8.10.05: A Day to Remember ‹ Blog « Without-Feathers.com

Marriage is a great institution, but I’m not ready for an institution yet.
Mae West

A Day to Remember

August 10, 2005

You remember when, a few entries back, I mentioned how much my spouse rocks? Well, cancel that. He more than rocks. I can’t think of any term greater than “rocks,” except maybe “boulders.” Yeah, my husband totally boulders.

What other man would choose to celebrate our three-year anniversary (coming up on the twelfth) by taking an entire week off from work—and then not tell me that he did so, and even go so far as to get up this morning at seven o’clock and pretend to leave for work. And then, three hours later, he sneaks back home and appears at the door wearing the suit he wore to our wedding, bearing a dozen pink roses and two (two! two!) Titanic-related books—A Night To Remember and Titanic: An Illustrated History. My poor mother wondered what kind of fellow dares to associate his marriage anniversary with the Titanic; wonder turned to worry when I showed up at her door and asked to borrow her biggest, sharpest kitchen knife. (It was just to cut the rose stems, Ma. If, however, he’d bought me a copy of that book I was just ranting about, the knife might have had other uses.) And then! Then we kicked off our week of wedded celebration in style! That’s right—we went to Ikea and bought four bookcases, and spent the rest of the day putting them together and arranging them. Now that’s a party!

I just can’t believe Tony went to so much trouble just to play a sweet trick on me. The man actually set his alarm last night, put on his work suit this morning, looked appropriately depressed at having to go back to work after the end of his weekend… If he can deceive me about this, what else could he be hiding? My god, he could have five other families on the side, and just spend his days going from one wife to another, trying to remember each anniversary and birthday and who’s on the rag and which house has the crazy penguin-cat who likes to watch bugs. Me, I can’t even fib about whether I wasted an hour watching Hawaii Five-O or not:

Tony: So, did you watch Hawaii Five-O today?
Romy: Of course not! That would be a pointless waste of time! Besides, Jack Lord is ugly. Especially today, when he was standing on this balcony, and the wind kept blowing that funky hunk of oversprayed hair around like a chipmunk skin swaying on a clothesline, and… DAMMIT!

I sincerely hope that our children inherit his deceptive tendencies. You get much farther in life if you can lie—especially if you can lie to your spouse. Their father will train them to use their powers for good, of course; they will all bring their spouses bouquets and books, and they will all look damn skippy in suits. Such is the fairness of the universe.

Sweet and perfect as my husband is, I have to admit that he’s not going to be the only man in my dreams tonight—because of all the news coverage, I’m pretty sure Peter Jennings will play a role in my nocturnal cinema. I dream of Peter Jennings on a fairly regular basis; for some reason, he always seems threatening, and is usually trying to break down a door or chase after me like a brain-eating zombie. I just hope he doesn’t start putting the make on me—erotic celebrity encounters are fine and dandy, but necrophilia is just… oh, who am I kidding, it wouldn’t be the first time I got reamed by the Reaper in my dreams. (In-laws and potential clients, turn your eyes away!)

Seriously though, Peter’s passing is a bummer. He was handsome, he was smooth, he was a damn good reporter, and he had this wry sense of humor that often shone through his reporting. He seemed like the kind of guy you could invite to a dinner party, knowing that he’d bring just the right wine and tell good stories and know how to party in a civilized kind of way. Tom Brokaw would be a terrible bore, droning on and on about the Greatest Generation; Dan Rather would end up drunk as a skunk and slurring out weird Southern similes, and Brian Williams would just hover on the fringes looking nervous and slightly retarded. Yes, I have given great thought to what various famous news anchors would be like at a private dinner party. If I turned my mind to science instead, I would have cured lung cancer by now.

Of course, I don’t spend all my time thinking about such silly subjects. I also consider such important and abstract topics as religion, morality, and the basic nature of humanity. Why, just the other day I turned to my good friend Pope Benedict XVI and said, “Benny, if God is truly omnipotent, can He create a rock so heavy that even He cannot lift it?” And do you know what the Pope replied? He said, “Book ‘em, Danno.” And then I said… DAMMIT!