| Thanks to davegrrr for his pointing me to this story in a blog he follows, and for his short background to give context to the story.
Background: “The attorney” is Tony’s long-term boyfriend. Tony lives with his grandmother as they are all the family that is left and she needs his help with day to day needs. This is a short, but very heartwarming vignette about people knowing more than we give them credit for and about how the people who really love us just want us to be happy. Everyone should have a grandmother like this. |
| Drop a bit more Cool whip on there for me, will ya?”
Granny held out her plate of half-eaten pound cake in my direction. “I’ll bring it out here,” I said getting up and heading to the kitchen from the screened porch. “You don’t want to open that out here,” she nagged at me. We had been to the doctor earlier in the day and I guess the good report had her feeling feisty. “It’s too hot. It will puddle.” “It will not puddle in the five seconds it takes to scoop it out.” “When did you learn so much about Cool-Whip?” she challenged to my back as I left her. “You don’t even eat it.” I couldn’t argue her last point. She was right. I don’t eat Cool Whip. I can’t stand the stuff. Not because it’s fake whipped cream. I can’t tolerate real whipped cream much, either. It’s a texture thing. I like my food like I like my men: hearty and firm. Besides, I’m convinced it’s made of PVC or something. It won’t puddle in a thousand years. I brought the bowl out to the porch and put a spoonful of the goop on her plate. It killed me to see her ruin good pound cake with it. What’s worse, the deed was done by my own hand. Her orders, my hand. I’m the hunter sent to murder Snow White in the forest and Granny is the Evil Queen. On my way to return the Cool Whip to the refrigerator, my cell phone hummed on the counter where I had left it. I had forgotten I put it on vibrate at the doctor’s office. I can probably count on two hands the number of people who have my cell phone number, so it’s a high probability that I can guess who’s calling. And even though the Attorney’s number came up, I still answered with the same “Hello?” that I do on the house phone. The “hello” with a question mark. Like I don’t know who is on the line. I guess it’s habit. We chatted for a moment. He was about to go on a run. I had dinner dishes to clean up. So, we agreed he’d call again later. I went back out on the porch and waited for Granny to finish dessert. “Was somebody by?” she asked. She had heard me talking in the kitchen. “No,” I replied. “I was on the phone.” “I didn’t hear it ring. Who was it?” I explained to her that is was the cell phone on vibrate and that it was my friend [The Attorney]. She couldn’t place who he was, so told her they have yet to meet. “That’s his pound cake we’re eating, ” I said. Keeping a tradition that Granny and I have, I made the attorney a pound cake for his birthday last week. I knew that he couldn’t (wouldn’t) eat an entire pound cake, I split it in two and kept half. From that, she determined that the Attorney and I must be close. I told her that he was probably about my best friend. “I got the feeling that you were talking to somebody you were fond of. You talked real sweet.” The words slipped across her gums as effortlessly as the Cool Whip did. And the cat got my tongue. For a moment neither of us said a word. It seemed like the whole world got quiet, poised for my response. All I can remember hearing was the sound of somebody’s tires churning the gravel on a distant road and the irregular “thump, thump…thump” of insects dive-bombing into the screens, mixed with the regular “thump” of my increasing heartbeat. “Does he talk sweet to you, too?’ she decided to pursue on her own. “Yes ma’am. I guess he does.” Thump, thump…thump… “Good.” |
You can follow Tony’s blog yourself, if you want to.
What an interesting name in the obituaries today: Isorene Rasberry. That’d make a good character name in a book.
I worked from home this morning, and from Helios this afternoon.
Well, the remodeling is done, and I so hate to say it, but I’m very disappointed in the final product. Shall I enumerate? [Of course you know I’m going to.]
- The new area, which is where the couches used to be, has a table that when I sit on it, the table comes up to about my chin, so in order to reach my keyboard, my hands are up in the air. Also, being as short as I am, my feet don’t reach the foot bar, let alone the floor. Quite uncomfortable.
- As well, for me, the seats are too low, or the tables are too high, when I sit at the new tables along the wall. After about 30 minutes, my shoulders and the back of my neck hurt from my arms being constantly raised to reach my keyboard. On a positive note, my feet do reach the floor there.
The outlets that are supposed to be plentiful along the wall with the new seats, might be there, but you can’t see them just by looking. People keep nonchalantly looking for them, but they’re not obvious if they are there.There do seem to be some holes, which are in the shape of outlets, but currently contain nothing, in the walls between the seat cushions. Hopefully, there will be outlets in them eventually. Personally, I would have put wood under the seats down to the ground and have the outlets there, so people could just reach down and plug in, instead of having to look and reach between the seats. I’m just saying…
I guess what’s most annoying is that no one who works there is “helping out” by clarifying what the customers should do as they try to figure it out, while it’s still, presumably, unfinished. Put some signs up if you don’t want to, or have time to, help the customers. But I bitchily digress…
When I raised my arms today to put on my jacket at Helios, it was obvious to me that it was an upper body workout day at the gym yesterday.
Do you ever see someone and think, “Thank god I’m me and not him!”? There was someone there at Helios today that made me think that. Twice.
I created my first podcast tonight. It’s a recording of my friend’s eulogy. However, I’m not pleased with it, so I’ve removed the link to it.