house on the left had contained our first apartment in marriage. Third floor. Wellington Street.
Across street from the Anglican church where we held our wedding, September 1974.
Here follows fiction:
Tuesday morning. About eleven. Public Library Reading Area.
Chuck had opted for a day off from the factory. Sure it was peak season. Autumn. Many shipments of steel product to be picked, securely packaged, sent off by transport or courier. Paperwork accomplished.
But the weekend had been horrible. Baby Darlene was teething and bitchy. Sarah was exhausted and fighting a flu. Arguments, serious ones, had come so quickly and persistently all weekend. Saturday night and repeated doubles of Scotch had not helped.
Sunday the idea of Church met a brick wall. Waves of self-justification and comeback had soured the brew. Not going to dress up, make the trip, feign smiles and contentment with people he hardly knew. No damn way for all of that bohunk. No matter how hard Sarah pushed, and she always pushed.
Chuck made the breakfast; entertained or soothed little Darlene; virtually pushed his wife out for the church thing and a little space from the baby. Why had he been so slow in the past to offer this sort of relief and help. Women’s work? Get over that Buddy.
But Sarah had returned surprisingly quickly. Too much caught up in the war of attitudes and unforgiveness. Football on the tube for Chuck took first billing all afternoon. He had put lasagna on the slow cook for an early uncomplicated dinner. Sarah contented herself, reading one of her Danielle Steel novels. Always mushy and idyllic. Mr. Right. Friends who really knew how to listen and help in the story’s conflict. Fiction, just fiction and delicious escape. The baby was exhausted and slept.
Monday at work was a write-off because of Chuck’s mutterings to himself and old hurts and conflicts remembered. Given ugly attention.
Tuesday, and there came the retreat to the Library. Consequences at work be damned. Would space, quiet, peace, meditation, dismissal of all the warfare strategies prove helpful? Would prayer, unsophisticated? YEP. No one would mind, he suspected, if the whole thing began with about forty minutes of shut-eye…a comfortable chair, a spy novel resting on his stomach…
Day of celebration of life event for our Mom
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