Monday March 13, 2006
	Her f-ckin' dishwasher.
	All I Want for Christmas is You by Mariah Carey is coming from the dried out speakers of my vintage Cadillac and when the song nears its end I push the rewind button (it's still equipped with the original factory installed cassette player) and then play the song again.  It's nighttime in central Florida and both the windows of my Deville are down (which isn't good 'cause sometimes they won't go back up).  I've been driving around for some time looking for suitable locations to dump the used up  dishwasher I've cut into two pieces.  Additionally I have the upper rack (the thing one pulls out and puts glasses and cups onto) and the lower rack (where one puts plates and such).  I've removed the door of the dishwasher and placed it behind the drivers seat. The cell phone rings: "Whatcha doing honey?" she says. I spent the entire day with her and we talked and laughed and ate and did everything TV commercials say we should be doing and if I didn't see or hear from her again for a least ten days that would be okay with me but just an hour and a half after leaving her and she's calling me wanting to talk more and I'd prefer she didn't call me honey (If my dick was missing or I didn't install her dishwasher and take the old one away would she still call me honey?). "Thought I'd head to the supermarket and get some Quaker Instant Oatmeal," I say. She says: "What flavor baby?" Now I'm baby. "Maple and brown sugar," I say. "Just wanted to thank you again for installing my dishwasher?" she says. I did more than f-cking install it.  I went to Lowes and loaded it into the trunk of my beat down Cadillac and then drove it to her house and then got it (the dishwasher) into the house and then removed the old one and then installed the new one. She says: "You should be a dishwasher installer."  I say: "Sounds like a good idea, honey." Ain't that like some women?  She knows I'm a writer and figures maybe I won't be able to support her being a writer 'cause it's artsy and all and already she's planting a seed:  I should be dishwasher installer. She says: "Call me in the morning." I just f-cking left her and right quick we're talking again on the cellphone and now I gotta call her in the morning?  For what reason?  What will I have to say to her in the morning?  Hi honey.  I took a bath and went to sleep and then I woke up and I drank orange juice five minutes ago and now it's the morning and I'm calling you.  I can feel her heavy hand all over me and I'm uncomfortable and for whatever reason I'm remembering my aunt Marge. "Happy birthday Norman," says my now deceased aunt who really wasn't my aunt (my stepfathers sister). "Hello aunt Marge," I'd say.  "That sure is a pretty dress, ma'am." My aunt Marge was fat and tall and she'd take me out on my birthday.  At the Kresge store in the mall she'd tell me I could have anything in the toy aisle so long as it didn't cost more than one dollar. Good toys cost way more than a dollar and she knew that.  The cow would watch me closely as I struggled to make a choice between junk or junk.  I wanted a good toy.  It was always jacks and a rubber ball or a green plastic army man that came with a inadequate parachute. Whore.  I'm certain had I been a blood relative I'd have gotten an expensive toy.  At an early age I'd been broken down by a overpowering woman.  A mountain of fat with a plastic purse full of controlling dollars.  I was thin, blond, little and the step nephew.  What could I do?  "I'll call you in the morning," I say.  I won't call her in the morning or ever again for that matter. "Night baby," she says then hanging up. Later on I threw the dishwasher door out of the Cadillac while doing thirty or forty miles and hour.  It bounced and slid and sparked (protesting the indignity I had subjected it to the only way it could).      There goes your dishwasher door honey I say aloud (and to no one 'cause no one is in the car with me) then rewinding the tape player. I ejected the upper and lower racks onto US 19.  Out the window they went one at a time.  They bounced and rolled and slid and it felt good to watch them become somebody else's problem. I can have anything so long as it doesn't cost more than a dollar I say aloud (and to no one 'cause no one is in the car with me) then singing along to Mariah Carey's All I Want For Christmas is You. The cell phone rings again: "I've never felt this way about anyone before," she says. It sounds like a line right out of a movie and I'm pretty sure it is so in response I say: "I appreciate that." "Night," she says then hanging up, again. In the Starbucks parking lot I dump one half of the dishwasher and at a stop sign off a secluded road I leave the other. Night, I say aloud and to myself then rewinding the cassette player.    PREVIOUS   HOME   NEXT