Hello North Dakota

Mama J. would die of embarrassment if she knew I was telling you this so let's just keep this one between us because it's too funny not to tell. She was the source of the funniest thing that's happened around here in a while. She loves the phone and spends a great deal of time on it. In fact, when she heads off to see St. Peter we'll need to bury her with a phone card so she can call us several times a day like she's accustomed to doing. Otherwise, Jesus will be sending us a phone bill. She's very direct when she calls you, and she doesn't give you time to respond to most of what she's saying. She speaks with the speed of an Amtrak train. When you pick up the phone, she states your name, identifies herself and launches into a one sided conversation sometimes before you finish saying hello. She can speak without breathing, so it's often quite a while before you get to say anything. We're used to it, so we don't think much about it, but we've always thought it could get her into trouble if she did it to the wrong person. It took several years but it finally happened this week.

Papa T. had outpatient eye surgery Thursday. He has a sister, Jane, in North Dakota who wanted to hear how the surgery went as soon as it was finished. From the recovery room, Mama J. called her and the conversation went something like this: (Keep in mind there are no pauses between sentences.)

"Jane? This is J." "T.'s surgery went fine. He's in recovery and will get to go home as soon as he's a little more alert....yadda, yadda, yadda" (insert 30 or so seconds of other nonessesntial information.) "Guess what. Sissy came home for the surgery, and she's here right now. Would you like to talk to her? Here she is."

She handed Sissy the phone, and Sissy says:

"Hey Aunt Jane. How ya doin'? Don't worry about Daddy. He's doing fine."

And from the other end of the phone Sissy hears:

"Sissy, I'm glad Daddy's doing fine. But this isn't Aunt Jane. This is Sandra at Willoughby's Pizza Parlor in Williston, North Dakota, and I need to be going now."

Sissy doubled over in laughter and so did everyone else in the room..except Mama J. She was really embarrassed. She carefully dialed Aunt Jane's number and relayed Papa T.'s condition and the phone story to her. Aunt Jane says the next time she orders pizza, she's going to call Willoughby's and tell them Aunt Jane needs a pepperoni pie. She's pretty sure they'll know who she's talking about even though she's never ordered from there before. We've laughed about that phone call for two days. Mama J.'s not laughing about it yet, but I did catch her smiling when we teased her about it yesterday. She still doesn't want everybody to know, so remember, this one is just between us, okay?