One of Those (Good) Days

Everything, And Nothing

It’s Friday morning, the Blackest of Fridays, and we are barely waking up. Little Bean’s nephews have a morning engagement, and we are sedated from all the turkey and stuffing from the night before.

Our hotel sits on one of the busiest strips in town and even from three floors up we can hear the chaos of the day after Thanksgiving busting through the window.

But, and it’s an important but, we have nowhere to be. No obligations. We have snacks and leftovers in the hotel fridge, the heater is on full blast.

We. Do. Nothing. We read. Scroll the news. Play video games. And it’s glorious.

After a while, she says, “Wait, wasn’t there a Target across the street?”

I nod.

“Let’s go!”

“You want to go out in THAT?”

“Dadda, it’s Black Friday!”

So we do go out into the madness. Target. Michael’s. Five Below. Elbow to elbow on a cold pre-storm day in Buffalo, my baby and me, spending money. Well, not that much money actually. A small bucket of Play-Doh. Some glow-in-the-dark stars for her ceiling. A gift for mommy.

We find some felt for her craft projects at a Buffalo staple called Ollie’s, kind of like a cheap-o warehouse of junk.

And after… after all that doing nothing, we’re exhausted and hungry. But we’re in Buffalo.

“Chicken wings,” I say.

“Chicken wings,” she agrees.

We go to Duff’s this time, a sports bar with what seems like 27 TVs playing college football, where our waitress, Olivia, calls Little Bean ‘babe’ and the wing heat levels are written on the wall like a thermometer. We order a plate of fried pickles as well. I mean, pickles are a vegetable, right?

Later, the boys join us and we sneak them into the hotel pool and that goes on for hours. In the evening, door drop plops a bunch of somosas and Greek salad and French Fries at my sister’s house and we all gorge ourselves while we watch some weird baking show that everybody seems to know except me about making cakes that look like other objects.

With the exception of the lady of the house not being with us, it is a perfect day. Perfect in its nothing. We accomplished zero. We lived perfectly in gratitude with full bellies surrounded by people we love. We were away but together and thankful of our lot in life that allowed such a day.

That allowed one of those days.