Second date 1, Arrival

What a day.

Aristotle says somewhere that a play should observe certain "unities"; among these is "unity of action," which means that a murder mystery or spy drama shouldn't also be a romantic comedy. Let me say here and now that there is no way any thorough account of today could observe unity of action. In one way or another, the last 18 hours have touched on most of the themes of this blog.

Let me try to tackle this chronologically. If the story is incoherent, tell me so in the comments and I can try to clear it up. [Note added as I finish this post, six days later: There is no way I can fit the whole first day into one post. I'll do well to bring the story up through breakfast on the first day. The rest will have to go into subsequent posts.]

First, I have to remind you of the background. D made an arrangement with Wife that she would come visit us for a few days between Christmas and New Year's, to help Wife clean the house. This sounds absurd until you consider a couple of things. Foremost is that Wife gets depressed by the clutter and filth in the house -- it makes her feel completely helpless -- and yet she does nothing about it. There are probably lots of reasons for this: among them that she feels like she should be above housework, and that the powerlessness sparked by the clutter and filth makes her unable to face tackling it. Second, D is a remarkable cleaner. She is fast, thorough, industrious, efficient, and organized -- and while she doesn't make a big deal about cleaning (she would rather discuss theology or art or her work or even perfume), nonetheless you can eat off her floors. I still think that there is something mildly insane about a professional woman crossing several time zones on her own money to clean somebody else's house -- and I have said so several times (to disguise D's hidden motive in coming to see us, not to mention my own eagerness to see her) -- but the fact remains that Wife doesn't see it as insane and she welcomes the help. What is more, D is genuinely concerned about Wife's psychological state, so it is slightly less crazy for her to make this trip in this case, than it would be for anybody else in any other case. (D's "hidden motive," of course, is to see me. There may be some people who are built for a celibate life, but D is not one of them.)

So that was the concept. And the plan was that D would arrive early yesterday morning (Sunday, December 28). But no such luck. Her flight -- the first of three that she had to take to get here -- was cancelled because of weather. So she tried rapidly to rebook, or to fly standby. I should point out that this says something about D right away: many people would have decided to give up at this point. True, the tickets were non-refundable. But non-refundable tickets can nonetheless be rescheduled for any time in the next year. So when D called with the news about her flight, I expected her to say that she was going to reschedule for another time. When she explained what her new plans were -- to fly standby to a major city a good six hours from here, and then to rent a car and drive -- I was a little astonished. But I asked her to call my cell phone when she got in to the airport, and again when she got into town.

[Six days have elapsed since I wrote the previous five paragraphs -- six very full, very intense days. I am picking up the story again, but may have to stretch my memory a bit to catch it all. Please bear with me.]

I was expecting her to call about midnight, but she called some forty minutes earlier than that. She had arrived at the big city safe and sound, and was now in a rented car on her way in our direction. Apparently her trip had been harrowing: at one point every possible flight that could have taken her this way had been cancelled or was full, and she was left standing in the middle of the airport with nowhere to go. D does not really believe in special providence, and she takes a dim view of praying to make things go your way; but she said she was left with nothing else besides prayer, so that's what she found herself doing. And sooner or later, she did indeed get a flight -- earlier than the one she had expected -- and so now she was securely ahead of schedule. She figured she'd get to her motel in about five hours and would call again then ... maybe I could drive over at that time and bring her some breakfast.

So I went to sleep ... lightly and fitfully ... for about four hours, no more than that. Got up, got myself some coffee, pulled some food together, and waited. As I was puttering in the kitchen, Wife came out for a drink of water. There was nothing exactly wrong with D asking me to bring her some food, so I explained it as innocuously as possible what I was doing, and that I was waiting for D to call. If Wife had been more awake, she would naturally have wondered why D didn't drive through a McDonald's or something, but as it was she just mumbled and went back to bed.

Finally I broke down and called her -- because I wondered if I had time to catch another 40 winks. No, she was about half an hour out -- she had, in fact, driven through a McDonalds -- and would let me know when she arrived. Only half an hour, I asked? That sounded like she was making awfully good time. Admittedly it was the middle of the night, but whenever I have made that trip it has been more like six hours anyway, not the five she had been planning on. Where exactly was she right now?

This was apparently the wrong thing to ask. In the first place, she didn't quite know; but in the second place, she had been marking her time by watching the mileage posts by the side of the freeway, so she was quite sure of her projection and felt rather patronized that I was trying to second-guess her arrival rather than trusting her ability to figure it out on her own like a grown-up. It didn't help that the cell phone reception kept cutting in and out, and at one point I could have sworn she hung up on me.

Twenty minutes later -- she was making good time! -- she called from the motel. I couldn't make out what she was saying very clearly, but she still seemed to be out of sorts. I picked up the food and drove over there. And honestly, all the while I was wondering how I had gotten myself into this situation. I already had enough troubles with one touchy, over-sensitive woman in my life -- why on earth would I ever willingly have two? What next, what next, what next ...?

I found her standing in the parking lot, waiting for me and looking at me strangely. Apparently there was something wrong at the motel desk, so she couldn't check in yet; this meant she got to stand out in the cold waiting, instead. But the curious look was because she wondered what was going on with me. (Funny, I had the same question about her.) Why would I assume she was incompetent to find her way here, when she has travelled all across the globe? Why was I angry with her? Why did I hang up on her?

The last question was easy: I didn't. Must have been the lousy cell phone reception. As for angry ... hell, I don't know. Maybe because I was tired? Or because I was frustrated that when I tried to express care and concern, it got slapped away as mere patronizing and allegation of incompetence? Why did she have to be so damned sensitive on this point that she couldn't accept care and concern at face value?

We talked for a few minutes, out there in the cold. Did I still want to see her there? Yes, of course. Was she sorry she came? (This had been a big fear of mine all along, and it wasn't really dispelled until her last day here.) No, no, of course she was going to stick to her promise. Could we be OK, and not start off the visit hurt at each other? Sure, fine. We kissed lightly and she went back to the motel office.

Finally they let her check in. She spent a long time signing forms and fussing with papers, before she got her key. Once she had the key, we walked to her door and went in. The door clicked behind us, she set down her bags, and we kissed again.

And then suddenly the kiss was all there was. Somehow our clothes slipped off and tossed themselves pell-mell across the room. Somehow we fell onto the bed, still kissing, gasping, holding each other desperately, frantically. Oh my God, Hosea, I've needed you so badly; D, my sweetheart, you're beautiful and I love you. I lost all sense of time. The rest of the world might as well have disappeared. There was nothing else in the Universe but the bed and us. Welcome.

After a while the fever cooled, and we could think clearly again. We tried to wash off the more obvious smells (though I didn't want to look like I had taken a shower over at her place!). We found our clothes and pulled them on. We looked at the clock -- it had been somewhere between an hour and two, and the sun was up. Since D still had to return her rental car, we drove over to the agency so she could do just that. Then, grinning and happy and chatting, we drove to our house. The boys were awake, Wife was just getting up, and it was time to begin the project.

The story of this week will be continued in several future posts. The housecleaning project was in many ways truly the Project From Hell. And on a personal level ... well, the week was pretty eventful that way too.