The Pursuit of Idleness

The Pursuit of Idleness

Lorrie thinks I’m getting lazier, which I find kind of flattering. I heard her say as much to her mother on the phone the other day; and unless I misread her tone, she finds it to be not only an endearing quality, but also kind of sexy.

“Would you empty the dishwasher, please?” she asked me mid-way through the third quarter of the Instant Mashed Potato Bowl yesterday.

“Sure,” I played along. “As soon as the game’s over.”

Enter Lorrie, causing me, reflexively, to hide the remote in my underpants.

“There’s nobody there,” she said, looking at the near-empty Potato Bowl stands. Lorrie is extremely observant.

“Well they don’t know what they’re missing. These kids are incredible.”

“It’s 63-0,” she now noticed.

“I love a comeback,” I said, settling deeper into the couch.

There is no end to my idleness.

I listened as Lorrie emptied the dishwasher, feigning anger by causing the pots and pans to clang against each other so loudly as to drown out the TV announcer’s game commentary.


*****


I looked on sadly as the college bowl season came to a close. And before you could say: “Hey, could you bring in some more salsa and chips?” the Super Bowl had come and gone. Try as I might, I could not get into the N.B.A., the N.H.L., tennis from Down Under, or college hoops – at least not until “March Madness”, which was still several weeks off.

What to do? I had to think of some suitable activity – or in this case inactivity -- to justify my presence on the couch.

And then the light came on. I would read. Granted, reading does smack a bit of active participation; but if I were to look comfortable enough with it, it might still pass for passivity.
It was while I was positioning a reading lamp on the end table next to the couch that a second light came on – literally. It was this second light that was to launch me into the ionosphere of indolence, and, eventually, off of the couch.

“What’s that?” Lorrie asked when she came in and saw that next to my reading lamp I had placed a second, much shorter lamp.

“That?” I parroted, attempting to hide my pride. “It’s a call button. Like they have on planes.” And in fact I had gotten the idea from the airlines. “I put it there for you,” I said, batting my eyes at her.

She looked genuinely perplexed.

“You know how you hate to be interrupted when you’re doing something? Like when I say ‘Hey, hon, would you get me another cup of coffee?’ Or ‘Lor, is there anything to eat?’ This eliminates the need for me to do that ever again. All you have to do is look over here from time to time. If the light’s on, it means I want something.”

I looked on as she went into the kitchen, pulled a rubber glove onto her hand, came over to the couch where I was sitting, and unscrewed the light bulb from my little lamp.

Now it was me who was perplexed.

Later that day I once more overheard her talking to her mother. Apparently I had been wrong about her finding my laziness sexy back during football season.

*****

So now what? I had gotten used to living in that fool’s paradise where I thought my worst behavior was being smiled on; and she all of a sudden seemed hell-bent on “making a few changes around here.”

Yikes. This was terrible. It had taken twenty-seven years to get to where I’d been just a few short days ago; and now it appeared that I had inadvertently upset the pretzel cart. I had to get back. Back to that happy condition of getting my head rubbed whenever I asked; back to that division of labor that found her embracing the old school of who did what; back, in essence, to my couch. I just wasn’t cut out to do laundry.

Maybe I could defuse the situation. They say the best defense is a good offense. It was worth a try.

“I have to go to England on business,” I said that night at dinner.

“You’re not in business,” she felt compelled to remind me.

“You know, you’re just like the rest of them,” I lashed out.

“The rest of whom?”

“Just because I’m a writer, you all think I’m doing nothing all day. The dentist called today. Said he’d had a last-minute cancellation and figured I could come in because I’d be available.”

“And?”

“And I wasn’t available. I was working on a story. The same story, incidentally, that I have to go to England about.”

“Really? Would you like to tell me what your story’s about?”

I sensed that I was being mocked; and I didn’t like it. “No. No, I don’t want to tell you what the story’s about.” I now mimicked her. “And you want to know why? ‘Cause I don’t like your attitude.”

“Fine. You don’t like my attitude, and I don’t think there’s any story you have to go to England about. You want to know what I think? I think you’re getting all up in arms and trying to pick a fight so you can storm out of here without doing the dishes.”

Plan B.

“Alright. I’ll tell you what my story’s about. It’s about a guy who needs to go to England to get away from his wife.”

(Pregnant pause.)

“Go on,” she encouraged me, as she might have encouraged Hanzel toward the oven.
I continued. "And while he's there he meets this woman named Amanda. She's a chambermaid at the hotel he's staying at. She's incredibly beautiful, and the only reason she's a chambermaid at a fancy hotel...”

"So he's staying at a fancy hotel. Funny, when he takes his wife along with him he never stays at fancy hotels."

"It's a story. He's staying at the Churchill Hotel in Portman Square. Alright? And that's where he meets Amanda."

"Who's incredibly beautiful.”

"It's nice to see you're listening. Anyway, the only reason Amanda is working at the Churchill, on the executive floor, is because she figures it's the best chance she has to meet a rich guy and have him fall in love with her."

"Right. Now I get it. You want to go to London to find Amanda."

"God, no. Amanda is the last person in the world I'd want to run into. Her plan, once she meets the guy, is to get him to marry her by promising him a life of love and comfort. But all the while she is secretly plotting. And sure enough, twenty-seven years later: Bang! She's going to change all the rules. She's going to use her incredible beauty and her wiles to enslave the poor guy; to get him to do her bidding; to be at her beck and call."


"You sure you don't mean to do his fair share; to pull his own weight?"
"Maybe you should write the story."

It couldn’t be any worse than yours. And you still haven’t told me why you want to go to London.”

"I want to go to London to study what it feels like to live in the lap of luxury. You know: a chocolate on the pillow; a terrycloth robe on the bathroom door...”

"Room service."

"Exactly."

"You mean you want your call button back."

She had me there. Might as well confess all. “I do. I really do. I like being waited on hand and foot. I want the old Amanda back.” I was at my pathetic best.

“You’re doing the dishes.”

“I said that she was incredibly beautiful.”

“Flattery will get …”

“If I do the dishes, will you walk the dog?”

“No.”

“Make the coffee?”

“No.”

“Get me an after-dinner drink?”

“No.”


Just when I thought that I was getting nowhere fast, I saw it. You had to be quick to catch it; but it was there. Unmistakably. The corners of her mouth had turned up. Not much; but enough for me to know, even though she turned her back hurriedly, that a smile had formed. Formed and stretched like a rainbow across a clearing sky. The storm had passed. I pursued my advantage.

“Will you rub my head later?”

“Maybe.”

“Make me bacon and eggs for breakfast?”

“Don’t push your luck.”

My luck. Yeah, I guess, in the end, you’d have to call it luck.

Anyway, the way I figure it, with continued good luck I’ll be back on my couch by the All-Star break.