DailySusan Humor Blog

FLOWER GIRL / HANYACK

We are trying to figure out what to do with Maddy’s beautiful, beaded flower girl dress from last weekend. One idea is to keep it for when her three big sisters get married; maybe a new litlte niece or family friend will come on the scene by then to wear it. Another is to give it away, or sell it at a garage sale. Still another is to cut off the bodice and some of the tulle and put it in a shadow box with a photograph and the little white mini-roses she wore in her hair.

So many people said she was the most beautiful little girl they’d ever seen, I’m afraid to do anything to break the spell. Usually, we refer to Maddy as a ‘’hanyack’’ -- best spelling I can come up with for an old-country term for a wild, out-of-control gypsy. It’s what my paternal grandpa always used to call us kids when we slid down the banister at his house.

Anyway, so her lovely dress lays here on the dining room table as we all savor our memories of a beautiful wedding.

Maddy’s already off on her next toot. The demure little flower girl has transformed into her old self: howling with glee at the movie ‘’Shrek,’’ hanging upside down on her swingset, and lining up her MicroPets on the stairs and bossing them: ‘’Guys! Look, now, guys. . . .’’

But she was a mini-princess Saturday night. I’ll not soon forget the picture of a hulking Husker football player, one of the bridegroom’s friends, bending down and posing her for a picture on his newfangled cell phone. He showed it to a couple of other hulks. They all melted. You’d think most young men like that would have Britney Spears or somebody like that on their cellphone picture window -- not a 4-year-old flower girl.

The other sight I’ll not soon forget is her white tights. Unbeknownst to me, she had kicked off her shoes when the dancing started. She had twirled and jived and danced the night away (well, ‘til 10:45) in her stocking feet. It sprinkled a little bit through the evening, and we were down on the bride’s family’s asphalt basketball court. It was pretty wet. Even though her dress was miraculously unspotted when we got home, her tights were practically black to the knees, and sopping wet.

That’s the REAL Maddy -- beautiful and ladylike, but underneath . . . 100 percent hanyack.

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Prayer request: A friend’s friend took a direct hit from lightning while walking with his son around a west Omaha lake on Saturday night. He is in critical condition in a hospital burn unit. The lightning hit him at the top of his head and exited through his feet. He is said to have a fourth degree burn on the bottom of his feet. John Reimer is a wonderful man, executive director of the local office of the Christian Business Men’s Club, a national organization which is Omaha-based. Father, we lift John up in prayer as well as his wife, Linda, and family, and son John, 30, who also was injured. May they recover and heal, and may this incident strike us all like a bolt of lightning: how much we love the people in our lives, and should pray for their well-being always. (Zec. 9:14)