No lawyer yet?

Wife mentioned this weekend that she hasn't secured an attorney yet.  But it's not just laziness.  She says she has approached three already, and none of them has been willing to take her as a client.  Isn't that odd?

I know at least one of the attorneys she has contacted, ... a woman married to one of Wife's former bosses, who therefore knows Wife personally.  Wife tells me that our assets were too small to interest this woman; but hell, does that really matter?  I thought lawyers were paid by the hour, not on a percentage of the client's assets.  So naturally my own theory is that she took one look at the name and said to herself, "I don't want to have to deal with her. Forget it!"

Does that explain the other two?  I have no idea.  I don't know who they were.  Maybe (for that matter) Wife might have invented them.  Or maybe they knew her personally.  Or maybe ... well, almost anything.

But what happens if Wife can't get competent legal counsel?  Does she just take the advice of her friends, who will tell her "Oh, when my hairdresser's brother's niece got a divorce, this is how it worked for her ...."?

I have no idea.

Getting what you want, part 2

It took me several days -- into the middle of this week, before I was able to write out a reply to Wife's e-mail about her frustration when Son 1 doesn't take steps -- what seem to her obvious steps -- to get what he wants in life.  But in the end, here is what I wrote her:

I’ve wanted to reply to this e-mail of yours for a few days now (you sent it on Saturday) but I haven’t had the time. You bring up some really important points about the boys’ futures, and what it takes for them to prepare themselves for those futures. But I also find that I see the same points just a little differently than you do, in ways that may be important.

First, there are some important places where we agree. I totally agree that the boys shouldn’t graduate college saddled with debt, although I think there are more opportunities to locate college funding than high school funding. (Scholarships, ROTC [at least for Son 1], and so forth.) I totally agree that Son 1’s social skills are off the charts, and what a blessing. And I totally agree that the competition for the service academies is ferocious.

Where I see things differently is a bit more subtle. If you’ll permit me, I think I can summarize the main thread of your argument below something like this:

1. Son 1 wants to be a fighter pilot for the Marines or the Air Force, and he wants to get there by going to Annapolis or Colorado Springs.
2. Competition for those programs is very tough. The service academies take only the best of the best, and only the best of the best OF THEM get to be fighter pilots.
3. In order to make it into these programs, Son 1 needs better grades than he has right now. That means he has to buckle down and study far more diligently than he has till now.
4. Hogwarts can give him what he needs academically to get where he wants to go, but they can’t spoon-feed it to him. He has to go get it.
5. If he doesn’t do the extra studying and take the personal steps to squeeze every last drop out of the academic program at Hogwarts, he won’t make it to the goal he wants to reach. And that means he will have wasted the opportunity he has right now, which would be very frustrating. And sad.

Is that about right?

My opinion is very close to agreeing, but not quite. To break it down, …

• I totally agree with (1) and (2).
• I mostly agree with (3) and (4).
• And while I agree with the first part of (5), I totally disagree with the conclusion.

Let me flesh this out a bit.

I think the core difference between how you see these things and how I see them is wrapped up inside this question: how bad is it when you don’t attain your heart’s desire? If you fail to reach the thing you have held all your life as a guiding goal, what then? You use words like “very disappointed”, “very unhappy”, and “thwarted”. OK, I understand that. But the reason I see it differently is that from my perspective nearly all of adult life consists of not getting what you want. Maybe that’s cynical, but I don’t think so. I think that’s just how it turns out for most people most of the time. We all want this or that or whatever, and we set out to get it, and somewhere along the line we get derailed off track and wind up with something else instead. And this happens over and over. And the really critical part is that notwithstanding that we hardly ever get what we want, life is still good anyway. It is still better to be alive than dead. It is still better to wake up each morning with a new day in front of you, despite the fact that your new day looks totally unlike any day you ever planned or imagined for yourself. And so you get up, dust yourself off, and try again.

So what do the boys need to get out of high school? Well sure, other things being equal it would be nice if they got the tools they needed to compete successfully for the things they want. Other things being equal it would be nice if Son 1 got high-enough math grades to get him into Annapolis, and then high-enough scores in whatever else he has to do to get him into the fighter program. But the way I look at it, it’s probably not going to happen … and what’s more it probably would never happen even if he started scoring perfectly in math. My guess is that the number of spaces in the fighter pilot program is so small that even if Son 1 suddenly revolutionized his whole approach to his studies and worked his little fingers off, even if he came out tops in everything from here on out … even then he might not make it because they will end up with a pool of the guys who are perfect at everything, and they’ll start going down the list to pick out fighter pilots, -- and they’ll fill their recruitment quotas somewhere in the middle of the S’s. Fred Smith will get in, and Max Sutcliffe won’t because they’ll be full up. Son 1’s last name is Tanatu and that starts with T, and so he’ll miss the cut. It could end up being that arbitrary, because there are so few slots available and so many guys who are really, really good who want to do it.

That being the case – or rather, that being at least a strong possibility – I think what Son 1 will need most of all in life is a thick skin. He’ll need the ability to pick himself up from failures, or from just not getting what he wanted even if it was through no fault of his own, and come back the next day with a smile on his face. And the only way to do that is to exercise, not his intellect but his character. The work needed to develop that ability to bounce back is not academic exercise but moral exercise.

This is one of the benefits that I see in boarding schools – not all boarding schools (I was never too sure about Beaxbatons*!), but at least Hogwarts and Durmstrang. You have pointed out that there are classes at the local public high school which are just as challenging as any classes the boys are likely to take at Hogwarts and Durmstrang, and of course you are absolutely right. Looked at academically, our local public high school really is a first-rate school. But what I don’t see there, or in any public school, is a conscious, deliberate program of moral development designed to educate a student’s character. And yet, adolescence is the time when it is most important to focus on character. Little kids have to learn the basics of getting along with others: sharing politely, saying Please and Thank You, using the bathroom correctly. In college the focus is resolutely intellectual, or it had better be. But it is in those middle years that the student’s spirit is malleable; it is then, above all other ages, when the spirit can be bent into the shape it will have for the rest of life. And so it is then when it is most critical for the adults around a student to set up circumstances that will call out the student’s best responses from a moral perspective … to train the student’s character to be the best it can be. Of course if the boys were living at home we would do the best we could. That’s what most parents do. If the boys were going to the local public school, that school would leave that stuff to us. But speaking only for myself, I fear I am a real amateur at that sort of thing and it is too important for me to be willing to botch the job. Which I would probably do, just through inadvertence.

Hogwarts and Durmstrang, though, have each one given a lot of thought to exactly this topic. They have come up with somewhat different answers, but I trust both schools to do a good job here. It’s not that I think any single one of the teachers there is so much wiser or more mature than we are; but I think that the institutions have built up a kind of institutional memory about how to educate adolescents, which helps them make the right choices more often than not when it comes to questions of character development.

This isn’t the only advantage I see to these schools, but it is a big one. And because of this, I think that their educations at Hogwarts and Durmstrang (respectively) will be valuable even if neither boy ever achieves his heart’s desire. I think the educations they are going to get in high school will stick with them through all the ups and downs of life. And therefore I think that those educations will absolutely not be wasted, no matter how the boys turn out.


* I have used the name "Beauxbatons" to stand for a third boarding school that both boys applied to and neither one got accepted by. I don't know why. Son 1's theory is that Beauxbatons is a school for rich kids (plus a few scholarship cases they can feel self-righteous about) and we just didn't have enough money. Maybe, or maybe not. I don't really know. What I do know is that as a school it may have a more impressive reputation than either Hogwarts or Durmstrang, but I was never persuaded that they paid as much attention to their students' moral development. So I wasn't terribly sad that neither boy got accepted there.

Getting what you want, part 1

The day after Wife's tantrum, by coincidence, we got an e-mail from Son 1's advisor at Hogwarts giving us an update on the year so far.  He mentioned a couple of classes where Son 1 is having trouble, partly because he's not taking good notes or going in afterwards for extra help.  Son 1's advisor said it's too early in the year for him to be worried, and in any event he had already talked to Son 1 about being more diligent.  But Wife and I started to talk about it, largely through e-mail while I was at work during the day.

She wrote me:

I hope Son 1 gets a stronger grip on his classes, but in fact this is completely in character with how he's done the past two years.... He didn't do well the last two years, either, for primarily the same reasons -- he didn't take notes, had nothing to study from, didn't appear to study for tests, and didn't understand math or science.

I know you argue ardently that Hogwarts will prepare him best for wherever he goes next, but I really truly question whether that's true if he can't even handle Hogwarts successfully and with a good faith effort: e.g. getting extra help. He tells me he's just overwhelmed. Has it occurred to you that either Son 1 really doesn't care enough about being at Hogwarts on an academic level to try very hard, or that maybe Hogwarts is genuinely TOO HARD for Son 1 and that he really DOESN'T belong there? In which case, is insisting that he go there a genuine gift?

I know we differ on this, but I am really concerned that it's unfair and unkind to expect this of Son 1, however much you disagree and denigrate me for thinking it. The AP programs at [our local public high school] are also very demanding, and it isn't clear to me that he'd be getting better grades in them, either, or even that we'd continue to live in this area that long [after the divorce]. But I have to wonder.

When are we supposed to know whether Son 1 is "doing better"? Apparently he never did last year. What reason do we have to think he will now?

I wrote back:

That's why I asked his advisor specifically whether Son 1 is doing better or worse than last year.... 

Also, going to Hogwarts makes a big difference for those students who aren't academic superstars, too. Many of my classmates weren't academic superstars -- the kids who got B's and C's -- and I'll bet you most of them are making more money than I am. [If I never explained this before, I went to Hogwarts when I was in high school. And yes, my academic record was a little nuts ... possibly more impressive than anything I have done since, which is kind of pathetic.]  There is no doubt in my mind Hogwarts was good for them too. If the school were "TOO HARD" for Son 1, he'd be failing and they'd kick him out. Up till now, that hasn't been the case. Of course we don't know about this year yet.

One of my big worries about moving him to the local public high school is that he would resent the change and just check out completely. You and I both know that Son 1 is totally capable of doing things that are absolutely not in his own best interest if he starts feeling stubborn. He did it when he was three, and I'll bet he can be just as stubborn now at 16 .... Just a thought.

She answered:

I totally agree with you that Son 1 would mightily resent having to lose his senior year at Hogwarts, and I really, truly don't want to do that to him. Yes, he can be remarkably stubborn, and you're right that he might well say "fuck you" and check out. I will do anything within reason to see to it that BOTH boys can stay in their schools. It isn't fair to Son 2 to promise him the same as Son 1, let him start at Durmstrang, and then pull it out from under him, either.

I'm sure it's true that many of your "B" classmates succeeded in life. I read an article somewhere that said that the "A" students in high school and college actually make less money over the course of their lives than the "B" students do. Not than the "C" students do, however. Yes, the "A" students did have more choice of more selective colleges. But 10 years after college graduation, unless someone's goal was to get into the best possible graduate school (or law school, med school, etc., where GPA made all the difference), WHERE someone had gone to college and what his/her GPA was had become virtually unimportant. At that point, it's really all about performance. And many "A" students are academically superior, but socially inferior, while in reality, social skills make more difference on the job than academic acumen. From that point of view, of course, Son 1 excels beyond expectatons. [It's true. His social skills are really good, better than either of ours.]

Where his choice of high school, and, in fact his GPA and standardized test scores will make a huge difference, is in his ability to get into a college of his choice -- specifically somewhere that will help him to attain his goal of being a military pilot. And in that regard, they're critical. That's why I said that I just don't think he can get into Annapolis, and that makes me very sad because I know that's what he really wants. Yes, I really DO love Son 1. And I would very much hate to see him disappointed. But when I see him doing things that limit his chances to meet a goal that is so important to him, I get frustrated. His not taking notes in math class is an example. I know he's overworked this year: I totally get that. But in class, he certainly has the ability to take notes, and if he isn't, I don't understand why. If he isn't seeking extra help -- and you'll notice that his advisor said that they may make that mandatory for him if his grades don't come up (which I back completely), then again, I don't think he's helping himself to achieve his own, much-wanted goals, as much as he could be. And I don't understand why. He really, really, when I've talked to him, doesn't seem to take seriously the connection between doing things like that and getting what he wants in the long run. That's probably typical of an adolescent. But he's had a lot of adult help understanding it from you, me, and his academic advisors at Hogwarts.... 
All I'm suggesting with Son 1 is that he may NOT get into a military academy. As you point out, he may be able to go to another good college with a good ROTC program, so that he graduates an officer. That may or may not lead to a career as a fighter pilot, which is why Son 1 wants to be in the military. He doesn't want to be a platoon commander, an administrator, or an airline mechanic. He doesn't even want to fly helicopters. He wants to fly fighters. And he may simply not get that. Few people do, even if they're VERY good, even in the cockpit. If not, I hope he can get something else he's happy with. For example, I believe that, if he had the money for the training, he could become a commercial pilot. A friend of mine who works as a stewardess tells me that almost all of them come out of flying for the military, but a few train privately, go to work for short-run commercial companies like UPS, then work their way into flying for major airlines. But Son 1 has already made it clear that he doesn't want to do that. It would be boring for him, and he craves the excitement of being on-deck of an aircraft carrier. I'm not sure how he can make that happen.  For his sake, I hope he can, because I fear his being very disappointed if he can't. That's what I was trying to express to you last night, and I don't think you got it. I'm afraid that, if he doesn't take his studies seriously enough while at Hogwarts, his ultimate goal will be out of his reach, and that will make him very unhappy, and I really, really don't want to see his life's goal thwarted.

So if I'm mad at him for not applying himself as much as he could, that is why. It's not that I think that he shouldn't be allowed to go to Hogwarts if he's going to get an occasional "B" -- it's that he has a fantastic opportunity in Hogwarts, and it hurts me, for his sake, if he wastes it. And yes, that comes out as anger, probably because I would have LOVED to have had that kind of opportunity, and it was not even potentially possible, and I would have applied myself completely, as I did in college. Son 1 and Son 2 have it, and I don't think they understand how lucky they are to have it, or what it costs us personally to give it to them. I'm not asking for gratitude: I'm asking for them to make the most of a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Is it worth it? I'd really like to say yes. I think it's very important. And no, I certainly wouldn't have spent the money on shoes! -- that was a low blow. I might have spent it on keeping the house above water by doing desperately needed maintenance, and certainly would've been willing to put it into their college funds. I am simply not nearly as convinced as you are that they will be able to go to good colleges if we have no assets. And I would hate to see them saddle themselves with many years of loans so that they can go to good colleges. Many students do that now, and have to put off marriage and children, much less home ownership, because of it. There are lots of articles on the subject. I don't want that future for my children. THAT is my motivation, and I don't believe it reflects a lack of love of them on my part. Quite the opposite.

I think this letter put a far better face on what she was trying to say than any of her ranting the night before.  (It's one reason I prefer e-mail for this kind of conversation. Cowardice is another reason.)  The last two paragraphs there are particularly important because the real root issue becomes clear there.  But this has already become very long, so I will save my reply for the next post.

Hating Durmstrang ... and the boys too??

Last weekend (or a little earlier -- maybe 8 or 9 days ago at this point), Wife had a tantrum in which she decided that she hates Durmstrang.  I suspect deep down this is because she sees Durmstrang as having taken Son 2 away from her; but it is also because the values of the school are so different from hers that she knows she herself would be miserable there. 

I had better back up and explain that Durmstrang very much emphasizes the simple life, and perhaps ends up taking it to an extreme. The good side is that graduates, by the time they are done, have had four years learning self-reliance, independence, and a measure of detachment from the crazier parts of popular culture along with a normal high school curriculum. When I think of the place in those terms, it doesn't take much for me to get all Thoreau-and-Emerson about it; I even think of it rather fitting into the mold of the ancient philosophical schools (e.g., the Stoics or Epicureans), although I realize that sounds a bit far-fetched for a high school. But in any event it is a very different way of life from the frantic and compulsive accumulation of things that is so desperately, graspingly, pathetically central to Wife's whole worldview. I suppose it was only a matter of time before she snapped. (In particular, she has started to compare it to those schools for truant or rebellious youth advertised in the back pages of Sunset Magazine.) 

What set her off was a letter from Durmstrang welcoming us (as new parents) to the school year, cheerfully talking about some upcoming events, and reminding us not to send the kids things that don’t really work there: sugary snacks, soda or caffeinated drinks, plastic water bottles. Wife was livid.  “I can’t even send him CARE packages! They have ruled out every single thing I could imagine sending him, which means they are deliberately isolating me by cutting off all possible contact with MY son!” Nor did she appreciate, or approve of, the remark that introduced the next to last paragraph: “[Our founder] said that Durmstrang is a simple life school where ‘one learns to get on without.’”

The answers to this outburst were all pretty obvious (at least to me) and for the most part I left them unsaid. 

• Gosh, is your imagination so limited that you can't think of anything else to send him? Books, music, even home-baked goodies that aren't icky sweet ... none of these occurred to you?
• How clever of you to have figured out that they put these restrictions in place -- not to benefit the students or to align the parents with the school's mission -- but specifically to isolate you personally from your son!
• And what exactly is wrong with learning to get on without? Sure, maybe it's nice not to have to get on without, but if you at least know how then you are more capable, more flexible, able to deal with a wider variety of situations when life throws unpredictable shit at you. And this is bad ... how?

No, I didn't say any of that.  I did try to soften the picture by suggesting that Son 2 was happy there -- by pointing out, in fact, that Son 2 had enough chances to view the place before accepting their offer (and is perceptive enough in general) that he probably knew exactly what he was getting into, that he went there eagerly and with his eyes open, and that the very few and very brief communications we have gotten from him since suggest he is perfectly content.  Isn't that a good sign? Wife’s reply, though, was to say bitterly “Well I guess he and I weren’t as close as I always thought we were” and then to damn him for it. 

I was actually shocked. Honestly it sounded like she was talking about bitter enemies whom she deeply hated, despised, and resented; not the two boys whom she says she loves so much that they are the most important parts of her life.  She blasted Son 2 for "rejecting all of her values"; she excoriated Son 1 (who is going to a different school, remember) for not being a scholar, for taking a relaxed attitude towards his studies, for being strong and physical and athletic ... I almost expected her to call him a "dumb jock".  (He's not at all dumb, mind you, but that's the kind of mood she was in.)  And she blasted them both for -- in her eyes -- expecting a "free ride" in life.  Huh??  Where did that come from?  Hey Babe, is this all because we are spending money on their tuition instead of buying you some fancy clothes or more shoes?  [No, I didn't say it.]  But you've heard all about her tantrums before, so I don't need to go on.  Suffice it to say that everything was hateful to her.  Everything was caricatured in the worst possible colors.  She hasn't been this bad in a long time; maybe it's the stress of the impending divorce.

Interestingly, it’s also not the first time I have heard this kind of hatred for one’s children.  Wife's mother said much the same kinds of things about Wife being wrenched away from her – or rather "betraying" her -- by going to college.  (Wife was the first in her family to do so.)  It probably goes without saying that Wife hates being compared to her mother.  She has made it a point of pride and self-definition for years not to be the same kind of parent her mother was.  But I remember listening to her mother's tirades just before our wedding, when she would howl at me because nobody else was nice enough to sit still and listen to her.  And it was all the same stuff.  I wonder if I should tell Wife that, or just let it go?

To be strictly fair, of course this isn't her only view.  When she is in a better frame of mind, of course she still loves the boys as well as she can love anyone.  But it made for a long evening that night ....

Porchia's "Voices"

Just for a little change of pace.

I recently ran across a reference to an Argentinian poet named Antonio Porchia.  I say "poet" because that's what everybody calls him in all the references I've found, but his "poems" were typically one sentence long.  Maybe two.  I'd be more inclined to call them "aphorisms" except he hated the term.  (Not sure why.)  Maybe "proverbs".  Or else -- the term he himself used (and the name of the book where they are collected) -- "voices".

Some of them are very evocative.  Some of them could easily replace the motto on my masthead ("Talks loud. Laughs louder. Thinks silently.")  Some of them I don't begin to understand.  But I picked up a volume of them, and have it on my desk at work.  And when I'm bored of the stuff I'm supposed to be doing, I pick it up and nibble, ... just a bit.
__________

Las pequeñeces son lo eterno, y lo demás, todo lo demás, lo breve, lo muy breve.

The little things are what is eternal, and the rest, all the rest, is brevity, extreme brevity.

Trátame como debes tratarme, no como merezco ser tratado.

Treat me as you should treat me, not as I should be treated.

Sé que no tienes nada. Por ello tepido todo. Para que tengas todo.

I know that you have nothing. That is why I ask you for everything. So that you will have everything.

Se vive con la esperanza de llegar a ser un recuerdo.

One lives in the hope of becoming a memory.

Han dejado de engañarte, no de quererte. Y te parece que han dejado de quererte.

They have stopped deceiving you, not loving you. And it seems to you that they have stopped loving you.

Lo pagado con nuestra vida nunca es caro.

What we pay for with our lives never costs too much.

Qué te he dado, lo sé. Qué has recibido, no lo sé.

I know what I have given you. I do not know what you have received.

En una alma llena cabe todo y en una alma vacía no cabe nada. ¡Quién comprende!

A full heart has room for everything and an empty heart has room for nothing. Who understands?

"Why don't you move out now?" (this evening, part 2)

This story starts here.

I fled the room, as I wrote, but Wife wasn't having any.  She was determined that I was going to hear what she had to say.  I tried sticking my fingers in my ears, but she just shouted over them, "I'll have you know that I change the sheets every time I 'use the bed' in the middle of the day!"

Did I ask this?

I was rattled ... not because she fucked one of her dismal string of boyfriends today but because she was hollering at me.  You could say, "Sure, Hosea, but you had your fingers in your ears. What did you expect?"  But to me it is every bit as aggressive for her to be "defending herself" or "clearing her name" or whatever she chooses to call it this time, even if she does it in a quiet and modulated tone of voice.  It's the content that grates on me so badly, not the decibel level.  So I left the house and walked around the block before making dinner.

Happily we talked about other things over dinner.  She started talking about her conversations with a mortgage banker, interminably (or so it seemed).  But then a few minutes later she started talking about this psychologist who is trying to address her migraines through biofeedback ... even more interminably.  And then the conversation meandered around to something else where she felt the need to "defend herself" and I stopped her.

"You really can't keep doing that, or I'll have to leave the house again. Honestly, when you start talking like that I feel like you are making a stick out of your words and hitting me with it. Really it's better if you just talk about something else."

"I'm sorry you feel like that, Hosea. I don't understand what I can be saying to make you feel like I'm hitting you. (And geez, I'm only defending myself in the first place!)"

"That's it. I'm out of here. I'll be back."

Slam.

I came back in just a couple of minutes, while Wife was putting her dishes in the dishwasher.  I started to put the food away and she headed towards the bedroom.  (The washing machine was still humming in the background.)  Then she turned and said, very calmly, ...

"You know, the divorce is going to take a long time. There are a lot of things we have to figure out, and then even once we've got them all figured out and the forms drawn up it will take the Court a long time to process those forms. So why don't you just move out now? It's obvious that I really grate on you, and you'd be happier. I can't complain about you. These days you have been unfailingly polite. But I still care about you and I can see that you are really suffering by being around me. So maybe you want to rent a studio apartment or something else, just to have a place to live while we go through all the details -- even if in the end it turns out that you are going to own the house instead of me and so you move back in. I think you'd be happier."

I mumbled that I would think about it.  Of course in many ways she is right: it has gotten to the point that I feel almost allergic to her.  In the back of my head I wonder if she has some ulterior motive ... if there is something she can steal or sabotage over weeks that she can't do while I'm at work during the day.  And of course it would cost more: I assume that she'd still want my help with the mortgage and the other household bills, if we hadn't yet come to a final agreement on how to disposition all the stuff.

But in some ways it is very tempting ....

Ewww, gross .... (this evening, part 1)

So I come home from work tonight.  Wife is at the computer and I'm about to make dinner when she says, "Can you give me just twenty minutes in the kitchen? I know I've had all day but I haven't had a chance to clean it up yet. It'll only take me twenty minutes and then you can go ahead and cook."

Sure, hell, why not?  So I let her go do stuff in the kitchen.  I poke at my e-mail but there isn't much.  And I wander aimlessly into the bedroom.  The covers of the bed are tossed every which way in a complete jumble.  Usually she at least has the bed made when I get home, so I assume she really hasn't had any time all day.  I wonder ... hello, what's this?  Ewww, gross ... it's somebody's butt-stain* on my side of the bed, right about where somebody's butt would be if he were lying in bed with his head on the pillow.  And it sure as hell wasn't there this morning.

I really couldn't care less whom she's fucking, but I don't want to have to sleep on the sofa.  So I wait till she's done in the kitchen and then ask her, "I don't want to know whose this is, but could you ask him to be more careful next time? And can you do something about it before bedtime?"

She tenses up and says, "Yes, I saw it there and I knew all about it -- and I was going to change the sheets this evening anyway!  And just for the record ...."

I flee the room quickly.  Any sentence that follows the words "just for the record" is a sentence I don't want to hear.  But she does change the sheets, and puts the smeared ones in the washing machine.  Good thing.


* As if he really hadn't wiped quite well enough and it had just rubbed off in the course of tossing about.