Our evening was going beautifully.
For dinner I tried a new cream of roasted tomato soup recipe using an immersion blender, and it turned out really well.
I was feeling so proud of myself that I decided instead of running to the store to grab some store-bought dessert to contribute to tomorrow’s school lunch, I would bake cookies.
It seemed like a good idea at the time. And it might have been.
The soup had been eaten, the cookie dough was chilling in the fridge, and the children were snickering in their beds as they read The First of Octember backwards. I was relaxing and feeling great about my evening. I mean, I had roasted tomatoes.
Until…“Look at this,” my husband said, pulling some pages out of our younger son’s homework folder. “I guess they must be learning about baptism.”
BAPTISM! Ack! The teacher had asked us to send in a picture from our child’s baptism tomorrow. Naturally, I had had 24 hours’ notice, but I had completely forgotten to take care of it during the day today. We don’t own a photo printer—or any printer, for that matter. Photos can be printed in an hour, as long as you remember to send them to one of the many stores with a photo printer and then pick them up. But I had forgotten. And it was too late to send a picture somewhere to have it printed.
“Just pull the picture out of the album,” said one helpful person I called. But there is no album. In fact, there is no printed picture. Because I take thousands upon thousands of photos, but I so rarely print them. Even if I had a print of that picture, there is no way I could put my hands on it before this child begins first grade.
Then I thought of FedEx Kinko’s. I checked the website. Open until 11. Perfect.
I just had to find the picture. That should be easy, right? Not as easy as using an immersion blender to puree roasted tomatoes, it turns out. Instead of taking pictures on our son’s baptism day, I was in the pictures. The photos on my camera show our children playing at our house beforehand and riding in the car on the way to the baptism, but they certainly don’t show The Baptism.
I started worrying that I didn’t have an actual photo. I suddenly recalled how my sister Maureen’s camera had failed that day and her photos vanished forever. Just great.
Then I remembered one more place to look, and finally, finally, I found a photo, taken by someone, and it’s a good one. Thank you, anonymous family member or friend. I saved it to my memory card, raced to the store, got the photo printed, and raced home.
Then I made cookies.
I don’t recommend replicating this day yourself—except for trying the soup, which was yummy and not hard to make. It certainly wasn’t as difficult as completing my kindergarten homework.