poison ivy

Two Years Later

/ Quilly / 50 Comments

Two years ago, He and She started this adventure that is “Their Lives Together” here on this island.  Today, she is thinking that their relationship might have been much shorter had the following scene happened then rather than at noon today:

She itching all over, whined to him about her horrid red rash.  He grabbed his magnifying glass and her arm and took a look.

“It’s a rash,” he said.  “Where else is it?”

She told him there was one kind of rash on her tummy and her leg, and another kind of rash on her arm and her butt.

He looked at everything with his hand lens (magnifying glass) — even her butt.  She said, “I would think you could see my butt well enough without making it bigger!”

He ignored that.  He also dismissed the rash on her tummy and leg, agreeing with her that it was probably her reoccurring eczema.  Then he invited her to examine her own arm with the hand lens.  “See the red pustules?”  He queried.  She nodded.  “Those are on your butt, too,” he said.

“So what are they?”  She wailed.

He smirked and said, “Poison Ivy most likely.”

“Poison Ivy!”  She wailed.

He tried valiantly not to laugh. “I’m afraid so.”

“I am suffering here!”  She said.  “You are not supposed to be enjoying this!”

He really smiled then and said, “I’m sorry, love.  I’m not enjoying this, I just can’t seem to do anything about the smile.”

She thought of several things She could do about his smile, but was too busy scratching to act on any of them.

Mangoes & Rash Behavior

/ Quilly / 25 Comments

Both Dr. John and OC frowned on the idea of me going outside and tossing rocks at the mangoes with the children. I explained to OC that our lease forbids climbing trees, but it doesn’t say anything about tossing rocks. OC said, “That’s probably because throwing rocks is already against the law!” Now I need to check a copy of the Hawaii penal code before I decide whether or not to join the rock throwing children. (Such decisions were much easier when I was a kid.)

Well, the good news is, enough Mangoes already littered the ground that there were plenty for me to gather up, bring into the house and feast upon. Mangoes are very pulpy — at least the kind that grow in our yard are — and they are very juicy. I eat mango while standing over the sink. What’s a little stickiness when one is munching on sweet, yummy mango?

Those of you who have been around awhile might recognize a quote from OC written on my blog about a year ago, as we were preparing to move to Hawaii.

No, I haven’t eaten one. I ain’t even touchin‘ ’em. The mango tree belongs to the poison ivy family, for crying out loud. Yes it does. For me to eat a mango, would really be a rash act.

I quite happily told OC that, members of the Poison Ivy League or not, mangoes didn’t bother me. That turned out to be a rash proclamation. It seems that an occasional mango is fine, but indulging in them everyday is not.

I’d gathered an armful of mangoes and brought them into the house, where I proceeded to eat them, one or two at a time every day for three days. The evening of the third day I said to OC, my face really hurts and it’s all sore and chapped feeling. OC looked at me and said, “You have a rash around your mouth.”

I immediately looked down at my plate in concern. (We were eating out when the conversation occurred.) I said, “There’s nothing on my plate I haven’t eaten before.” He said, “I noticed the rash when you picked me up from the boat.”

I said, “You know, my arms really itch, too.” I showed him the angry red stripes (for want of a better word) on my forearms. OC looked at them, turning my arms this way and that and then queried. “Have you been eating mangoes?”

“Well, yes,” I said. “But –“

“Those look like juice streaks,” he said, pointing at my arms. “You might want to lay off on the mangoes for awhile.”

Yeah. A looooong while.