halving the potato


When I was in high school, I would make weekly visits to a woman named Eula.  She was in her eighties and had long hair and perfectly manicured fingernails.  She used to own a beauty school.

Each week she would tell me a story.  She told me of her childhood in San Francisco.  How her grandmother would send her to pick up butter at the corner store ten blocks away.  Never once did I get scared, she'd say.  But the world has changed since then.

She told me of her husband.  They met at the diner where she worked as a waitress.  He was there every day, without fail.  With a smirk on his face he would say, Eula, I'd like to take you out; what d'ya say?  Her response was always no.  He was a lady's man, she told me.

One day, she came to work and he wasn't sitting at the bar. 

About a month later he showed up.  It was a Friday, she added.  He walked up to her and asked if he could take her out; his smirk was gone.  She said yes.

He took her horseback riding the next day.  They spent the weekend in the mountains with friends.  She told me she never wanted that weekend to end.  Monday morning we were married, she said.

I smile when I think of Eula and the love that she and her husband share.  I'm sure they were the kind of couple who never needed an excuse to kiss.  They told one another I love you every day.  I can see them working in the garden together until his back gave out.  They never went to bed angry and I'm sure they held hands until the day he passed away.

I'm sure the same will be true for my husband and I.  He will still tell me I am beautiful and I will still call him handsome.  We will never sleep in separate beds and we will always kiss one another goodnight.  When we are in our eighties, I bet he will still open the door for me and I will still buy Miracle Whip instead of mayo.  Because, like the Irish say, it's easy to halve the potato where there is love.

4 comments:

  1. can I just say that I miss you! And love you! Can't wait to see you this summer sometime :) yahoo!

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  2. thank you, mara! she was truly a remarkable woman; she taught me so much.

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  3. Dear Tori,

    I've just finished reading your selected blog entries for new readers and teared up through each one. You have such incredible love, passion, and wisdom and it is intoxicating. (You have a way with words to boot) I am so grateful for the short time I had to work so closely with you and your husband and for all that I learned from each of you. I wish you all the best as you draw closer to your time as parents and know that the children who enter your home will be so blessed.

    Love,
    Jari

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You are wonderful.