Lucky

 

---

Now that I have an inconvenient medical condition, I think about what I did to cause it. I smoked for fourteen years, knowing that it was a terrible thing for me, knowing that Dad died of lung cancer, as did several of his brothers and sisters. I think about eating badly, and exposure to all kinds of pesticides and chemicals and god knows what over the years.

Also, being superstitious, I think about all the taboos I’ve broken: all the salt I’ve spilled without throwing a few grains over my shoulder, all the ladders I’ve walked under.

Mostly I think guiltily of all the people I've been unpleasant to, or actually hurt, either accidentally or on purpose. (Of course I have. You have too. But we’re talking about me, not you.)

But I have had very much happiness in this life – more than I deserve, really. Partner is largely responsible for much of that. But I was lucky to grow up in a place that was as beautiful as Washington state; lucky to go to a funky Catholic-liberal college like Gonzaga in the crazy 1970s; lucky that my first city was Spokane, an easy-to-navigate place that wasn’t at all threatening; lucky to get into Brown for grad school (though I threw it over after a year); lucky to find my way to Providence, my dear dowdy hometown for thirty-five years now; lucky to get into the Peace Corps, and meet all kinds of interesting people, American and Moroccan and British and Tunisian, some of whom still keep in touch with me; lucky after that to work at Brown University, in a job that has mostly been very good for me, and to work alongside people whom I have grown to love and respect.

And then there’s Partner.

I cannot even tell you what he means to me. We met in 1995, and I knew as soon as I saw him that I probably loved him. Does that sound silly? He tells me that he felt the same way, and I respect him too much to tell him that I have a hard time believing that anyone could ever love me at first sight. At any rate, we were living together within a few years. We moved to our present residence in 2002 – a nice little apartment, just right for the two of us. I’ve grown to love Partner’s family – his two sisters and their families – and I think of them and love them as my family, just as I feel about my own family back in Washington.

Partner and I have grown older together. We’ve traveled together. We’ve been angry with each other, and reconciled. We’ve been sick, and taken care of each other. We shop for groceries together, and go to work together in the morning.

I’d be lost without him.

To paraphrase Frank Herbert: My life has been mostly (undeservedly) sweet. But Partner has been the sweetest thing in it.

No matter what happens from here on, I consider myself very lucky.

---

Walking with a cane

---

Partner tore a muscle in his thigh at Thanksgiving; it pained him grievously, and made it difficult for him to walk comfortably.

 

 

So he used a cane for a while.

 

 

We’re a three-cane family.  We both own formal canes that are basically varnished tree-branches, and I keep a regular old medical-supply cane in the umbrella stand for occasional use.  I have occasional attacks of sciatica – one’s coming on right now, actually – during which I walk painfully, with a strange posture.  One of my very sweetest co-workers said some years ago that she always knew when I was having a sciatica attack, because I “walked like I had a load in my pants.”

 

 

Charming.

 

 

Anyway, Partner was using his fancy cane when he went back to work after Thanksgiving.  One of his co-workers called him “Gandalf,” which I thought was hysterical, and I wish I’d thought of it first.  Myself, I like to use the regulation old-lady medical-supply cane; it looks stark and grandfatherly, and it tacitly reminds the children I work with that time is fleeting and the body crumbles.  Heh heh.

 

 

(My friend Patricia, now living in East Deerswamp, Massachusetts, has a much prettier cane, tinted lilac and patterned with lovely flower designs.  She was always a bit of a princess.  When she was still in the office with us, she’d jab us with it, unless we grabbed it away from her and jabbed her back.)

 

 

So Partner and I are tottering on into old age together.  Good!  Why not?  I saw a wonderful YouTube video recently of two old football players on stage together at a banquet; they’d been enemies/rivals decades ago, and the feud has never died; one tried to josh the other with some flowers, and the other struck out with his cane, and a fistfight ensued.

 

 

Which is the other reason a cane is handy.  It’s excellent for bopping people on the head.

 

 

Patricia would agree.  So would Partner.

 

---

 

I am a pathetic nerd

---

Last summer, my student assistant Noah and I went down to the mall bookstore; he wanted to buy something, I forget what, and I just wanted to browse.  He came up empty, but I came up with an old DC Comics World’s Finest anthology, with Superman and Batman in color on the cover.  I could tell Noah, when he saw me holding it, was withholding judgment.  (Do I need to tell you that he was more than thirty years younger than me?) 

 

 

“I can’t help it,” I said defensively.  “I used to love these comics when I was a kid.  I still do.  It’s like comfort food.”

 

 

“Yeah,” he said unconvincingly.  “I understand.”

 

 

No, he didn’t.  But maybe he will in thirty years. 

 

 

Okay.  So Partner and I were in Universal last month, and there are X-Men and Marvel characters running around all over the place.  Partner kept photobombing them: I have pictures of him sneaking up behind the Green Goblin, and Rogue, and Storm, while they were being photographed with other people.

 

 

Then we found Cyclops!

 

 

You could tell, even under the costume, that this guy was cute.  The suit had built-in muscles, and that stupid visor covered most of his face, but sometimes you can just tell.

 

 

Partner saw his chance.  “Who is he?” he said, trembling.

 

 

“Cyclops,” I said.  “Go pose with him.  Oh, and call him ‘Scott.’  It’s his real name.  He’ll like that.”

 

 

“What do you mean, his real name?”

 

 

“He’s Cyclops,” I said impatiently.  “It’s his secret identity.  If you call him ‘Scott,” he’ll know that you’re a real insider.”

 

 

So he made friends with Cyclops (see above picture).

 

 

He was giggling as we walked away.  “I said, ‘Thanks, Scott!’  And he liked it!”

 

 

So: do you see the benefits of having a nerd for a wife?

 

---

 

A nice aimless story

---

Partner and I were in Stop & Shop before Halloween.  He was in the deli, and I was in the grocery.  I was zipping through the candy aisle, and something caught my eye: the word JESUS, which seemed oddly out of place.  I stopped and examined the item: it was a box of Christian lollipops for distribution on Halloween, each wrapped in a cute little paper decorated with a pumpkin, bearing the legend: JESUS SAID: I AM THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD.

 

 

Aha.  I’ve heard of this.  Jesus-ween, right?  It’s an evil holiday, so let’s Christian it up.  You don’t see it much here in pagan / Catholic Rhode Island, where people often allow the Virgin Mary to camp out year-round in a bathtub on their front lawn, but it’s an interesting phenomenon.

 

 

So now Partner and I are done shopping and are rolling the cart out into the parking lot.  I am aware of Partner’s hearing difficulty; God knows I am hard of hearing too.   So I try to enunciate, as carefully as I can, as we walk: “They were selling lollipops with Bible verses on them, for Halloween.”

 

 

And Partner looks at me with total incomprehension and says: “Wally Cox?  Why did Wally Cox have Bible verses on him?”

 

 

Partner and I are the Burns and Allen of the Third Millennium.

 

 

Except I’m not sure which one of us is George and which one is Gracie.

 

 

I think we take turns.

 

---

 

 

Final arrangements

---

Partner and I are both getting on in age, and have begun to talk about our final arrangements.  Naturally we want to be together, even after we’re both defunct.  (This is irrational, but we’re human, so naturally we’re irrational.)

 

 

We have, unfortunately, discovered that we have a little discrepancy in our final wishes.

 

 

Partner wants to be cremated (after he’s dead, I mean, not today) and have his ashes thrown into the water off the Pacific island of Maui.

 

 

I want to be buried in a proper wooden casket and put in the ground in Venersborg, Washington, close to where I grew up, in a grave facing Spotted Deer Mountain, in northern Clark County.

 

 

So, you see, we have some negotiating to do.

 

 

I think we will do a catch-as-catch-can scenario.  If I go first (which I think is very possible), I want him to take me with him wherever he goes.  It would be nice if some little part of me – even a keepsake – were put in the ground near my parents, but really, it doesn’t matter that much.  It matters much more to me that I be with Partner.  He can take me to Maui if he likes.  There’s enough of me in Venersborg already, I suppose, after having grown up there. 

 

 

And, if he takes me with him to Maui, Partner and I will be together.

 

 

And if (God forbid) Partner goes first, I will carry out his wishes, and he will swim with the fishes off Maui.  But a little pinch of him is going to stay with me, and I will be buried in Venersborg with an envelope in my pocket, and that envelope will have some of Partner in it.

 

 

And, if I bring a little piece of him to Venersborg with me, Partner and I will be together.

 

 

And that’s really all that matters, isn’t it?

 

---

 

Happy birthday, Partner

---

Today is Partner's birthday. If all is well, we should be in DisneyWorld (or Universal Studios) right this moment, having a wonderful time.

 

 

Our first meeting was a dinner date at Downcity in downtown Providence in 1995. (The place burned down a few years ago.) I ordered fish, which arrived burnt on one side and half-frozen on the other. I would have sent it back, but I didn't want to make a bad impression on Future Partner, whom (for some reason) I liked very much.

 

 

About a month later, we went to Newport Grand. We bet on a few jai-alai matches, and we put down some money on one of the Triple Crown races (either the Belmont or the Preakness – the records are unclear). I'd never bet on a horse race before, so he coached me. He pointed out that my birthday was July 10, and his was October 7, and his sister Peggy's was November 7, so it was obvious that the ideal trifecta bet was 7-10-11.

 

 

He was in line in front of me at the betting window. His theory about 7-10-11 sounded interesting, but – I mean, really? So I watched him bet those number, and then it was my turn, and I bet 1-2-3. (In Roseanne's words from the last season of her series, when her character won the lottery: “A perfect straight.”) And I thought no more about it.

 

 

Next morning came a call from Future Partner. “We won!” he yelled. “Twenty-two hundred dollars! How much did you bet?”

 

 

I was uncomprehending. “I'm glad you won,” I said. “But I didn't bet the same numbers you did.”

 

 

He was incredulous. “How could you not - ”

 

 

I didn't understand, you see. It was magical. He knew it right away. Me, it took a while.

 

 

That was sixteen years ago, when we were both young and foolish.

 

 

Now we are old and achy and irritable.

 

 

But we're still together.

 

 

Partner: I love you very much.

 

 

I hope you have a hundred more birthdays at least.

 

 

And I will still not bet the numbers you tell me to bet.

 

---