The Gas Bill and the Pidocchi Pets

THE GAS BILL

Yesterday was the start of my “ferie” or holiday. I don’t have work for a week so I took Dylan out for a bicycle ride this morning and run some errands.

Here in Italy, we pay the bills for water, gas, electricity and so on at the post office. The Poste Italiane also serves as a bank. So we went there and I paid our monthly rent of the house and that slices my monthly salary into half. I also took care of the phone bill and Internet.

I think Dylan enjoyed the ride, the sun was out and it was really a nice day. When we got home I checked the mail box and took out a letter. It was from the Gas, Water and Garbage company. Yes, they’re all rolled up into one. I prayed, before opening it, that it won’t ruin my day with my son. The envelope was thick and I quickly shuffled the papers to look for the sum total to surprise my self. When I saw that there were four digits, excluding the two digits for the cents, I nearly fainted. I really almost did.

As soon as I placed Dylan down the bike, he ran towards his plastic toy dog with wheels that he rides and pushes around. I said to myself they probably made a mistake or at least they should have made one. But the records were clear and true.

Poor little Dylan, he went to play alone as I just stood there watching him. My mind never fails to do its job of thinking of other problems to connect to the gas bill. Like, we will likely postpone our trip back home this year again. The next was that I don’t have the tips from work this week because I’m on a holiday. Another was, this is the most troubling one, that our labor union at the hotel thwarted an attempt by the managers to hold a meeting, with us the dependents, about probably some lay offs this month and the next. The union wasn’t given the proper notice for this meeting so they succeeded in stopping it.

The word lay off is a frighting word specially in these times. I’m predicting that the first person to go is no other than yours truly! Because I have a seasonal work contract and not a fixed one.

I would like to add just one more problem from my mind’s list. Just for the sake of prolonging this entry. On Wednesday we have to go to the immigration office to renew our papers. I religiously pay my taxes but here you need to spend more for your work permit.

Suddenly my mind miraculously thought of one good idea, thank God! I left my son for a minute to run inside the house and turn off the damn thermostat.

The Pidocchi Pets

Two days ago my seven year old son, Lukie, happily pulled out a wiggling tooth. At bed time he placed his white precious gem underneath his pillow and went to bed with a smile on his face. When he woke up the next morning his tooth disappeared and he found a ten euro bill instead.

When he got home from school yesterday, while we were having our merenda, another tooth fell. Boy! Was he lucky or what! He did the same ritual and in the morning the tooth was gone and he got another ten euros.

Today coming home from school again, Lukie wore the sweetest smile when he came in the door. With the two missing tooth amplifying the “TH” sound, Lukie joyfully informed us that another one of his gems was wiggling. Oh brother, I told my self, enough already with this. There’s a financial meltdown for christ sake! He was scratching his head when he told us. For once, just once, I hope the Tooth Fairy would pick up the tab for this one! What we didn’t know that he also brought home some “petS”. Mind you that’s with an S.

When I was slightly older than Lukie, I brought home stray puppies. Now that I’m a father I’m still sure the puppies were stray. Anyway those were the  problem free days where life was simple. In our time now we can’t have a dog or a cat. We can’t afford to rise any pets. Don’t get me wrong I want me kids to have pets but now is not a good time. Let me repeat that again “NOT A GOOD TIME”.

While we sat all together on the table having tea and cookies, Lukie still kept on scratching his top. My wife, annoyed with the head scratching, quickly inspected our son’s head. Like a concerned mother ape, she combed using her fingers, Lukie’s hair. In a split second she screamed “PIDOCCHI!” And in an instant she ordered me to buy an anti pidocchi shampoo.

The anti pidocchi shampoo burned a hole worth thirteen euros, “13 euros,” through my wallet. It burned through the thick receipts I had in there, if you really want to know the truth! Killing them pest petS cost money these days.

Lukie would have to wait after dinner to wash his head. In the mean time I was curiously crazy about my son’s pidocchi. I wanted to see them petS with my own eyes. So what I did was search the house for a comb with teeth that have very narrow gaps between them. I found one and took the most white bond paper I could find, placed it on the table, asked Lukie to bow his head facing the paper and I combed him down. Several strokes later, WALA, one gray pidocchi fell on the bond paper. It wriggled while I continued and another one, a smaller one, fell.

My wife went running out the bedroom when she heard us rejoicing in our hunt. We only found two but that was enough to put us all in high. It was a good killing. Squashing the tics and hearing the loud tic beneath my finger nails, my finger nails I remind you, not my wife’s finger nail, was . . . . . . I’m lost for words to describe  the feeling. Wow, is all I could think of now.

Before bed time my wife shampooed Lukie’s hair thoroughly, rinsed it well then blow dried it. She inspected it again and spent quite awhile with him that night.  Finally she came in our bedroom as I was reading Dylan his favorite book entittled Spot. It’s about a dog. Moving on, she told me that there were still a lot of pidocchi eggs in our son’s hair. I think she was a bit delighted that the eggs were still there so she could spend some extra quality time with Lukie. Being a Filipino we simply love this pass time. Then she took Dylan for breast feeding and all of us got a good night’s sleep.

It’s kinda funny how these little creatures made us forget about the gas bill and ending our day with a smile in our hearts.

~ by musashiboogie on March 11, 2009.