Getting My Feet Wet

"I don't know," he exclaimed, clearly exasperated. "I'll figure it out when I get there, okay?"

"I just worry, Dan, when I don't know when to expect you," I answered, hearing and hating the plaintive note in my voice, but continuing anyway. "What should I do about dinner tomorrow?"

"Dinner? Jesus, Natalie," he sighed heavily. "Just do whatever. If I'm here, I'm here and if I'm not, I'm not."

He was on his way out of town--driving the two hours to his mom's house for an overnight "visit" (with my mother-in-law,"visit" was nearly always a euphemism for "crisis management") and driving home the following afternoon. I hated these spur-of-the-moment trips--I didn't deal well with unplanned events throwing my schedule out of whack. I knew that what Dan needed was an understanding wife with a sympathetic ear and a supportive shoulder, but just then revised dinner menus were dancing in my head.

Dan's impatient voice interrupted my planning, "Natalie?"

"Oh, sorry." I shook myself from my reverie. "Yeah, okay, I'll figure something out."

"I'm sure it will be fine. Look, I really gotta get going now if I'm going to make it to mom's in time for dinner." He gave a short, rueful laugh. "Sheesh ... what is it with the two of you and dinner plans, anyway?"

His little joke ensured that we would be parting amiably--something that was important to both of us--and we shared a quick hug and kiss before he grabbed his overnight bag and left through the kitchen door.

After he left I busied myself in the kitchen, clearing lunch dishes away from the table and putting them in the dishwasher, returning milk and condiments to the refrigerator, and wiping down the counters. Those tasks completed, I reached for a dishtowel to dry my hands with and glanced up at the kitchen clock, sighing heavily when I saw that it had been less than an hour since Dan had gone. I always felt at such loose ends when he was away. The days stretched vast and empty ahead of me, like an untraversable chasm. I literally counted the hours until he was due back, even if he was only on an overnight trip.

We had thought we might have dinner out that evening then catch a movie, but those plans had gone right out the window when Dan's mom had called bright and early at eight o'clock that morning. I had known the instant the phone rang that it was my mother-in-law calling. Nobody else we knew would call so early on a Saturday morning, but Dan's mom thought that sleeping in, even on the weekends, was positively decadent behavior and she did her best to discourage it at every opportunity.

I didn't know what I would do with the day now that I was on my own. I had really been looking forward to an evening out and some "quality time" with my husband, but now the whole weekend was shot. "Might as well not even have a weekend," I muttered, disgruntled. I threw my dishtowel into the sink, finding a perverse satisfaction in the disorderliness of not hanging it up on the hook where it belonged, even though I knew that I would be the one to return it to its rightful place later.

I walked into the living room and plopped myself gracelessly onto the couch. I grabbed the remote control from the coffee table and flipped on the TV, surfing aimlessly for a couple of minutes before resigning myself to the well-known fact that there is nothing good on TV on Saturday afternoons. I pressed the remote's "off" button and shifted to stretch out on the couch.

I lay there for a while, thinking uncharitable thoughts about my mother-in-law and plotting revenge for the wrong she'd done me. Of course, I would never really do anything and, truth be told, I actually liked her most of the time, but I was feeling put upon and I figured that imagining her comeuppance was as good a way to pass time as any. At some point I dozed off and woke up an hour or so later with late afternoon sunlight in my face.

The nap had done me good and I was feeling a bit less out of sorts now that I was relaxed and well-rested. I decided to try my luck again with the TV and switched it on with the remote. Still nothing good, but as I was flipping through channels I noticed one of the endless number of long-distance commercials and stopped to watch it. It had the usual sappy content, but it served to remind me that it had been a couple of weeks since I had talked to my parents. I reached for the phone and dialed their number, hanging up when I got a busy signal.

I tried a couple of more times but couldn't get through. I figured my dad must be playing around on the internet. I had tried several times to talk him into putting in a second phone line so that it wouldn't be impossible to reach them when someone was online, but he always scoffed at the idea. "If it's important enough, they'll call back," he said, never taking into account the possibility of emergencies, not to mention frustrated daughters.

I think it was plain old irritation as much as anything else that propelled me to my feet grumbling, "I'll show him important enough." I went to the bedroom and stuffed a change of clothes into my backpack then grabbed my toothbrush and deodorant as I passed the bathroom on my way to the front door.

I was in my car and almost halfway to my parents' house, four hours in the opposite direction from where Dan was now, when it occurred to me that I had never made the trip without my husband since we had gotten married. Not only that, but I had taken off without warning. At that very moment, not one single person knew where I was or where I was heading. It was very unlike me and I was exhilarated, despite the smallness of my actions on the grand scale of things. I sang the rest of the way there.

After my parents and I had eaten dinner together and I was getting settled in my old room, I called Dan at his mom's house. When he came on the line he sounded a little concerned, "Natalie, is everything okay? I've been trying to call you for a couple hours now."

"Oh yeah, no biggie," I said breezily. "I just decided to come down and see mom and dad. You know, spend the night and drive back tomorrow sometime."

"Uh, okay." He seemed not to know what to say. "When should I expect you home then?"

I grinned to myself as I answered non-chalantly, "Who knows? It was just one of those spur-of-the-moment things. What do you say we play it by ear, okay?"