21 Days of Love

In the last few weeks I have been stressed out, freaked out and on the edge of causing bodily harm to everyone in my path. There is a whole battery of excuses that I could give for my edgy behavior and a number of apologies that I could, should, and have made (excluding U-Haul, I don't regret anything I said or did there!!) Here are a few standard excuses I like:

--Red Hair (a fun one to cop to whenever squeaky and irrational screaming is involved)
--Being Broke (this is a simple catch-all excuse for any number of things AND is entirely true)
--Moving makes me crazy (also a known fact)
--Being Tired (another handy blanket excuse)

That said, I know as well as everyone that hatred and violence only breed more of the same, and I have crappy health insurance and can't afford the collateral damage. So how does one quell the rage within? Well, love of course. Hmm..........and whom should I love? I could go the Miss America route here and say "everyone" but, that would be lame and difficult to measure, so I'll pick the future Mr. Purlygrl. That has a nice ring to it doesn't it?

According to conventional internet knowledge (I couldn't find a real consensus within the framework of actual psychological research) it takes 21 days to make and/or break a habit. So, with the wisdom of ask.com behind me, I will forge forward with 21 days of love. For the next 21 days I will do something loving for my sweetheart every day. I firmly believe that love is not a feeling (feelings are for sissies), it is an action, a choice, something we live, something we DO.

Thus today was day 1.

Day 1: Woke up early and made breakfast for my sweetie. I'm sure you wonder why this is loving? If you ever lived with me you would understand. Mornings and I have a very tenuous relationship, one largely associated with loathing, grunts and hostility. I simply don't understand morning AT ALL. Why is there morning? Why would anyone wake up before 10? Why do people talk to me before I've had coffee? Why am I expected to be nice before noon? All of these great questions factor into my disinterest in having breakfast with ANYONE at any time prior to 11ish. Still, my love wishes to have breakfast together and has made the request on numerous occasions and so my first act of love was to get up early and make breakfast for him. Funny thing is that it was actually kind of nice (except for the morning part.)

You Can't Make This Shit Up #5--The Legman

It's almost laughable how many jobs I've worked over the past few years. In fact, half the time it is downright hilarious, the other half............well, that makes for less cheeky blog commentary. I really am not a transient, a hobo or a gypsy. I'm just a highly educated broad trying to eat AND have health insurance........and yeah, I'm crazy enough to dream big and want both of those things at the same time. So, yes, I've made yet another fascinating career change. I now work at a cemetery. What do you do, you may ask? Well, sales of course.

Which is how I met this interesting fellow. Now at first blush, this should be a sad story. A seventy-something man and his wife make an appointment to pre-arrange his funeral because he is dying. We spent hours in our mausoleum discussing the merits of ground burial vs. above ground entombment. Mr. Wentworth needed an oxygen tank to breathe and his wife appeared to be on the edge of tears off and on. There was lengthy discussion about the older unwed sister of his wife and their daughter, whom they may also purchase cemetery property for. It is a belabored and emotional Monday morning that ultimately left the couple exhausted and needing time to talk. We decided to break for lunch, I would call to schedule their next appointment later.

After a couple of days I called to set the next appointment. Mr. Wentworth answered the phone in a belabored and breathy voice, which could have simply been related to the oxygen tank, but in time I grew to re-interpret. (What follows here is and abridged and slightly watered down version of the conversation, the things he actually said would make a sailor blush and I don't care to repeat verbatim.)

Mr. Wentworth: I just have to tell you, you have the most amazing legs I've ever seen.
Purlygrl: Uh......
Mr. Wentworth: It's all I've been able to think about since we left the other day.
Purlygrl: ............Silence
Mr. Wentworth: I've always been a leg man, and I've got to tell you, you just have the sexiest legs I've ever seen. If I were a few years younger you'd be in trouble.
Purlygrl: .....more painful silence.......... (Also important to note that this last comment is VERY wishful thinking on his part.)
Mr. Wentworth: [at this point he continues to digress, we'll move forward]

It's important to note that at this point roughly 28% of me was willing to consider the possibility that Mr. Wentworth was on some sort of heavy opiate painkiller and wasn't fully cognisant of what he was saying. That is until...........

Purlygrl: (awkwardly) Ah, so, the reason I called was to set up that follow up appointment. Would next Monday at the same time be good for you and MRS. WENTWORTH?
Mr. Wentworth: I don't know, my wife isn't home right now. You don't think I'd be talking to you like this if she were home do you?

.....And the morphine explanation goes out the window with Mrs. Wentworth's dignity...........

On a subsequent conversation he detailed his hopes that he might die in his sleep dreaming of me and of course my lovely legs. In the end the Wentworth's bought three mausoleum spaces, and a second right of internment, which resulted in a pretty healthy commission for me.

I'm not so naive or puritanical that I am really all that shocked or horrified by men behaving this way. I really get it, men are pigs. When I was a waitress, a bartender, even a clerk I encountered guys like this, but this one takes the cake. In my wildest dreams it never occurred to me that a dying man would behave this way while buying, of all things, his own crypt. Honestly, you just can't make this shit up.