Monday, January 28, 2008

Scissled


They're gone again. They're gone!!!

My scissors.

In the silverware drawer, on the right hand side, is where I keep my scissors.

But they steal them. The children come in, take them out of the drawer, use them, sneak out into the backyard, dig a hole, and they bury them. Or they just toss them in the trash, I don't know which.

I have one with purple handles, one with orange handles, and one with black handles. They're all gone.

Two days ago, while cleaning out the laundry room, I came across a pair of grey-handled hair scissors from long ago. I placed them in the drawer.

Immediately, a child appeared, feverish to get his hands on those scissors.
It's like there's an unspoken credo among them:
The Scissors Must Be Freed.
Take them, quick! She's not looking! Hurl them out the window! Toss them under the couch cushion! Hide them in the laundry room!

It was with a sense of helplessness that I watched him walk away with those scissors. I knew I would not see them again.

Now it is today, and the boy twin is Star Student Of The Week, and my task is to create a collage of pictures of him on a wrinkled piece of paper with a frame printed around the outside of it, that he has just pulled from his backpack. I have 25 photographs that we had copied just for this project, and if I don't find a pair of scissors soon, it's going to end up looking like I tried for the artistic, "torn edge" look when trimming these pictures, and, combined with the wrinkly 8 1/2 by 11 paper, I'm telling you the effect is going to fall flat.

I have one pair of ultra-deluxe scissors in the sewing bag. Whenever somebody finds these, I leap out from behind a nearby object and hiss, "Those are FABRIC scissors!!! Don't you dare get them anywhere near paper!" These scissors are in pristine condition, complete with a plastic point-cover, and to my knowledge have never touched a piece of fabric. The last sewing project I completed must have come pre-ultra-scissors. It was the creation of two Easter Daisy Princess dresses one of which, if inspected closely, had a ravaged back button hole, the crowning touch at the end of a long and frustrating sewing week in 2002. I have not sewn since.

I have this sense of security though, in knowing that they are there, still sharp as ever. If I used them on the next hair cut, they would not "bend" your hair or make you scream by pulling it out by the roots, like our present hair scissors used to(before they disappeared). They are like my little insurance policy.

Tomorrow I will buy myself another pair of everyday scissors. I will hang a bola around my neck, and tie the scissors to the end of it. I will be like a walking cutting machine, leaning over so that the children can complete their art projects, fumbling to zip up my coat without poking myself in the eye, flinging them over my shoulder before giving hugs....

Or I can just tempt fate and stick 'em in that drawer again.
Yeah I'll probably do that.

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

Mark my words....before the end of the night you'll be using your sewing scissors on the photos for the collage. Its in your hormones to do such.

Its like taking the dark meat chicken, saying that that's really the part you like. (not that I do that one - I take the white meat. I'm just saying....Mom's of old used to do these things. I read it in a book)

mrc-w said...

Oh my mom was the same way with scissors. She would mark them with a sharpie "FABRIC ONLY" but then when one of us used them to cut wire or something, she would have to scribble it out and put them in the pencil drawer. Poor moms and their scissors!

Kelle said...

LOVE IT!!! When I gave up the classroom, I brought home the bin of 25 scissors I bought for the kids and hid all 25 of them in various places around the house to avoid being scissled. Now, it's like a Scissor House! Yes, I may find scissors when I need them, but they clutter every drawer and cabinet! They stick out of the drawers when you try to close them so that they don't close, and then I just get mad and insanely open and slam the drawer over and over as if it will somehow dislodge the scissors and make them fall neatly back into place! You can have mine!!

Kulio said...

Hahaha! Oh man I've done that with the utensil drawer when it won't close....

Molly I want to go out and buy aunt Esther a nice pair of scissors right now!!

Diane, yes, it's the "oh give it to me, burned toast is my favorite" mom syndrome....

Anonymous said...

by the way, I LOVE your verb. Scissled.

kool kenna said...

HAHAHAHA! i can just imagine you with a pair of scissors around your neck

Carin said...

such is the reason for my favorite things post...finding my scissors (blue handled, in case you were wondering) where I've left them.

because, yes, it is so rare.

scissors must go where tape goes...I've wrapped countless gifts with glue sticks (found one with no cap...had to scrape off the dry stuff).

loved this.

riahbell said...

This post is one of my favorites!
Love reading these!
hmmmm I know what to get you for christmas next year...a years supply of sissors.
:]