sharp, stabbing, burning pain searing its way through my back! Finally their pizza came and they started eating. Shortly thereafter, my pizza came neatly boxed, and I waited for my son to finish his pizza. Now, keep in mind we are talking about a 13-year-old boy eating pizza. Usually such a quick event that I don't even see the pizza move....it just disappears. But.....not tonight. He ate slowly....painfully slowly. It was almost unbearable.
In the end, I was the bigger person. I sat down, carried on conversation, smiled (knowing I looked increadibly good tonight and loving every moment of it), and had a little bit of fun with my son. After we got in the car he said "Wow, that was weird!" You are telling me son....you are telling me! It must have been due to the lunar eclipse that I saw that night. What other explaination could there be?
One of my favorite times of the year is spring. Might have something to do with my birthday (which seems to be more dreaded each year) or perhaps just the temporary calm before the storm between winter and summer here in Northern California, which as anybody familliar with the weather around here knows, both can be britial.
