There’s a saying, “Find someone to love and drag them to the end with you.” Poor Gar, he really should have taken a longer minute to reevaluate his spouse selection. I know he’s pondered, “Why am I living like this with her?”
It’s on him, though, because as I’ve told him, “I came with a warning. I gave it!”
When we bought our truck a few years back, we had a big, black toolbox put in, fitting it at the front of the bed, going all the way across from side to side.
For a while now, Gar had been contemplating getting a shell for the truck so last summer we had a camper topper installed. I usually take my little Durango so I hadn’t driven the truck very much and hadn’t noticed if having the topper made any difference in visibility. Last October, at 85,000 miles, the engine went out of the truck so one had to be ordered, taking a month to come in.
Gar left for Atlanta to drive a switch truck for Samaritan’s Purse - Operation Christmas Child, at about the same time the new engine was arriving. The day before he left, he needed a saw to help me make log Christmas ornaments, so I crawled into the back of the truck and got it out of the toolbox.
When I picked up the truck, new engine happily humming, our mechanics gave me some advice. Knowing in a few weeks we’d be driving to Florida for Gar to spend the winter, they said to drive the truck often to make sure there weren’t any glitches.
Heeding the advice, I drove the truck everywhere and realized right away that the camper topper made it impossible to see out the back window, forcing me to rely solely on the side mirrors. On the phone to Gar, I whined about this daily, saying I felt it was dangerous.
Confused, he said he wasn’t sure what I was talking about. I would become exasperated and complain that I couldn’t look in the rearview mirror and see out the back window because it was pitch black.
After being gone for a month, Gar got home from Georgia and, a couple of days later, while I was at work, he texted, “I just went and fueled up the truck and the reason you couldn’t see out the back window through to the camper was because the toolbox lid was open. I’m getting in there now and putting tools away and shutting it.”
Then he, sincerely and without malice, innocently asked in his text, “Who was in the toolbox last and left the lid up?”
Ummm. We have a grandson who, when asked who ate the last piece of pie, cheekily answered, “Somone, of course.” That answer sufficed to his grampa about the toolbox. Without witnesses or cameras, there was no need to incriminate myself.
I’m pretty sure Gar feels trapped with nowhere to run and knows he’s yoked with someone who’s just not right. One morning Gar, carrying most of my parcels, left a motel room ahead of me. I said I’d bring my suitcase and purse, so trundling along, pulling my luggage behind, I happily whistled a catchy tune, oblivious that my bag wasn’t centered on the sidewalk.
As Gar reached the truck, he turned just in time to see one of the wheels on my Samsonite randomly and without warning catch in the groove between the pavement and lawn, causing the bag to flip on its side like a dead pig.
Newton’s third law states, “For every action, there’s an equal and opposite reaction.” Well, I wouldn’t know anything about that because that’s far too chummy with math, but I do know my response might have made a bystander’s day.
When the bag went over, so did my arm which happened to be attached to my body. I was jerked backwards and trying not to fall, I did a flip turn like I was trying out for the summer Olympics aquatics team.
It was a move on a grand scale and the only way it could have been richer is if I’d have been wearing high heels.
By the time I’d righted myself and my bag, Gar was leaning through the truck window watching, squint-eyed and pokerfaced. He’d witnessed my malarky so often, he didn’t appear fazed. He didn’t even show pity. It was more like he was talking to God: “God, I’m guessing I’m probably stuck, and there’s no way to right the ship now.”
