It was an adults only weekend. For us that means a quiet weekend. With no noise. Or loud sounds. Or medium sounds. Just borderline silence.
It's the thing I long for in my wildest dreams.
So Friday after school my mother came by to pick up Lauren for the weekend. I ran to the grocery store for chicken and sweet potatoes-- because the dogs eat tons of chicken and sweet potatoes and we're always running low. Then Mr Blyleaf came home and we headed out for dinner at 85 Main.
In between deciding to go out to eat and actually going out to eat, I asked MB to not talk to me because I was afraid we'd use up all of our material and not have anything to talk about at dinner. That's totally normal, right?
We had hamburgers made from grass-fed cows from North Grosvenordale and drank Peak organic beer. It was great except I could only eat around the edge of my hamburger because I ordered wrong, so the inside was pink and that turned my stomach.
Is this level of detail too much? Don't answer that-- I can't hear you. Just know I encourage skimming.
You'll be happy to know our strategy was spot on and we had plenty to talk about. It helps that we always have the sweetest girl in the world for our waitress who contributes, in a very significant way, to the discourse-- which reminds me, I have to watch American Idol to check out some fella named Paul.
After dinner we went straight home to conquer the DVR which has been suffering from a lack of attention. I think we got through approximately one program before we fell asleep.
Saturday was going to be a crap shoot. I was mightily encouraged by the weather forecast and suddenly had an urgent need to take care of some spring fashion necessities. Specifically, I was thinking it's time to pack away the holy trinity (black skirt, black tights, flat boots)in favor of skirt suits, sundresses, a black pump, and a nude/bare pump. For me this requires hosiery. I knows it's old-fashioned, but my bare leg looks like I'm wearing nurses' white tights or something. So I do what I must.
Here's the crap shooty part-- MB wanted to come to the Nordstrom with me. That's Kathy's territory, but she happened to be in Nevis (well, where else, right?) so technically I had an opening. It's just that I was going to be buying shoes. With, like, money.
Turns out I underestimated MB. He doesn't give a rip about shoes, but once I defined my terms (he didn't understand platform vs, wedge, for example) he was masterful managing my very specific shoe criteria. In fact, he's at his best when a clearly defined objective has been laid out for him. And he can weigh variables like nobody's business. So, when the Nordstrom didn't have exactly what I wanted, he kept me from getting all crumbly and giving up-- which is my tendency.
We left Natick without a shoe, but with a supply of Donna Karen hoisery-- which is not nothing.
Back at home we faced yet another challenge. One o'clock was the start time for the Red Sox, Bruins, Family Circle Cup (tennis), and Le Comte Ory (opera). A good problem to have, I know. Suzanne Somers was on ShopNBC this weekend, too. Unfortunately, without Kathy to watch with me via email, I couldn't even consider that an option. So MB and I mostly watched tennis, but eventually abandon all of it to play with the dogs in the yard.
Our dogs are so funny. Keena likes to fetch a stick. Montana prefers a Jolly Ball for horses. And the Corgi doesn't fetch at all-- she runs after the German Shepherds. We had a moment out there, watching Montana play so happily in the sun when it struck us both, just really hit us hard, how lucky we were to have him and how his emergency surgery just a couple of short months ago was worth every penny. He's eight, nine next month, and he had a life threatening emergency. They didn't know when they went in, what exactly they'd find. So we had to make a really hard call. I'm sure it was the right one. If you're interested, I'll write about that another time.
When the dogs were plenty tired out, we got back to the shoes. After margaritas and salad, we hit the DSW. That's right, I wasn't fooling around. DSW is hard for me. There's too much to pick from and I get overwhelmed. I really prefer a smaller, well edited selection. But I had my detached analyst with me. Good thing, too, because I found the perfect shoe. Only not in my size. It was available online, so before ordering it, I decided to ty on the wrong size just to see. That's when I had a total break down. Because after all that searching, the perfect shoe looked terrible on my foot. Terrible. My leg looked corpse-like and the skin on my foot was doing this thing-- this odd crinkly thing. I was beside myself-- not because of the shoe or my leg or my weird foot skin, but because I had to make more decisions that, in the grand scheme of things, are of very little consequence but, for whatever reason, completely overwhelm me. Hard decisions I can make; trivial decisions, forget it. So MB made a plan B and settled me down. We still didn't find anything, but I felt better. We got lattes for the road and headed home.
That night, we finally watched the last two episodes of Downton Abbey-- I had been saving them for the perfect night. And I also watched Saturday Night Live because the Foo Fighters were on. Hey, Dave.
Sunday morning we had delicious french toast. Then I ran errands, watched the first episode of The Borgias (jury's still out), and took a walk with a friend.
The walk was the perfect thing. I'm so happy to have a friend in town who I can call (okay, she called me-- you know I don't initiate anything) for a spontaneous get together that doesn't require hair and makeup. Sometimes I feel so sorry for the Real Housewives of Orange County and never more so than when I'm out in my pretty town with the fields and the barns and the sweet people who you can have actual genuine conversations with, while feeling relatively certain that it won't end in name calling or wine throwing.
Then it was time to go pick up Lauren. And after a whole 48hrs apart, I couldn't wait.
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