Umm, I think that will come out

I thought it time to post an unrelated kid story. My life revolves around my bundles of "joy", but this has to be shared, as it's the worst I've felt since the cursed event occurred several years ago.

I worked in Corporate America, and didn't belong (imagine that). My two older sisters and I went out on a limb and decided to remodel homes....ourselves. Now there are several stories that should be shared, and will be eventually. But this one takes the cake. (Suzanne, can you guess which one?) ;)

We literally taught ourselves by means of conversations with Home Depot employees and books that should have been titled, "Remodeling for Dummies", as in the beginning that is what we were. Self taught- and a big yikes to that. Imagine- tile, grout and thinset in hand all ready to go. Book laid on floor, Suzanne reading aloud, "Step one mix the thinset..." etc.

But we were, in the end, mostly successful. I am proud were not "flippers" but took time and care bringing love back to dilapidated homes and moving people in with a little to no down payment.

On our fourth remodel we decided to take on a gross second floor condo, to do a "quick" rehab. There are hundreds of hilarious stories with this home, like painting the kitchen THREE times because the first two came out horrible, but I digress.

Suzanne and I were exhausted. Hauling: flooring, tools, paint, tile, a toilet, up and down stairs in the middle of the Arizona summer.  Day. After. Never. Ending. Day. Nearing the end of the remodel one particular bright and sun shiny afternoon we loaded the back of her newer, hatchback, spiffy red car with several five gallon buckets of paint as well as other miscellaneous remodeling tools. Her tools, her rules-they had to be fastidiously cleaned and packed in an orderly fashion at the end of every twelve hour day and hauled back up the next as to not risk overnight theft in the vacant properties.

We drove to the condo and commenced lugging heavy items out of the car, up the stairs, back down the stairs, up the stairs, until we were mind numblingly exhausted and I felt as if I had gotten lost in the Sahara Desert for five days with no water or camels to assist. Ya, it truly sucked that bad.

On trip number bazillion (in actuality number five), I leaned all the way in and grabbed the handle of the last of the five gallon paint buckets to drag it to the end of the hatch. It tipped as I dragged. The joke was on me, along with the paint. The lid wasn't fastened securely, probably my due to my carelessness and haste in packing up at the end of remodel three. A sea of gleaming white ceiling paint came splashing over the edge. I do not possess Ninja like reflexes similar to my sister (she got all those genes, and there was none to spare by the time I was born). All I could do was helplessly yell, "Noooooo" and watch this horror unfold before my very eyes. In slow motion even.

Latex paint sloshed all over the inside of her car, down her bumper, my legs, caught in the roll of my capri pants, on my flip flopped feet and finally onto the pavement. I didn't cry. Instead stared in awe and disbelief. A few seconds later I yell- in my little sister panic voice, "Suzzzzaaaannnnneeee!" That tone of voice has been used in our family only when she had to protect us from a bully or we were in danger or hurt. And true to her big sisterly nature, she came bounding down the stairs lightning fast- even evoking her Ninja skills.

She screeched to a halt and just looked. Her eyes large and nostrils flaring like a bull in a rage, for what seemed like an eternity. She didn't say a word. Silence is deadly with her, so I started devising a plan and settled on crying to evoke some sympathy. Unfortunately my body was too dehydrated to squeeze out a single tear. I immediately began working out plan two. Which direction to duck the blow that was surely to come. I know she can catch me, so running was out. Plus I had a shoe full of paint and it was wicked slippery.

She told me to go upstairs and rinse off. I hung my head and complied. At least that would give me some space so I wasn't in reaching distance. I slipped and slid my way up the stairs, leaving a trail of white flip flop paint marks in my wake.

Once I was cleaned and knew the initial anger had passed, I crept back down. "I'm sorry!" I say, "I'll clean it." "Damn right you will." she responded, and to my relief started laughing. The cursed cleaning took several hours and my arms stung all night from my torn bicep and forearm muscles burning. 

If you look carefully, to this very day, you will see little white paint speckles in the locking mechanism of her trunk. My bad.