Really? I had to find this out just when John Le Carré released a new novel?
At least I can say honestly that I'm not using my loan money to buy adult beverages. Yeah, you, the guy with no partner or kids. You know who you are. Maybe I should tell Sapphire about that, and then we'll see who gets the lecture about what student loans are for.
Well, the student loan money for this school year is pretty much gone, anyway. With school over for the year (and graduation coming up in two weeks!) I'll be getting more hours at the music store, so at least there's that. My manager says I can have full-time hours this summer, but I'll have to go back to part time in the fall. That's okay with me since I'll be starting law school in September. But, that's a subject for another post.
I'm talking about online shopping in this post. In particular, I mean the kind of shopping that used to be carried on in malls, the kind that girls like to do. I'm talking about the kind of shopping where you just wander around and look at stuff until you find something that you think you absolutely must have. I like to call it the 'I'll know it when I see it' approach.
My sister-in-law Rommie is addicted to online shopping, which would be perfectly fine if she wasn't a stay-home mum with two little kids and a husband who goes to school and works part-time. I'm sure Sapphire has given her the talk about what Michael's student loan money is supposed to be used for, but I guess the message didn't get through. Rommie can literally sit there for hours and browse web sites for clothes, shoes, jewelry, stuff for the kids, stuff for the kitchen, craft supplies, soap, towels, you name it. The list goes on and on. It's amazing, the things this woman will buy online. We all decided that Rommie's internet shopping habit had reached an all time high on the crazy-o-meter when she bought underpants for Michael from some online men's designer clothing store. Dylan and I teased him for weeks about his 'cyber shorts'. We made ourselves pretty unpopular with that, I must say.
Rommie's online shopping isn't limited to things for herself, Michael, Jack and Cleo. She often helps her sister and brother pick out clothes. While Cassie seems to like electronic window shopping with her big sister, I'm not sure Xander appreciates Rommie's fashion advice all that much. Apparently she has good taste, though. I got quite a few compliments today on my new shirt, which I bought online with Rommie's help.
Sini doesn't like my new shirt. She says it's dull. I think her disapproval has more to do with Rommie helping me pick it out and less with any actual dislike of it on her part, though. If I haven't mentioned it before, Sini can be extremely jealous. Sometimes her possessiveness can be kind of cute, but most times it just makes things awkward.
Of course, this situation may have been made worse by Rommie's comment about the shirt Sini thought I should get: "Would you really let your man go out in public wearing a bright purple shirt?" For someone like Sini who comes from a culture where going out in public while wearing any kind of clothing is a big deal, I have no trouble figuring out why she was offended. Also, purple is one of Sini's favourite colours.
For the record, I would've worn the purple shirt. As long as my clothes are comfortable and fit me well, colour really isn't an issue for me.
Since I'm on the subject of clothing and colours, I have to share a Pax story with you guys. I hope you don't think I'm turning into one of those annoying people who tell about every single thing their kid does because it's just so adorable. Believe me, Pax does a lot of things that are not cute and definitely not for sharing with an audience. I think you'll appreciate this one, though.
For the past few days, Pax has been fascinated by socks and stockings, of all things. A few days ago when he was 'helping' Sini and Hunter do the the laundry, he discovered this mysterious layer of human clothing. Sini said she was losing patience with all his questions, especially since she couldn't answer most of them. When I got home from work she and Pax both pounced on me and demanded my attention. With Sini acting as translator, I told my adopted alien child everything I knew about hosiery. Conversations like that should probably be in the category of stuff you never thought you'd say until you started living with people from another planet.
Anyway, our little Pax became consumed with the idea of covering his feet with something other than the shoes he frequently liberates from my closet. On Thursday morning, when I was getting ready to go to work, he came into our room. I could tell he was up to something, even without the advantage of being able to see him. I didn't say anything. I just let him sneak his way across the room until he was beside me.
"Hi," he said.
"Hi, Pax. What are you doing?"
"Nothing." He seems to have learned that response and its connotation fairly quickly
"Really?" I said. "Sounds to me like you're doing something."
There was a long pause and then a puzzled, "Tyler feel me thinking?"
I laughed at that. "No, buddy. You know I can't feel what you're thinking. Only Sini can feel what you're thinking. I could tell by the way you were walking."
"Tyler magic," he said.
"No, Tyler is observant," I said. "Do you need help with something?"
"I can has?"
"Can I have," I corrected him. "What do you want to have?"
"This." He lifted my hand and dropped something onto my palm. "Can I have?"
I felt the object he'd placed in my hand, and it took a lot of self-restraint to keep myself from laughing again. "Pax, whose socks are these?"
He didn't answer me right away, but at last he said meekly. "Michael."
"Did you take them from Michael and Rommie's room?"
"Yes."
"And did you have permission?"
"What means permission?"
"Did Michael say it was okay for you to take these?"
"Michael not say okay. Michael not there."
Right, because Michael had to go in early to help do the inventory at the bookshop where he works. I said to Pax, "I'll tell you what. Why don't you put those socks back where you found them? If you want socks, we can get you some socks of your own."
"Okay," he said, and scampered off.
At breakfast, I approached Rommie with the subject of getting some socks for Pax. Our resident power shopper thought it was a fabulous idea, and offered to go to the mall later that morning if Sini wouldn't mind watching Cleo and Jack for a couple of hours. Sini, who has probably never worn socks in her entire life, was genuinely perplexed and wanted to know why Pax wanted them.
"It is not normal." was her distressed pronouncement.
"Humans wear," Pax informed her. "I like."
"What colour would you like your socks to be, Pax?" Rommie asked.
"Pink," he said.
Pax is still working on learning the names of colours, so Rommie's reaction was understandable. "Pink? Are you sure?"
"Rommie socks pink."
"Yes, they are," she said, laughing. "I'm wearing pink socks. You want socks like mine?"
"Yes! Can has pink?"
"Pax, try that again," I said. "Try to ask for things the way we taught you."
"Okay." He jumped up from his chair and came around to my side of the table. He clutched my hands and said earnestly, "I can has pink socks, please?"
With that, it was settled. Pax was going to get socks of his own which, for him, was a major life event. I went off to work with a smile on my face. Actually, every time I thought about Pax that day, I grinned. My boss must've thought I was losing my mind, because when he asked me why I looked like the cat who ate the cream, I told him that my kid was getting his first pair of socks today.
"I thought your kid was a girl," he said.
Yeah. You know that awkward moment when you realize you can't explain that your other kid is an alien without sounding like a crazy person? That was it. I mumbled something about it being a slip of the tongue, and then walked away. Fortunately, a customer came in just then, wanting someone to show him an affordable guitar for his teenaged son, so I had an excuse not to talk to my boss any more for a while. I was busy with the customer and my boss seemed to forget about my child's apparent gender-identity issue.
Dylan and Beau met me after work, and the three of us walked home together. As we came through the front door, I could hear Pax running to greet us. He was shouting at the top of his voice, "Tyler! Tyler!"
"Use your inside voice, Pax!" I called out.
Beside me, Dylan had started laughing, and Beau said softly, "Oh, lord..."
"What?" I said.
"Uh..." was all Beau seemed to be able to manage.
A second later, I knew what. Pax launched himself at me and nearly knocked me over in the process. Instinctively, I put my arms around him to try and stop his forward motion, and that's when I realized why my cousin was laughing so hard and why poor Beau was so tongue-tied.
"Pax, where are your clothes?" I blurted.
"I wear clothes, Tyler. I wear socks!" he said.
Nothing but socks, apparently.
"Come on," I said. "Let's get you dressed. You know the rules."
"Sini say okay," he said, and then added proudly. "Sini say permission."
"Sini is outvoted on this one," I said, and hustled him off to our room for some jeans and a t-shirt, something suitable to be photographed in. It was inevitable that Sapphire would want to take a picture of him in his new socks, after all.
Since Thursday night, Pax has been going around telling everyone in the house who'll stay still long enough to listen, "I happy. I has socks."
I think this world would be a truly perfect place if only the key to everyone's happiness could be as simple as a new pair of socks.
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