Last Saturday I went to my girlfriend’s for dinner and offered to fix three things before we’d finished our wine. The first was a crooked kitchen cabinet door. She’d already ordered hinges and planned to put them on over the weekend. Later she mentioned she needed tires, and I offered to call the guy I’ve used for years. She already had an appointment.
We were sitting on her back porch when I noticed a board was getting soft. I’d just started explaining how I’d replace it when she set her glass down. “Can I ask you something?” she said. “Do you ever come over here just to spend time with me?”
I sat there with a complete answer about the porch board and no answer at all to her question.
She was gentle about it. Almost every time I came over, she said, I found something to do. I’d offer to move furniture, weigh in on a contractor, or take a look at her computer. She appreciated the thought. She also liked having me over for dinner. “I invited you over because I wanted to see you,” she said. “That’s enough of a reason.”
I’m 58 and divorced after 29 years of marriage. If my ex mentioned something was broken, I tried to fix it before she had to mention it again. It was one of the ways I knew how to take care of somebody. Five months into dating a funny, affectionate 56-year-old who loves her house and has her own plumber, I’m apparently still looking for the loose hinge.
Last month I had a lousy day, and she drove 40 minutes after work just to take me to dinner. She reaches for my hand when we’re walking. She even laughs at jokes I know perfectly well are terrible. Since Saturday, I’ve been thinking about how easily all of that went right past me while I was busy trying to be useful.
We’re having dinner again tomorrow. She’s cooking, I’m bringing dessert, and I’m going to try to make it to the table without conducting an inspection.
