If I ever get bored, all I have to do is trail along with my husband on some errand or another. Today he was trying to find a place to have his lawn edger repaired, and since we needed to pick up a couple of things, I went along. A friend had directed him to a repairman, only knowing the general directions to his house, and not knowing the repair man's name.
Howard said the street was four blocks east of 14th street, and the 3rd or 4th house. Well, after traveling on Lake road for much more than four blocks, my husband decided the street must run off Hartford. We were looking for a fix-it sign for small engine repair, and not seeing one, I suggested he ask an old gentleman sitting on the front porch of a house we were coming to.
The man rose from his lawn chair and I saw them shake hands and talk animatedly for a few minutes, while Howard pointed, nodding, then wave each other off like long-lost friends, he got back in the car. "That man was (Mr. So-and-So!)" he exclaimed. I recognized the name as a man we'd met doing a nursing home service where his wife was a resident. (At that time my husband found out he was a brother of someone he had worked with in another lifetime.) "The house is the second one from the corner," he announced as we backed out.
After knocking on the front door of said house, hubby came back, got the edger from the trunk, and headed to the back of the house without explanation to me, but I figured he he'd drop the tool off and be right back. Wrong! I finally decided he must be waiting for the repair, and I was just about to go check on him when he came back empty-handed.
"Are you ready for this?" he exclaimed dramatically. I thought he was going to give me an exorbitant figure, but he said, "That man was Bill Jackson (not his real name), the brother of Tom Jackson!" Supposedly someone he used to know? "Tom's son was a coach at (a certain college) and has a building named after him!" There was much more, and I realized why he had been gone so long.
Just as we were getting out of the car to go into a store, on of our son's called. His dad had to tell him all about meeting this guy, and the fact that the man had told him of a good place to eat in Pawnee. "He said his motorcycle buddies had been trying to get him to there for years, and when he finally did, he couldn't believe how good it was, Howard told him.
By this time, I was gesturing that we get of the hot car, and he talked into the phone as we went, stopping mid-sentence to say to a man getting into the truck next to us, "Are you from Louisiana?" The man looked at his t-shirt and said he used to live at Lake Charles, prompting Howard to further inquire,
"You work at Conoco? Our son used to lkive at Lake Charles, and he works there now." The son he had dangling on the phone.
Finally getting into the cool store, Howard looked at me and said, "What?!!" I just believe in being friendly. I needed to get home and rest,
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