More from Minnie

I started to tell you about Minnie already, but today Kelly, who wasn't there the first time, asked Minnie to tell the story again. This is what she said:

It was our anniversary. Our tenth. Ray had been secretive for weeks, hinting he was planning something huge. Something special. He'd been kind of giddy, even, but, again: secretive.

I had been planning something for him, too. In secret, I'd measured his favorite sweater, a cardigan, and I'd used the pattern to design another one for him, a pullover, which he claimed to dislike, but I had a feeling he'd like this one. I'd designed it entirely myself, beautiful cables and popcorn-filled diamonds. It was beautiful.

Minnie had to stop talking for a moment, but then she continued.

But anyway, the morning--well, the night before our anniversary he told me he was going to work very early in the morning so he could be home in time for the big surprise later. I told him to wake me before he left, but he didn't. I got up at seven as usual, and I was setting the house in order, and then I heard this incredible noise in the street, like those speakers the kids have, playing loud music. Our street was always quiet, so I went to look and it was these two trucks that said "Home Invasion" or something, and, I mean, they had a whole crew, and they came right to my door.

There was a carpenter and a perky redhead who introduced herself as the host. She had a microphone and there was a camera man. They had me take them through the whole house and show them everything.

I mean, I've seen those shows on TV but I don't watch them. I don't even really know why. But so I had to take them through the whole hous and I was just glad I'd dressed and put on a nice outfit.

I showed them my fiber studio, where I have my looms and my spinning wheels and they asked me questions and had me do a little spinning and weaving demonstration, after they told me I had to sign a release to be on TV.

So I signed all the papers they gave me and we went around the house, and they made comments, too--mean things. They said my den was thirty years out of date.
But it was comfortable.

Next

Another thing, before we continue

I know I was telling you about the interview, and Minnie, and I will finish those stories, but right now I have to tell you something else that I just remembered. It happened, before I ever got here, when I was working in a shoe store:

On a bright sunny summer afternoon I looked up from the counter and saw a woman had come in who had long wavy hair to her waist, and water was streaming off of her. She was barefoot and she hesitated in the doorway the way you might if you were figuring out the best route across a sea of broken glass.

She never said a word the whole time I waited on her--and she never did find a pair of shoes she could walk in without pain. She left barefoot, too, and, though she had her back to me, I was pretty sure,from the way she put her hand over her face and her shoulders were shaking, that she was crying.

Another time, I was crossing the street in an American city when I saw a parade of ten men and women in full Revolutionary War uniforms; there was a penny-whistler, a drummer, and they all had on tri-corner hats, too.

I know how to read signs, but I don't know how to know which things are signs, and which things are just whatever they are.

Next

Today at lunch...

...I sat with another new person, Kelly. She said that she came here from an apartment complex. Her next door neighbor was a nice-looking young man she sometimes thought she might get to know better, but the two of them could never seem to make eye contact in the hall. Even when they rode the elevator together, she said, they barely looked at each other and they never spoke.

"Sometimes I wonder how money changes relationships," Kelly told me.
"Do you think it changed that one?" I asked her.
"Maybe," she said. "Maybe if he'd sprung for a louder bathroom fan or I'd invested in a quieter vibrator, things would not have been so weird when we saw each other. But I just don't know."



Some days the cruelty of this wall is breathtaking; some days it seems like a gift to have it there, keeping what's on the other side invisible and inaudible.
Next

Minnie

Minnie is beginning to tell us her story.

A few months before their tenth wedding anniversary her husband became giddy and secretive, hinting that he was planning a huge surprise. Minnie was planning a surprise, too: an Aran sweater she'd designed, a pullover. She knew he preferred cardigans but she felt this might be an exception--plus, she was not confident enough in her measurements or knitting skills to plan a cardigan. She spun the yarn herself, from wool roving she bought online.

The night before their anniversary, Minnie's husband told her he was leaving early the next morning, so he'd be home in time for the surprise in the evening.

She told him to wake her before he left, but when she woke up at 7 am, he was gone, and there was only a note telling her not to go anywhere that morning.

I'll tell you the rest later; they're telling us to go to sleep now.

Next