This may explain why he felt a hunting blind was a perfectly acceptable gift to give me for my twenty-fourth birthday. Fortunately for him, we’d been dating for only about three months, so I accepted the gift with great enthusiasm instead of making him leave on the spot. Looking back, I should have set the gift bar a little higher from the beginning, because he had no way of knowing the small tin of popcorn he got me the following Valentine’s Day was going to send me into tears and hysteria. It wasn’t so much that I didn’t enjoy the festive, cinnamon-flavored popcorn as that I reached the bottom of the tin only to discover there was no velvet ring box.
It’s not his fault. All those John Hughes movies I watched throughout my formative teen years would have set up any guy for failure. Who can compete with Jake Ryan, the Porsche, and the final birthday cake scene? It’s not possible.
(That movie may or may not also have been responsible for my slight obsession with hair adorned with baby’s breath. So classy.)
One night, early in our relationship, we were at my apartment after attending a wedding shower for some of Perry’s friends. There is nothing that makes a single girl start to dream about new linens and china patterns like a wedding shower. Because everyone knows that’s what marriage is all about —the new household items. It didn’t matter that I had no idea how to prepare an actual meal; a new set of Calphalon cookware would change all of that. Perry stood at the door, wrapped his arms around me, and whispered words he would live to regret for the next two years: “For what it’s worth, I know you’re the girl I’m going to marry.”
With that statement I began to mentally plan a wedding. A wedding that wouldn’t take place for another two years because Perry left a crucial word off the end of his statement. What he should have said to the crazy lady with starry-eyed visions of ivory silk shantung in her head was, “For what it’s worth, I know you’re the girl I’m going to marry SOMEDAY,” but he didn’t know that because it’s not a lesson you learn when you spend a large majority of your young adult years with a bunch of guys competing to see who can get their truck stuck in the mud.
When the day finally arrived that an actual proposal of marriage came and the follow-up question from Perry was “How soon can we get married?” I whipped out the wedding planner I’d secretly purchased months before (okay, years before) and said, “Let me call the church.” The answer, according to church availability, was August 16, and the rest is history. Instead of looking like a Russian ice princess on my wedding day, I spent my reception with the glow of a woman wearing fifteen layers of petticoats in 120-degree weather.
Love is not only blind but also indifferent to extreme temperatures.
Organizing a wedding in three and a half months isn’t the easiest task, so it totally paid off that I’d been planning it in my head for twenty-five years prior to the actual day. All I had to do was substitute a bouquet of lilies for the white fur muff covered in roses, which I was willing to do, because did you read the part about getting new cookware?
At some point in the midst of the wedding-planning festivities, I dragged Perry to several department stores and local boutiques to register for gorgeous place settings of fine china and sterling-silver utensils that, to this day, we’ve used all of three times —one of which was when I made dinner and discovered that all our regular forks were dirty and we were out of plastic ones. So I pulled out the sterling, and honestly, it did give the Cheesy Cheeseburger Hamburger Helper a certain sophistication that had previously been missing.
These days, whenever we attend a wedding, we sit back with our three plates of cake and four glasses of house wine and watch the bride and groom take to the dance floor for their first dance. We get all sentimental, look deeply into each other’s eyes, and say, “Those two fools have no idea what they’re getting into. They don’t deserve those new dishes. You know who deserves some new towels? We do. We’ve survived over a DECADE of marriage, and we’ve earned those towels.”
When you’re a young, bright-eyed fiancée, you have no idea what color towels you want for your bathroom because chances are you’re moving into his apartment, and anything will be a step up from the thirty-year-old towels he stole from his parents’ house before he moved out, the concrete blocks that serve as an entertainment center, and the neon Bud Light sign that he and his fraternity brothers swiped during what has become a legendary night in college.
The exception is if you marry a man whose mother served as his interior decorator and helped him purchase all new dishes and linens when he initially moved into his bachelor pad. If this is the case, you may want to reevaluate whether or not you want to spend the rest of your life with a man who let his mother pick out his sheets. It’s like the old saying goes: “The hand that picks the sheets rules the world.”
Of course, maybe I’m just a little bitter because we’re down to a mere three dinner forks in our Country French flatware pattern. It’s the price you pay when you eat on paper plates most nights and throw them in the trash, forgetting not everything is disposable.
But all those years ago, I was one of those fools who agonized over choosing all the right items to celebrate our new life together, especially the bedding. I walked around the department store exclaiming, “It needs to be pretty, but not too feminine! It should have a masculine influence because, Honey, I want our bedroom to reflect both our personalities!” How could I have known our bedroom would have plenty of his personality, thanks to all the boxer shorts and socks left lying around on the floor as part of his decorating style —Early American Frat House?
There was no need to choose that over-the-top-masculine navy-plaid Ralph Lauren comforter to convey that a man lived on the premises because the stack of Texas Trophy Hunters magazines next to the toilet broadcast that message to any visitor who had the misfortune of using our downstairs half bath, which was the size of a phone booth but without the charm and intimacy.
(If you were born after 1992, I want to explain that a phone booth is something from ye olden days. It was a small glass enclosure with a phone inside that you could use to call someone if you had a quarter or a friend willing to accept a collect call.)
(The phone booth was necessary because there was no other way to make a call if you weren’t at home. At the time, iPhones were just a glimmer in Steve Jobs’s eye. We couldn’t have imagined a world where we would have a device we could carry in our pockets that would give us access to unlimited information and lots of funny videos about cats.)
Perry knew the registering process wasn’t about him, because otherwise we’d be at Home Depot or Academy instead of Scrivener’s picking out delicate crystal welcome bowls and eating lunch in a tearoom that served chicken salad on a leaf of lettuce with a side of consommé. He just went along for the ride because he instinctively knew his role in this whole affair was to smile and nod at everything I selected, even when everything in him wanted to scream, “We don’t even eat shrimp, so why do we need sterling shrimp forks at $75 apiece?”
The great irony of selecting expensive merchandise for your parents’ friends to purchase for you in exchange for some free champagne and carved beef tenderloin is you’re selecting things for the life you think you are going to live, when in reality there is no way to know what that life will really entail. Based on my registry selections, I had big dreams of a future filled with formal dinner parties requiring twelve full place settings of china and linen napkins. The reality is the last time we had people over for dinner, I served salad from a bag on paper plates and handed them some Viva paper towels to wipe their mouths. Formal dining for us means we put the dogs outside.
Perry and I were two different people coming from two totally different backgrounds. I’d spent the majority of my formative years believing there was no finer meal than a Big Mac spread out on the paper wrapper it came in. He grew up with grandparents with a staff they referred to as “the help” long after it was politically incorrect, and a mother known to make him eat Arby’s roast beef sandwiches on f
ine china at her dining room table because “only stray dogs eat out of bags.”
It’s no wonder we were a little confused about what our life together would be. He wanted to break free from the formality of his childhood, while I envisioned a life reminiscent of the Ewing family, where we would walk in at the end of a long day, pour ourselves a drink from a crystal decanter, and toast to another day of swindling Cliff Barnes out of his share of the business.
The only problem with this scenario was we didn’t own an oil company. Or a ranch. And neither of us really enjoys the taste of whiskey or bourbon or whatever it was Sue Ellen used to inhale straight from those crystal decanters.
(At the time of this writing it had only been a few months since the death of Larry Hagman [aka J. R. Ewing]. I’m not kidding when I say it felt like a piece of my childhood had died. A piece with very large eyebrows.)
During our engagement, I lived in a delightful little apartment complex for the bargain price of $395 a month, all utilities included. I was essentially paying a dollar per square foot. It was a tiny apartment, but did I mention the part about all utilities included? For a single girl living barely above the poverty line, it was a little piece of heaven. I could set the air-conditioning at sixty-five degrees and leave it there all day. I wrapped myself in a down comforter all year long, drank hot chocolate, and pretended it was winter while I watched with the rest of the world to see if Ross and Rachel were ever going to get together.
I quickly noticed within a few days of moving into my little apartment that I was the only resident under the age of eighty-two. I’d inadvertently stumbled onto some sort of semi-assisted-living arrangement reminiscent of Melrose Place for the elderly. All the apartments were situated around a common courtyard area with a pool and a landlord who constantly tended to the plants while wearing a surgical mask and toting around her oxygen tank. From time to time she’d pull the mask away from her face long enough to take a hit of her cigarette or yell at one of the residents for parking their Cadillac too close to her hedge of red-tip photinias.
Needless to say, I stood out in this land of Geritol, and they were fascinated with me. There were nights I would go out and arrive home long after the ungodly hour of ten thirty. Perry would walk me to my door, past all the clotheslines hung with large girdles, and we would see thirty-two sets of miniblinds throughout the courtyard pop open as they watched the only entertainment they considered better than Walker, Texas Ranger.
Lee Vernon was the neighbor I knew the best. Mainly because I had to walk past her apartment every time I went to my car, and she spent most of the day sitting in a lawn chair right outside the door with her oxygen tank and her Chihuahua named Penny. Within two days of my move into the complex, she knew everything about me and, most important, everything about Perry. I suspect she had some sort of CIA connections, based on the amount of information she was able to gather about us in such a short amount of time.
I soon learned she was the eyes and ears of Village Oaks. She knew everything about everyone and would tell you about it whether you wanted to know or not. It became part of my after-work ritual to stop by Lee’s apartment and catch up on the latest gossip, which usually included juicy information about whose Social Security check had yet to arrive in the mail or who the Bradford widow was trying to seduce. I determined the main reason she always sat outside in her lawn chair was to ensure she didn’t miss anything. It was reminiscent of how the paparazzi camp out whenever there’s a chance they might spot Britney walking barefoot out of a 7-Eleven or Kim Kardashian buying diapers for baby North (make it stop), except she was waiting to see if Dorothy Nowacek and Evelyn Moore were going to get into a fight over eminent clothesline domain.
Lee was the first person to find out Perry and I were engaged. He proposed to me in my apartment, and as we left for dinner, we shared the news. By the time we returned, everyone in the complex had heard about our newly engaged status and celebrated by staying up late to watch Murder, She Wrote while intermittently peeking through their miniblinds to see how late he’d stay at my apartment.
Since my parents lived out of town, and since I wanted to see if I could make five hundred square feet seem even more claustrophobic by packing the place with silver gift-wrapped boxes filled with breakable items, I arranged for all our wedding gifts to be delivered to my apartment. Every day when I’d return home, there was a porch full of boxes waiting for me. I’d carry them into my apartment while being careful not to trip over the punch bowl set with matching cups that I was using as a doorstop. (Incidentally, that was the last time it was used for anything.)
Lee appointed herself watchdog of all my delivered gifts. She had a clear view of my second-floor apartment from her lawn chair and kept lookout all day to make sure one of her fellow senior residents didn’t try to make off with a shiny new toaster oven, because everyone knows those octogenarians love nothing more than some toast.
One day I had to work late and then I met some friends for dinner, so I didn’t get home until after midnight. When I walked up the steps to my apartment, I was relieved to see I didn’t have any packages to be hauled in. I fell into bed and slept until the shrill ringing of the phone woke me at 6:00 a.m.
Reaching past the boxes of new towels, I grabbed the phone and sleepily said, “Hello?”
The raspy voice on the other end said, “Honey, it’s Lee. I got worried when you weren’t home at your usual time last night, so I picked up all the packages that got delivered yesterday and brought them down to my place. You know these people around here won’t hesitate to steal something.”
Yes, I have no doubt I was living in an apartment complex that served merely as a front for an elderly crime ring specializing in pawning stolen wedding gifts to pay for their denture cream and support-hose habit.
Lee continued, “Honey, you can come down here and get these gifts whenever you want. I’ll be here all day.”
I had no reason to doubt the validity of her statement, so I rolled over and went back to sleep. When I finally woke up around 10:00 a.m., I threw on some clothes and went to retrieve the gifts. I walked down the stairs, marveling that she’d managed to make it up to my apartment, collect the gifts, and get them back to her place —all while toting her oxygen tank. It made me shudder to think about what a precarious journey it must have been.
Lee was stationed outside her front door as usual, but she stood when she saw me coming and led me inside to get the packages. There were about three or four things sitting in her living room. As I picked them up to carry them upstairs, she told me I’d need to come back down because there was one more gift in her refrigerator.
Her refrigerator? Did someone send me a ham? Did Perry register for a selection of Hickory Farms smoked meats when I wasn’t looking? I walked back down to her place, and she brought the box out of the refrigerator. Sure enough, it was a big cardboard box with the words “Refrigerate immediately” stamped all over it. I couldn’t imagine what was in there.
I thanked Lee for taking care of my gifts and then ran upstairs with the package because the curiosity was killing me. Normally I waited until Perry and I were together to open a present (or at least that’s what I told him, but in my defense, he really didn’t show the enthusiasm I was looking for whenever we received another crystal vase or a set of steak knives), but I couldn’t wait to see what this was, not to mention there was no way the whole thing would fit inside my refrigerator.
As I delicately ripped open the box, I continued to speculate about what might be inside. Maybe some bacon? Imported caviar? The first installment in a membership to a cheese-of-the-month club? (Please God, let it be a membership to a cheese-of-the-month club.) I pulled out the tissue paper to reveal a perfectly refrigerated wooden salad bowl with matching tongs.
Apparently someone had packed and mailed their gift using whatever box they had on hand. Thanks to Lee, our new wooden bowl had remained perfectly chilled all night long.
Bless it.
I’d fi
nally found someone as enthusiastic about our wedding gifts as I was and vowed that when the time came for Perry and me to pour the first drinks from our new crystal decanter, we would make a special toast to Lee. Unfortunately, we didn’t receive a crystal decanter, so the only toast we ended up making was the kind we could make in our shiny new toaster oven.
Which really worked out, because I believe that bread covered in butter and grape jelly is actually more festive than whiskey anyway.
CHAPTER 2
The Art of Kissing Frogs
I FEEL LIKE I SHOULD BACK UP. Because at least two of you might be wondering how Perry and I ended up together.
But first I need you to know that I spent most of my teens and early twenties with an approach to dating that resembled playing a competitive sport. I could have won a silver medal for my flirting abilities and taken the gold for my skills in pursuing the absolutely wrong guy.
And I would have taken last place in protecting my heart. Because I spent a lot of time being in love with the idea of love and not putting nearly enough thought into whether or not the object of my affection was worth it.
It didn’t help matters that Danny Zuko and Sandy Olsen from Grease influenced most of my thoughts on love and relationships during my formative childhood years. I mean, is there a worse example of changing who you are to make someone love you? Even if the whole thing is done to incredibly catchy songs, you have to know it probably isn’t going to work out long term.
But I loved the drama of it all. The red Candie’s shoes. The tight black leather pants. The fun house. And, mostly, the chance to say, “Tell me about it, Stud” while dramatically putting out a cigarette with the toe of my shoe.
And then as I grew older, more mature, I decided I wanted to be Scarlett O’Hara. Because that’s healthy.
The Antelope in the Living Room: The Real Story of Two People Sharing One Life Page 2