“Everyone” on Deck

Deckzilla's New Coat

Yesterday was an enjoyable day at my place of employment. My Favorite Panamanian surprised me by showing up for an unscheduled lunch together. It’s probably a little goofy but I still get a thrill by these little surprises, even after thirty-six years of marriage. We talked about the upcoming weekend and the impending presence of both granddaughters to celebrate Mothers’ Day. We also talked about the annual application of sealant to Deckzilla, yet another rite of spring passage. I told her I was going to do it after work yesterday and she adamantly corrected me by saying, no “we’re going to do it.”

A few years ago this type of exchange might have bothered me but the march of years has made any type of assistance offered for physical labor more than welcome. We parted after lunch as she headed off to do some shopping. I know. Huge surprise. I returned home four hours later to find the house empty and my promised assistant noticeably absent. I wasn’t surprised, I mean, she said she was going shopping. I got to work moving everything off Deckzilla and started the sealant application. It actually went pretty well until I noticed the sun was going down and my wife had still not appeared. I was more than a little grumpy when she finally did show up with yet another car load of plants. I normally assist with the unloading but since I was racing the sun to finish the deck while there was a smidgen of ambient light available I left that for her.

From the Other End

She was appropriately apologetic and confessed to a loss of track of time; a condition endemic to the wife’s shopping excursions. She also reported that she’d talked with the FBR who was upset with me because I was unavailable for our nightly FaceTime call. I hadn’t heard the phone ringing in my pocket but since my hands were liberally coated with sealant for the past four hours I couldn’t have answered it anyways. I felt genuinely bad about missing the call even though the FBR only deigns to acknowledge our presence about 50% of the time now. At least her other grandfather, Wingman’s dad, was in town for a visit so the grandfather end of granddaughter support operations was covered. And the deck came out looking spectacular!