I would like to preface this column with a sincere declaration of love, admiration and awe for my in-laws.
I love them dearly. I realize there are people out there who have numerous horror stories to relate about their in-laws (please stop e-mailing me about them); I do not have such stories. Even if I did, I am not stupid enough to share them in a public forum. That would be wrong.
I admire them immensely. They're retired, an occupation that I aspire to obtain before I reach the age where the only meal I am physically able to consume is a meat shake.
I am in awe of their ability to find birthday presents for my children that contain no fewer than 549 tiny pieces, hermetically sealed into 498 plastic baggies that take a combined degree in engineering and physics to build into something that remotely resembles the picture on the box the pieces came in.
These tiny pieces have a life force of their own and will eventually maneuver themselves into places where they know I will find them in my bare feet.
A package arrived today from my in-laws for my youngest daughter's fifth birthday. Upon opening the box, I discovered three presents wrapped deceptively in gold paper. So pretty, so dangerous. So full of things I just knew were going to force me to need a tranquilizer dart big enough to bring down a woolly mammoth.
I got married so I wouldn't have to do things like take out the garbage, replace light bulbs, kill spiders or put things together that have more than two pieces. He puts things together; I do the appropriate oohing and awwwing in appreciation of his manly prowess and spatial abilities.
Upon opening the innocent-looking box of presents, it was discovered that one was the new Swan Lake Barbie movie. Yeah! All I had to do for that one was to cut away the plastic wrapping and place it into chubby, 5-year-old, waiting hands.
The next box was the actual Swan Lake Barbie herself, wings and all.
Have you ever tried to extricate a Barbie, any Barbie, from the box she comes in? As I spent the next 45 minutes unwinding the little plastic twist ties that held Ms. Swan Lake captive in her cardboard prison, I pondered how the person who held the job of twisting those little ties felt about his/her career.
At last I'd undone the tape over the blond hair that had been (I am not making this up) sewn into place and bound with more twist ties.
This precious doll was immediately seized upon by the birthday girl with giggles and delight and rushed off to her bedroom. Her joy was due to thoughts of taking Barbie's pretty wings off and cutting all that blond hair down to resemble something more in the line of Annie Lennox.
And now for the last box. The biggest box. The box I knew was full of doom. Since I knew there was a theme to the presents opened thus far, I feared that the box contained the entire movie set of "The Swan Princess" and I would have to put it together.
My fear was justified.
Once the box was opened, out popped 549 tiny pieces, hermetically sealed into 498 plastic baggies, along with several hundred larger, molded-plastic pieces with various holes and protuberances that caused me to hyperventilate.
Hubby had obviously seen this coming and turned off his cell phone. I was on my own.
I won't go into the gory details here, but I'm fairly certain that the Great Wall of China took less time to construct, and no 5-year-old Chinese girls were allowed within plastic-baggie-tossing distance of the construction site to give helpful hints on where each brick should be placed.
I will tell you that Swan Princess Barbie has a matching place setting for four, including forks and knives, salad plates, dinner plates, cups, saucers, etc. These sit atop a lovely table, beside a large tree with little animals perched inside. There is a lake with a swan swimming around on it and several thousand items of food for Barbie and her prince to eat.
There is also a swing on the tree that has a skunk attached to it, via a tiny plastic protuberance that spears him squarely in the skunks' nether regions.
Suffice it to say that I'm quite certain Mr. Skunk is not happy about being skewered in that delicate area. I am also sure that one night soon I will need to walk through my house barefoot, the skunk on the swing will know this and plan his little skunk revenge by placing his tiny, plastic-molded body under my foot.
I'd like to reiterate that I really do love my in-laws. I love them so much that I'm going to bring the Barbie Princess Swan to their house the very next time we visit.
I'll also bring along the tranquilizer dart gun just in case.
Pamela Troeppl Kinnaird can be reached via e-mail at PamelaTroeppl@ comcast.net.
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