Don't Cry Over Spilled Soup

Mom needed a break. Usually dad took us to PoJo's and left my mom with the baby so she could relax. The run-down strip mall arcade was definitely second-rate to Chucky Cheese. No pizza, no creepy full-size dancing dolls, no smelly blue tunnels and questionable ball pit. But the glitz and glam lacking in PoJo's was made up by the fact that PoJo's had Tetris, which made the outing not just bearable for dad, but actually enjoyable. He strategically directed colorful falling bricks with a joy stick, while me, my sister, and brother spent our silver coins on Skee Ball and Air Hockey games in order to collect enough tickets to buy watermelon Jolly Ranchers, Tootsie Rolls, and green sticky hands.

But tonight mom went out for night on the town (let's be honest, she probably went to Barnes and Nobel for the hot chocolate and the smell of books) and we stayed home. Normally dad fed us cereal and called it good. Then he allowed us to gather around him on the computer to watch him play King's Quest 5. We'd watch a pixelated King Graham cross our screen seeking clues to an ever unfolding storyline that would get us one step closer to our goal of...I don't know if I ever knew what the point of that game was. But it didn't stop me and my siblings from directing and pointing, and jumping up and down in suspense at the pixelated villains and treacheries. 

However, soup and Aladdin were on the menu tonight. We sat at the bar watching him wind the can opener and pop off lids to Campbell's chicken noodle soup. He poured the concentrate into the pan, carefully adding water. Filled our cups with cold water from the tap, and divided the soup equally among the colorful plastic bowls. Kirsten and I fought over who got to use the funny spoon (an old, decrepit spoon with a loose yellow handle that had somehow survived the 70's and managed to find its way into our silverware drawer. Still not sure where it came from, but we fought gallantly for the right to slurp our soup from it). Dad handed a bowl to the 4-year-old, Clint. Kirsten won the spoon this time, but I was already making plans to commandeer it for breakfast tomorrow. 

Dad watched Clint as he started walking to the table. At first Clint walked very slowly and carefully, balancing the soup in his little hands, but Dad could see a sudden flicker of confidence in the four-year-old's eye as Clint quickened his step towards the table. Suddenly dad saw impending doom. 

"No Clint! Don't spill!!" Dad cried. 

Soup spilled everywhere. 

Clint looked up in alarm, his own soup still safely swishing back and forth in his orange bowl. But he saw a puddle of chicken noodle goodness splattered across the bar right underneath dad's bowl.

Dad burst into laughter which soon transformed into one of his famous giggling fits. He couldn't stop laughing. And when my dad started laughing, everyone started laughing. Dad's laughs were contagious. 

Right then mom walked through the door carrying a bag of fresh books. "What's going on?" She asked. 

Dad tried to talk, but he could only get a few words out. "Soup....spilled..." Mom looked quizzically at the soup puddle. Finally he composed himself enough to say, "I gave Clint a bowl of soup and...." 

He burst into uncontrollable laughter for a few seconds, until he again composed himself. 

"He started to run off with it, so I shouted, 'Don't spill!'" 

And then dad burst into another fit of laughter until he again, tried to finish. 

"And right as I said that, I spilled my own bowl of soup all over the counter." 

Kirsten, Clint and I shrieked with giggles as he finished the story, Andre, the baby, catapulted applesauce onto his face, and my mom joined the laughter while she pulled my dad in for a big smooch. Ew.  

Our family wasn't perfect, but life was splattered with happy, silly moments. And after all I've seen and experienced, it seems to me like these moments are what life is all about.