The View of Her Tomatoes

Some of the biggest conflicts of our marriage come when Kris and I cannot agree on where to place things. We’ve had huge rows about seating arrangements for dinner parties, for example. And when we receive our furniture shipment later today, I’m sure there’ll be some tension as we try to find the ideal layout.

But for now, this moment, we’re fighting over blueberries.

Kris doesn’t really like blueberries. And because I don’t do as much as I should to help in the garden, she’s leaving the current blueberry project to me. I tore out three of our blueberries (the 25-year-old plants the neighbors gave us) as well as our two gooseberries. Yesterday we bought three new plants, and we have two more coming by mail. It’s up to me to decide where to plant them.

In theory, I’d simply plant them where the old plants were. But the old plants didn’t thrive. Part of this was because I didn’t water them enough, but there’s also the problem that they didn’t get enough sun, and that they were spaced too closely together.

I’d like to create a dedicated blueberry patch in our yard. This morning, I walked through the north side, looking for a place to put the plants. There really isn’t one. The north side gets full sun, but it’s packed with fruit trees. It’s our orchard. There’s really no place to put blueberries.

Fortunately, there are a couple of spaces on the south side of the house that might work. The best spot, in my opinion, is running east-to-west next to the vegetable garden. There’s plenty of space, it gets full sun, and I could alter the soil as needed.

Unfortunately, Kris hates this idea. For some reason, she refuses to let me put the blueberries there. We’ve been butting heads now for an hour.

It occurred to me that I didn’t know exactly why she didn’t want me to plant the blueberries between the house and the vegetable garden. So I asked her. And here was her reply: “They’ll block my view,” she said.

“View of what?” I asked.

“The view of my tomatoes,” she said. “I like to look out and admire them. I try to make the garden beautiful and pleasing to me. I put a lot of work into it. I want to be able to see it.”

sigh

Far be it from me to deprive Kris of a view of her tomatoes. She does a lot of work around here, and she deserves to be able to see the fruits of her labor. (Literally.) I’ll find someplace else to put the blueberries. (I’ll probably put them in the spots we had originally designated.)

But when the Man Room furniture comes in a couple of hours, I’m going to be assertive! Just once in our 20+ years together, I’d like to win one of these arguments about where to put things. Kris can’t always be right — can she?

Dragonfly

On my drive home today, a dragonfly struck the window of my Mini Cooper. Curiously, the impact did not kill the creature, though it certainly was stunned. Instead, its tail somehow became tucked beneath one of my wiper blades.

I was sad to see it happen, but I didn’t do anything about it. What could I do? It looked alive, but I couldn’t be sure. And what good would stopping the car do? I figured it would be dead by the time I got home.

It wasn’t.

As I unloaded the groceries, I noticed the dragonfly was very much alive. It was flailing to escape from the wiper’s grasp.

“Kris,” I called. “I need you to do something for me.”

“What is it?” she asked.

“There’s a dragonfly under the wipers. It’s still alive, and I can’t bear to look at it. Can you take care of it?”

I know this is a reversal from typical gender roles, but that’s how it is in our house. Kris deals with death and destruction all day long. I write about the psychology of money. I’m the sensitive one; Kris is matter of fact. Killing insects is her province (though I’m responsible for spiders.)

She carefully freed the dragonfly and held it in her hand. “One of its wings is broken,” she said.

“What should we do?” I asked. She gave me a look as if to say that I shouldn’t be such a baby.

“Don’t worry about it,” she said. “It’s just a dragonfly.” She hung it from a clerodendron blossom. I tried to ingore the thing as I went about my business, but I couldn’t. I found its plight heartbreaking. I stood by and watched it closely for several minutes.

The dragonfly was beautiful, a sort of crystal blue with deep liquid eyes and lace-like wings. It was conscious and active. It gesticulated with its forelegs, it rotated its head, it vibrated its wings.

Eventually, it made a futile attempt to fly, but merely swooped to the grass. The dragonfly could walk just fine, but could not take to the air.

A part of me knows that it’s ridiculous to be so concerned about an insect. Eventually, I had to leave. I don’t want to know how this creature’s story ends. Its destiny seems clear enough. It’s a shame that something so beautiful cannot live forever.

Postscript: Now I know how this dragonfly’s story ends. Simon finds it and eats it. Alas, poor dragonfly.

Two Stories About Corn Dogs

Believe it or not, I have two stories to share about corn dogs. One occurred about a month ago; the other occurred last week.

Haggling Over Hot Dogs

The geeks have been getting together to play Dungeons and Dragons again lately. I can remember playing D&D with Dave when we were in grade school and junior high. Now, 30 years later, we’re doing it again. Last month, we met at Dave and Karen’s.

On my way over, I stopped at the minimart near their house to pick up something for dinner. As I was trying to decide what to buy, a man and a woman came into the store. I couldn’t tell their relationship exactly, but he seemed like her father. She waited by the hot-food case while he picked up a beer.

“How much are them corn dogs?” the woman asked while her companion selected his beverage. She had a southern accent.

“Seventy-nine cents,” said the shopkeeper.

“Seventy-nine cents,” said the woman. “Seventy-nine cents. How ’bout you give me two fo’ a dollah?”

“Seventy-nine cents,” said the shopkeeper.

“Yeah, but that’s the price during the day,” said the woman. “It’s late. You ain’t gonna sell those. How ’bout you give ’em to me two fo’ a dollah.”

The shopkeeper didn’t say anything. I picked up a bag of chips and a bottle of soda while I listened them haggle.

“You cain’t give me two corndogs for a dollah?” asked the woman. “Come on, now. You know you kin do it. If you give me two fo’ a dollah, I’ll buy ’em. But I ain’t buying nuttin’ fo’ seventy-nine cents. Whaddya say?”

“Seventy-nine cents,” said the shopkeeper.

“How come you cain’t do it? The woman that work here, she’d do it. You know she would. Two fo’ a dollah. That’s better than lettin’ ’em go to waste, dontcha think?”

The old man came up to the counter to pay for his beer. The woman turned to look at me — I was next in line. “Whaddya think of the weather?” she asked. “Hot, ain’t it?”

“It’s not too bad,” I said.

“Yeah,” she said. “But it’s muggy.” It wasn’t really that hot or muggy, but I just nodded and smiled.

The shopkeeper took the old man’s money and handed him his change. The old man picked up his beer, but then he paused. “Hold on,” he said. “I want wunna them corn dogs.”

“Seventy-nine cents,” said the shopkeeper.

The old man picked up his beer and his corn dog, but then he paused. “Gimme a lottery ticket,” he said, and he handed two more dollars to the shopkeeper.

When I got to Dave and Karen’s they were seated around the table, finishing their dinners. Paul was there too, eating a burrito. Tim was chatting with the group.

“Is that your dinner?” Tim asked as I pulled my bounty from the bag: chili-limón Doritos, Necco wafers, diet Dr. Pepper, and a pickled sausage.

“It is,” I said. “Would anyone care for pickled sausage?” Nobody did.

“That minimart down the road is great,” I told Dave and Karen.

“It is?” asked Karen in disbelief. I’m not sure she’s ever been in a minimart.

“Yeah,” I said. “It’s my favorite minimart in Portland.” (And it is, too.)

A Corn-y Tale

Last week, I was in a nearby 7-11 picking up a snack. When I went to the counter to pay, I had to wait for the woman in front of me. She was fumbling in her pockets, looking for change while holding a corn dog in one hand. It was slathered in mustard, and she was taking big bites out of it while she searched for her cash.

In addition to the corn dog, she was buying…two cans of corn. WTF? I didn’t even know 7-11 carried corn. I thought it was a vegetable-free zone. More to the point, why would anyone stop at 7-11 just to buy two cans of corn and a corn dog?

I was baffled. I still am.

Hurt

At 3:09 pm last Friday, Paul Carlile texted me. “I’m in PDX,” he wrote. “Are you available before 7.”

“Sorry. No,” I replied at 5:14. I had plans. I was taking pizza to Andrew Cronk and the kids, and then driving to the airport to pick up Kris.

Had I known then what I know now, I would have changed my plans completely. I would have let the Cronks go hungry. I would have left Kris standing at the curb.

Susan, Paul’s long-time girlfriend, just called. Though they’d recently broken up, they were still close. “J.D., this is Susan,” she said, and my brain had to whir — Susan who? “I’m sorry to have to tell you this,” she said, and then I realized it was Susan S., of course, who else? “But Paul killed himself last night.”

“What?” I said. Was she joking? Through her tears, Susan told me what she knew. Paul had been depressed for a long time. A mutual friend had spent the weekend with him, trying to help him come to grips. When she left, she thought Paul was on stable ground. He wasn’t.

I feel hollow. I didn’t see Paul often anymore — just a few times each year — but he was an important piece of me, a piece that is now lost. I have several paragraphs of memories typed here in my text editor, but I’m not in the mood to share them. It’s as if I want to keep them to myself, to hoard them.

Suffice it to say that I would not be who I am today without Paul. I cannot believe he’s gone.

Here’s a song Paul introduced me to:

It seems painfully appropriate for this occasion.

Update: More memories of Paul.

The Reluctant Wardrobe

We’ve gradually been purging the clothes from my closet. I have a tendency to never throw away (or give away) any garment, especially those I love. If a shirt becomes a favorite, I keep it for years, no matter how tattered it becomes.

One of my favorite pieces of clothing is a tattered old blue FILA hooded sweatshirt. It’s cottony soft, has a zip-up front, has an ample hood with drawstrings, and feels comfy on a chilly autumn day. But the thing is a rag. The cuffs are frayed and falling apart. The hood is tearing away from the body of the sweatshirt. Kris is embarrassed for me to wear it in public.

I’ve spent the past year trying to find a replacement, but I’ve never found anything suitable. No sweatshirt possesses the same qualities. Some have hoods, some are made of cotton, some feel comfy, but none combine all of these things in one. I check Costco every time I’m there, but no luck. (Costco’s where I bought the sweatshirt originally.)

Last night, Tiffany came over for dinner. Every time she comes over, she returns things she’s borrowed, or offers things she no longer wants. Last night was no different. But at the end of the list, she held out a piece of black clothing. “Do you want this?” she asked.

“What is it?” I said, and I unfolded it. It was a hooded sweatshirt. A FILA hooded sweatshirt with a zip-up front. “Huh?” I said, like a character from a Japanese cartoon. I ran upstairs to fetch my precious blue hooded sweatshirt, which Kris and just that morning put in the “throw away forever” pile.

I compared the two sweatshirts. They were both from FILA. They were both the same size. They both had the exact same tags. They were the same sweatshirt, but the old one was blue and the new one was black.

“Where’d you get this?” I asked Tiffany.

“Costco,” she said. “A few years ago, we were driving back from [some place in California], and I was cold, so we stopped at Costco. This was the only thing I could find.”

“It’s the exact same as my old sweatshirt, except that it’s black,” I said. “Thank you.”

“Yes, thank you,” Kris said. “Now maybe we can throw that old one away.”

Tiffany, as always, just laughed at us. I think that for her, visiting the Roth-Gates household is like visiting a foreign country, where the people are just a little strange. But the people in this country are happy now, though. They have a precious new sweatshirt.

Goodbye My Lover

Last fall on our trip to Lincoln City with Mac and Pam, I witnessed one of those small perfect moments that linger in memory.

After clam chowder at Mo’s, we stopped at Cold Stone Creamery for dessert. It was about 7:30 on a Friday night, and the place was dead. We were the only customers.

We placed our orders with the young woman at the counter, While she scooped and folded our ice cream, I noticed her co-worker in the back room. This other young woman was making an ice cream cake, shaping it with a long spatula-like tool. As she worked, she sang to the music on the loudspeaker. She was completely absorbed in the moment: building the cake, singing with passion. She was unaware of our presence.

The song was a plaintive story of love and loss. The male vocalist had a thin, high voice perfectly matched to the subject matter.

“Who’s singing this?” I asked.

“I think it’s James Blunt,” Mac said. I had never heard of him. “Pam likes another one of his songs — ‘You’re Beautiful’.”

I continued to watch the young woman as she sang and built her cake. When the song was over, she set down the spatula, pulled off her gloves, walked to the stereo, and played the song again. She walked back to her work area, pulled on her gloves, and picked up her spatula. And she sang: “Goodbye my lover, goodbye my friend. You have been the one, you have been the one for me.”

This little scene occurred five months ago, yet I think of it at least once a week. What was the story there? Had the young woman recently suffered some sort of heartbreak? Or did she just love the song? Either way, the moment is burned on my brain.

Allergies

Kris has been complaining about her allergies for the past couple of weeks. “They’re terrible this year,” she says. “It’s the worse they’ve ever been. Aren’t yours bothering you?”

No, they’re not. In fact, I’ve quietly been skeptical that this a bad allergy season. Kris talks about it a lot, though. “All the people at work say their allergies are really bad this year. Mine are really bad, too.” When we get together with people, she talks about it. “My allergies are really bad this year.”

Last night she erupted into a prolonged sneezing fit. I feel for her — I’ve had bad allergies in the past — but still, I wasn’t sure this seasons was especially noxious.

Then I woke up this morning.

As sometimes happens, my allergies came on overnight. I always expect them to hit around July 1st, but their onset is actually variable. One year they didn’t hit til August. Apparently the date this year is June 21st. Ugh.

This may be a bad year for allergies.

Unrelaxing Weekend

What a long, unrestful weekend! I’m not saying it was bad — there just wasn’t any time to read, write, or relax.

A large part of this was due to our annual neighborhood garage sale. This year our guest sellers were Will, Marla, and Tiffany. Day one went very well — we sold $290 of stuff (compared to $153.25 on the same day in 2006, and $123.50 in 2005). Friday we collected $172.75 (compared to $206 in 2005). But Saturday was a bomb.

Saturday dawned cold and wet. We couldn’t set up in the driveway, so we held our sale in the dungeon-like garage. Few people drove by, and even fewer stopped. We only sold $11.25 before we closed up shop at 2 p.m. My total wasn’t bad — $295, thanks to heavier-than-normal book sales — but nobody else broke $100. After talking with neighbors, we think that the rain and the Rose Festival combined to put a damper on things. Nobody on the street did well this year.

When we weren’t selling our old junk, we were busy being social. On Friday night, Kris had the WITCHes over for dinner. WITCHes == Women in Teaching at Canby High School — Sue, Linda, and Coleen were three of Kris’ closest friends when she was teaching, and the group still gets together several times a year. (Tiffany joined us Friday, too.)

After we packed up, Andrew and Joann stopped by for a chat. They were up from San Francisco to spend a long weekend taking in the Rose Festival. We had hoped to join them for dinner with Dave and Karen, but scheduling conflicts prevented such a happy feast. Instead we shared a pot of hot Thai tea and talked about travel. (Andrew travels a lot for work, and was able to impart some good tips for our upcoming trip to Europe.)

On Saturday evening, we gathered at Vildana’s house in Aloha to discuss this month’s book group pick, Three Cups of Tea. Opinion was divided. Most of us thought the book was okay, but some (Courtney) loved it and others hated it. I thought the story was okay, but that it was needlessly padded, and that the writing style was gratuitously descriptive. (“This guy has never met an adjective he didn’t like,” I said.) I felt that this might have made a strong essay in Harper’s or The New Yorker, but that as a book it was rather weak.

We were supposed to host the garage sale on Sunday, too, but Kris and I didn’t feel like fighting the intermittent showers. Besides, we hadn’t had any time to ourselves.

We got a slow start on our day, but it took a turn into the twilight zone when Amy Jo forwarded a Craigslist ad for canning jars. Our day was sidetracked by an excursion (with Rhonda) to the home of Jim, the jar fanatic. Kris has promised to write the story of our experience, so I won’t elaborate here. When we arrived home, we had an hour to unwind before heading down to Hubbard for the MNF movie night.

Ron and Kara did a great job of turning their hay loft into a movie theater. They hung a sheet on the wall, set out movie popcorn and candy, and used a video projector to show Charlotte’s Web for the kids. Actually, it was only the adults who watched the movie. The kids watched a part of it, but most of them spent the evening climbing and leaping over the hay mound. (Maren, Daphne, and Diego all sat through the entire film, though.)

“You know,” I said on our drive home. “I didn’t write a single thing all weekend.”

“I know,” said Kris.

“That means most of my week is going to be spent writing,” I said.

“I know,” said Kris.

Writing has become real work! But I love it.

I Learn Ping-Pong

Kris told this story around work last week to the amusement of all her little friends. I’ll do my best to reconstruct how she told it, but no guarantees that it’ll be as funny.

One of my goals lately has been to “just say yes” when people ask me to do things. So long as the requests don’t violate my morals (no drugs, no sex with goats), and so long as I have the time, I’m giving new things a try. I’m not just saying “no” out of fear and trepidation.

Charlie Lam, my grade school soccer coach, stopped by work a couple weeks ago. He came by to evangelize his table tennis club. He tried to convince Jeff to join, but he wasn’t interested, so Charlie turned his sights on me. I’ve always like table tennis, and I have nothing going on Tuesday nights (except writing — but then I’m always writing), so I agreed to give it a try. “Just say yes.”

So I went to play table tennis a couple weeks ago. I didn’t know what I was getting myself into. How good would the other players be? Charlie had assured me that most everyone was just a beginner. “Do you remember Danny Hunt?” he had asked me.

“Sure,” I said. “Is Danny playing?”

“No,” he said. “But Danny’s mom is playing.”

Playing table tennis with Charlie and his group brought back a flood of old memories. He was my soccer coach for four years (five?) when I was a boy. I was always intimidated by him, though I’m not sure why. His son, Torey, was a good friend of mine. They lived a half mile away, so we spent a lot of time together. I was on Torey’s horse when my brother Tony ran into it with a bike, causing the animal to throw me to the ground and step on me.

Anyhow, playing table tennis with Charilie and his group felt like old times. He took some time to teach me proper form on my forehand. I didn’t do a good job (and even at my second session the other night I was having trouble), but I tried. We did drills together. We played some mini-games in which other players and I competed to be “king of the hill” (or “king of the table”, in this case).

Eventually, we played some full games. The rules have changed in recent years, I guess. I was confused at first. For example, the serve alternates every two points now instead of every five points. There are infinite “lets” on the serve. The ball must be tossed into the air on service, and must be struck behind the table. The biggest change, though, is that a game goes to eleven points, not 21.

Anyhow, I did well. I won several games, which made me happy. Not bad for my first night. I drove home in a great mood.

“So how was ping-pong?” Kris asked when I got home.

“Exhausting,” I said. “But fun. I’ll go back next week.” I told her all about the night. I told her how I was able to beat a lot of the other players.

“That’s great,” she said. “Who else was there?”

“Oh, nobody you’d know,” I said, getting ready for bed. “It was mostly just a bunch of fifth- and sixth-graders.”

That, my friends, is the story that delights my wife. I don’t think it’s quite as funny as she does. Those kids are good. They’ve been practicing for a while. I’m just starting. Still, Kris yuks it up every time she thinks about me gloating over twelve-year-olds.

The Early Bird

The last time Kris left town, I was a lonely man. I felt lost. She’s been gone all this week, too, but I’m not lonely yet. “Do you miss me?” she asks when she calls. I hesitate because I know the right answer. But I tell the truth.

“I haven’t had time to miss you yet,” I say. And I haven’t. I’ve been on the go non-stop ever since she left. If she were home, this would be one of those weeks during which it feels like we never see each other. In a way, this is good, I suppose, but ultimately it’s running me ragged.

I sat down at six yesterday afternoon to read Mark‘s story for the Woodstock Writers Guild. I dozed off. I slept for three hours, slumped in my easy chair. I woke at nine, cursed myself for missing the writers group meeting, and then trudged upstairs and went to bed.

My alarm woke me at four.

After some e-mail conversations with Leo, I’ve decided that best way for me to add time to write into my day is to build it into the front end. Leo suggests getting up at 4am, writing for a couple of hours, and then living life as normal, squeezing in extra writing if there’s time during the rest of the day. This may sound a little crazy to non-writers, but it makes perfect sense to me. I need a large block of uninterrupted time alone, during which I can get things done.

In order to wake up at 4am, though, I’m going to need to take a slightly different approach than normal. Usually I wake up, roll over, grab my laptop, and look at my site statistics and handle any e-mail crises. It’s 4:35 right now, and I haven’t checked e-mail or looked at stats. My goal is not to do so until 7. This may seem obsessive, but trust me: it’s a compulsion I have that I’ve been trying to break for months.

Instead, I pulled on some sweats, grabbed an apple and my pedometer, and headed out into the night. I took a walk around the block in the cool morning air. I communed with the morning cats; I listened to the Western screech owl in the neighbor’s tree; I watched a raccoon cross the road.

The trip around the block is one mile. I walked it in sixteen minutes. I munched on my apple and grogged awake. It felt good. I’ve been sitting at my computer typing for twenty minutes now. That feels good, too.

This plan holds much promise. Ten years ago, during the period in which I lost so much weight, one key to my success was that I got up at 5am most mornings to exercise at the high school track. I walked, biked, or ran a couple of miles, then went home and had a small breakfast. It was a great way to start the day.

I’m going to try something similar this summer. But most of all, I’m going to write.