Traffic Light Tales
“When you were born I couldn’t do anything,” Mum says, as the light switches from yellow to red and the car slows to a halt.
I roll my eyes and lay back in my seat. It’s been a long trip, I’m tired and I’m really not in the mood to hear any family stories. Besides, I’ve heard this story a million times. I can predict her next sentence, word for word. I couldn’t eat, sleep, get up. I could only watch you.
“I couldn’t eat, sleep, get up. I could only watch you,” she speaks again, eyes still focused on the red traffic light. “You were such a lazy baby, two days late. And you just wouldn’t come out. They had to use forceps and your Daddy didn’t like that. No, he really didn’t like that.”
Cars whizz by, and Michael is in the back seat, asleep, snoring lightly. I quietly snicker at his snores and plan to tease him about it later. Michael knows nothing about his birth or the first few months of his life, yet I’ve heard the stories hundreds of times.
“Your daddy used to hold you, and just stare at you. He adored you, you were his baby girl.”
My mind wanders to a night, some time in the past and I remember my father coming home late at night and seeing me still awake, even though it was a school night. “Come here, silly girl,” he says, and I rush towards him and scramble into his lap, even though I am much too old and too heavy to be sitting in his lap and he is tired from work.
“You’re fifteen years old and you’re still running around like a chook! Fifteen years, sheesh,” he shakes his head, and measures the length of my calf. “This long. You were this long fifteen years ago. Fifty-three centimeters. Ouch, get off my legs now, are you trying to break them or something?”
I grin to myself and look over at my mother. Her face is blank, and her mouth is a grim line. The traffic light changes to green, and we drive on.
# Gumby, 2 years, 3 months ago.
Humm. I’m not sure that I wanted to hear the intimate details of your birth Tracey…
I’m hungry.
# Noemi, 2 years, 3 months ago.
Happy Birthday Trace!!! I hope you had a great day filled with family and friends :D
ps: You are now officially a young lady of marriagable age in Mexican Society :P
# Alex, 2 years, 3 months ago.
Wow, what a touching story. Damn my foot is itchy. Happy birthday you sexy thing. :| Hope you had a day full of dead birds and other lovely things!
# Boris, 2 years, 3 months ago.
Uh, thinking about Chrasy’s “intimate details of birth” made you hungry? Brilliant. Chrasyyyyy!!! Yet another year since you burst out of that hole screaming and squirming. Sometimes I wish I was older than you…
# Tracey, 2 years, 3 months ago.
Oh come on, they were not intimate details of birth…
# Jon, 2 years, 3 months ago.
I’m still amazed by how well you write :). Happy belated birthday, since I am a few days late!
# Gumby, 2 years, 3 months ago.
How do you find out the perimeter of a rhombus when you only have the length of the diagonals? I keep getting 82, and I don’t know why. Its off by two. Euuhhh. Stupid maths assignments. Only my bloody class. Weiners.
# Jon, 2 years, 3 months ago.
Just wanna say I LOVE the new theme!
# Chans, 2 years, 3 months ago.
Happy belated birthday, better late than never I suppose!!
I don’t remember much from my sister’s birth, only that I had to spend the day / night at my grandparent’s house and that, by the time my dad came to pick me up, I had a baby sister.
# Boris, 2 years, 3 months ago.
Graaaaayt, delete the theme I like most… Well, guess I’ll do what you usually get me to do. First off- BLAND. I get how the white makes the “weather” part of the theme, but… Hrm, I can’t think of any ideas and the white is kind of essential so I don’t know. Pretend it’s perfect and don’t worry about it. Eugh, this is still prossably just my own opinion still but line spacing is too fat. Heh, I said fat. Um, the sidebar. Again, don’t know if this is just me, but after staring at your blog for about half a minute my right eye started to feel… uneven. I think it’s the way I read, left to right, that makes it feel weird as opposed to having the sidebar on the left. Heh, you ended up putting a picture there in the corner :p So much for the three column layout though… I probably sound evil with all the derrogatory comments, but I can’t be bothered to talk about anything that’s good, and I don’t think that’s what’s going to help you anyway. Constructive criticism, these are meant to be comments.
# Tracey, 2 years, 3 months ago.
:O Why did all these newer comments not show up in my emails! Shock! Anyway… Thanks for all the birthday wishes everyone!
Jon: I’m still amazed at how “well” I write as well! ^_^
Noz: As if I want to get married now!!
Boris: Why were you staring at the blog for half minute anyway? You’re supposed to read! Erm, I personally think the line spacing is too skinny… Do you mean the line spacing in this textbox? Cause I can sort of understand that. Oh yeah I know, three column. Pffft.
# Boris, 2 years, 3 months ago.
Eh, there was something wrong with it so I stared for half a minute trying to figure out what exactly it was that was wrong… And I mean the line spacing is too fat in the blog and the comments textbox. Three column, you could just stick a row of rapidly flashing gifs on the side or something to disorientate people… at least that’s what I did.