The day before Mark and the girls left, I felt inclined to do accomplished things so that I could demonstrate to Mark and to myself that I would be perfectly fine during this stretch of time alone.
I looked around.
Hmmmm.
The toilets needed cleaning, but that did not seem a showy or impressive enough display of my competence.
I envisioned leading Mark to the toilet, “Look! I have completely cleansed the toilet bowl of shit residue! I will be fine here all by myself.”
See?
No way such a woman should be left unattended.
I envisioned Mark in a conversation with his parents, “So how is Kris doing while you are gone?”
“She’s fine. She’s flushed and shitless.”
See?
I needed a more convincing display of my competence.
Ooooh . . . the huge tent we put up for Kallan and her friend to “camp” in the back yard!
Competence, here I come!
I dragged each of the air mattresses from the tent to the back deck. I used the air pump to vacuum the air from each of them. I rolled up each giant rubber mattress super tight (Mark gets all frowny when the mattresses are not completely deflated). I carried the deflated rolled-up mattresses into the house and laid them on the couch.
Now for the tent.
Persie the Labrador followed me out into the back yard.
“What the fuck, Persie?”
The Labrador, apparently alarmed and threatened to discover a huge tent in the back yard, had shit in large carefully formed deposits . . . one at each corner of the tent. The tent had been up for several days, so there had been plenty of time for her to mark all four corners.
The Labrador stared at me as I walked around the tent and surveyed the shit markers.
“Really, dog? REALLY?”
Fuck this shit. I was not going to clean up shit. If I wanted to clean up shit, I would have cleaned the toilets.
My goal was impressive competence, not shitlessness.
I decided to work around the shit.
So I pulled all the stakes and removed all of the supports and unhooked all the hooks and let the tent fold in on itself.
Completely missing the four corners of shit! YAY!
Stepping carefully, I folded the tent into as small a shape as I could manage.
And then carried it into the garage.
There. I piled all of the poles and rods and hooks on top of it.
I AM AWESOME!
I walked back into the house to see if there was some spackling to be done. Drywall, maybe.
I was glowing with competence.
I found Mark staring at the air mattresses, “You rolled them, huh?”
“What?”
“I always fold them. They fit into their bags better that way.”
“They fit like this. Look!” and I picked up one of the mattresses and shoved it into its nylon bag, “See?”
Mark stared at me, “But they are supposed to be folded.”
“I don’t see what it matters.”
“Just seems like after all the times you have watched me put those air mattresses away, you would know how it’s done.”
“Really, Mark? Really?”
“I fold them every time.”
“Well, let’s just imagine that I don’t always do things like you do them.”
“Seems like you would know the right way by now.”
“Fine. I have done this job incorrectly, but look! The world continues to spin, annoying husband of mine.”
Mark turned and glanced out the back window, spoke happily. “Oh, that’s great! You put the tent away! Thank you!”
“I know, right? All by myself.”
Mark gave me a hug, “Thanks, babe. That must have been hard to get it rolled up tight enough to fit into the bag.”
Uh oh.
“Ummm . . . I actually folded it up small and put it in the garage.”
Mark sighed, “You have to roll it up or it won’t fit in the bag.”
“I am thinking it doesn’t need to go in a bag.”
“It has to go in the bag. Geez, Kris . . . now I have to unfold the damn thing and roll it up and do the job myself.”
“Or you could pretend that you have already left, and we are talking on the phone.”
“What?”
“Say hello.”
“Kris, I don’t want to play games with you.”
“Just say hello.”
“Hello?”
“Guess what, husband who is not here to see any of this?”
“What?”
“I folded the air mattresses and I rolled the tent. Instead of the other way around, which would just be ridiculous. Everything is under control because I am competent.”
“Kris, I can see . . .”
“Shhhh. I know you have a lot of busy things to do. Go and do them! I will see you when you get home!”
I hung up my imaginary phone, “See? Just pretend you have already left and none of this will bother you. I will fix it before you get back.”
“Promise?”
“Yes.”
OK, so now Mark and the girls have been gone for ten days.
The dogs and I sit and stare at the rolled-up air mattresses that still rest on the couch.
“You know what, dogs? Fuck it. No way I am redoing those air mattresses. I am not going to roll them out and then fold them up just to make Mark happy. He is not even here. I don’t care what he wants. Do you guys care?”
The dogs do not care.
So I carry the mis-packed air mattresses to the closet and throw them in.
“You know what, though, dogs? I guess I could roll up the tent. How hard could that be, right?”
The dogs follow me into the garage, where the tent sits in hulking folded fashion.
I hold up the very small bag into which this folded monstrosity is supposed to fit, “Dogs, it is hard to see how this is going to work. Come on, we’ll take it into the back yard and see what we can do.”
I carry the tent into the back yard and start unfolding it.
Jack the smaller badly behaved dog goes insane.
Plastic crinkling sounds are one of his many mortal enemies, and he goes insane. He is leaping and snapping and growling and whirling . . . he is like a Piranha Terrier.
“Jack! It is a tent! What the fuck is wrong with you? Calm down!”
He will not calm down and he lunges and rips at a corner of the tent.
“OK, that’s it!” I grab him by the scruff of his neck and hold him in the air with one hand as I do the last bits of unfolding. Jack twists and snaps at the air . . . seriously, like a piranha.
I put him down, and he hurls himself at the tent, shaking and ripping as he grabs a piece of it in his mouth.
“Oooooh, Jack! Check it out!”
I unzip the main doorway of the tent and hold it up in the air a bit. Jack races snarling through the doorway and I zip it behind him. I drop the doorway back down.
He is still for a second, a small trapped lump beneath the fabric of the tent.
And then he starts running in crazed frenzied circles within the tent. I can’t see him, I can only see the insane nylon-profiled tunneling of Jack’s small body within the tent. Around and around he goes, barking and whirling and chomping.
Just below the surface and invisible.
Like a piranha!
I cannot stop laughing.
I will never be able to roll up the flattened tent with Jack inside of it, but I cannot stop laughing long enough to retrieve him.
He zooms happily within the tent, from corner to corner, snorting and sniffing when he reaches an edge.
I am dying.
Persie comes trotting over to see what we are doing.
She sniffs at the tent.
She trots to the center of the tent.
And shits.
As Jack zooms beneath the tent fabric, Persie shits on the top of the flattened tent.
Really, dog? REALLY?
But I cannot stop laughing.
Persie finishes shitting and trots away.
Jack keeps zooming.
And then stops.
Snif, sniff, sniff.
Bark bark bark bark bark bark!!!!
Jack leaps and bounds beneath the tent fabric and sends Labrador shit tumbling all over the tent.
Bark bark bark bark bark!!!
Zooooom!
“Hello, Mark?”
“Yes?”
“Guess what, husband who is not here to see any of this?”
“What?”
“I cleaned the toilets!”
Hee hee!
