We're gonna need a bigger...

Do you remember the scene from Jaws when Martin Brody sees the great white shark for the first time? Do you remember what he says? He turns toward his shark hunter shipmate and says "We're gonna need a bigger boat". This week I uttered similar sentiments to my husband...but I wasn't talking about a boat.

Why is it that the woman in the Brooks Brother's catalog (the one that is holding a straw hat, resting in a lawn chair, with her golden retriever by her side) doesn't have an enormous scooper/rake combination in her other hand? Because I have to tell you, if that family in the catalog really owns that dog, and that clean and luscious green lawn that they are photographed on, there is someone that is walking around behind them with an enormous scooper.

Real life can be funny. Even when it's not funny while you are in the moment, if you are wise, you will allow yourself to find the humor in it after the moment has passed. Each afternoon while I comb through my backyard with my newly purchased scooper and rake, I'm not laughing. Usually I am actually quite irritated, complaining and barking even louder than the dog. Sometimes I even raise my head from it's downward posture to find my husband looking at me through the back windows laughing. And because I know him well, and because I know he is really laughing with me and not at me, I kind of start laughing too. Because it is kind of funny. It's kind of funny that when we bought Mr. Darcy, I only saw the Brooks Brothers picture as our future with him. I only saw the green lawn, the sunny afternoons, the straw hat, the linen suit that bears not one wrinkle, the bow tie around my husband's neck, and the three children standing in fine tailored, pressed clothing. That my friends, is pretty funny. In hind sight, it's actually hilarious, because the reality is the only thing I have in common with that woman in the catalog is the golden retriever....thank goodness.