equinox blue spectacles and gray wildflowers replace granite
“Daylight?” I asked Nazy. “It’s not daylight, it’s the middle of the night.”
“We don’t control when,,”
“Why wasn’t I consulted about this?” I thought. “Do we have to get up, go out the back door and come in the front door with a vase full of flowers?” I asked, recalling tradition and ritual.
“Get up, Dan? I was thinking of staying up.”
As you can see, Nazy identified another challenge successfully met during our 45 year marriage… she goes to bed late and gets up late. I go to bed at a normal hour and get up at a normal hour.
“Normal?” Nazy interrupts. “Don’t you mean ‘early’ Dan?”
‘Yes, my dear, once again you are right.” I replied. “Actually I meant ‘normal’,” I thought —illustrating another secret (silence) of a long marriage.
Tiger got his glasses this week and, with diplomacy skills honed by international assignments in Switzerland and The Netherlands, I’ve been negotiating with him about the benefits of seeing things. I’m building on glasses experiences in the past:
Flashback
Washington, DC
Nazy’s Mother wasn’t enamored by her new glasses.
“I don’t like them,” she ‘explained’.
“Eh… why not?” I asked. “Can’t you see better?”
“Now everything has an edge,” Nazy’s Mom replied.
“That’s called focus,” I thought. ”You’ll get used to it,” I said.
End Flashback
Tiger told me that with his new glasses: “I can see the floor more clearly, Dan.” However, like his great grandmother, it’s not clear that he likes seeing things more clearly. But, he is gradually wearing the glasses for longer times.
This weekend, Nazy and I took him to Los Olivos on an excursion to see the ‘epic’ poppy and mountain lupin display on Mt. Figueroa. Tiger was particularly interested in the ice cream break. He also enjoyed discussing the difference between an Ocean and a Lake. (For the first time in a year, we could actually see water in Lake Cachuma.) Tiger enjoyed the garden supply store that had a huge collection of fountains. And..
“ … he would have liked the wildflowers,” I said, “if they had been in bloom.” (A local told Nazy that we were about ten days early.) We drove by Michael Jackson’s Neverland on the way and..
… mostly Tiger had time to enjoy with his grandmother.
Earlier, we joined Melika, Tom and several of their friends for a CPR course:
“This is really important for you guys,” the instructor noted. “We’re not sure why, but we’re seeing a lot of cardiac arrest in the 30 to 40 age group.”
“Great!” I interjected. “Nazy and I are safe. We made it over the hump.”
The instructor was Armenian with a Lebanese background. I feel sure that both Nazy and I can handle basic CPR and the Heimlich Maneuver. I also hope that we never have to put those skills to use.
The first house that Nazy and I bought *on Kensington Place in Memphis) had a large dining room. We, on the other hand, had no dining room furniture. We acquired, after a speedy search, a hefty dining room set which..
“I never liked,” Nazy claims.
We transported that heavy (and unlikable) furniture to Vancouver, Houston, Hanover, The Hague, Hanover (again), Zurich and Santa Barbara. We made some repairs and refurbishments along the way. We fixed one of the chairs that ‘just broke’ while Melika was having an unauthorized party in New Hampshire. We refinished the surface in Zurich. In Santa Barbara, a gargantuan granite table ‘came with’ Melika and Tom’s new house. It didn’t fit their decor, so they gave it to us. We found an unemployed cadre of large and strong men, rented the truck that had been used to move the space shuttle and arranged to have the street between our house and Melika’s closed while the table was moved. We reinforced the floor and had the outside wall of our current home removed so that strong men could wrestle the table into place. We put the unlikable old table outside — because “the weather is always good and we can eat breakfast outside.”
It began to rain. We discovered that the heavy table, had a thin veneer — a veneer that was not immune to rain and that it wasn’t designed for outdoor use.
Nazy and I went to see the Oscar winning Persian movie, “The Salesman’. I read the subtitles while Nazy listened to the original Farsi. It was a moving story that shows how much people, regardless of where they live, have in common.
And, young Arrow, always wants to be suave and debonair like the glasses-wielding Tiger. He went for the Wyatt Earp, JP Morgan handlebar mustache look. As he explained to me (or will explain when he learns to talk, “a handlebar mustache is a hirsute appendage of the upper lip and with graspable extremities”. Arrow admits that it is hard to project the correct ‘look’ while being strapped into a stroller.
For last week's letter, click here
Dan and Tiger in Los Olivos