After several months of trying to beat the World Record for the longest toenail, Geddy finally succumbed to exhaustion. No strength to lift his fork up to his mouth at lunchtime gave me (his doting and faithful mother) the first clue that the time had finally come for 'the trimming'. After all, it couldn't possibly be that he wasn't hungry for ham, green beans and potatoes. Geddy loves ham. Sometimes as I pass by him in the kitchen, Geddy sighs as he gazes longingly into the refrigerator looking for a bit of ham to satiate his desire for 'fat bacon' as Duffy (his loving and attentive father) calls it.
So, as Geddy sat at the lunch table with his head wearily resting on his hand, fork barely lifted from the table, I had to think quick. The mere fact Geddy had been laying about all day in his bed reading A Series of Unfortunate Events too exhausted to get out of bed gave me an indication that time was drawing near. And that we'd let things go on long enough. Geddy's socks were straining under the building pressure of the foreboding toenail slicing away quietly at the threads of the sock. Briskly, I snatched up that languid foot and unsheathed it. Before me lay such a sight that I nearly screamed with shock and horror, but, not wanting to alarm the children, I bit down hard on my tongue until I felt my tongue throb with pain. The nail clippers in my hand clattered to the floor like chattering teeth on a frigid night. "These tiny clippers will never do," I thought, "but they're all I have." I picked up the elfin-sized nail clippers and set to work on the massive toenail. Wrenching, writhing, grimmacing, sawing. It seemed to take my strength from me just lifting the foot up. Finally, sweet release.The toenail seemed to fall in slow motion toward the kitchen tile. There was a sonic boom and the house shook as the toenail dented the floor. Geddy looked relieved and seemed to perk up immensely now that the enormous toenail lay at his feet unattached.
"Do you need help lifting it to the trashcan Mom?" Geddy inquired.
"Yes," I replied. "I don't even think Chevy would be big enough to hoist this thing up," I reminded Geddy. "We'll probably need to go to one of those places that rents giant cranes, you know the kind that they use for building skyscrapers," I said solemnly.
"Well if it's too big for Chevy to lift then a crane isn't going to do much better at the job."
"You're probably right, Geddy," I sighed. "I guess we'll just have to move to a new home."
That crazy toenail!
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