Sputterpub's Blog

We talked to Cindy first. We arrived and went straight to the dining room; we were into big salads and iced tea when she found us. In five minutes she was complaining about Beth.

“I shouldn’t be talking like this,” she interrupted herself to say. “I’m telling tales out of school” with a head shake, and “Oh wow I can’t believe I’m bitching” she interspersed. But she continued.

Cindy and Lloyd are a gregarious couple from Seattle. When we met them three years ago, we also became acquainted with Beth and Joey from Atlanta. Everyone but 50-year-old Beth is in their mid to late 60s. We’ve seen one another for the same week, each year since then, at the same health resort. Many guests sign up to return annually; some of us look forward to encountering our resort buddies.

When the men first met they immediately hit it off. Seattle Lloyd is an extreme extrovert, attempting to get to know the majority of resort guests each year. So of course he acquired Joey and Beth, just like he added us to his coterie around the middle of that week. It just happened that Lloyd and Joey had compatible eating disorders and competitive natures, so they took to hiking, playing, and working out together. And they made a series of fitness bets.

The two couples ate dinner together every night. We joined them at least half the evenings. So we got to know them all.

Lloyd and Joey hiked before breakfast. They did circuit training and boot camp and spinning by lunch and they spiced their non-class afternoons with volleyball. Cindy and Beth were not as compatible as the husbands.

The women got along okay, but they would never have picked each other for a friend. There was a fifteen year age difference between them. Both had been married twice and liked her current husband better than her first, but that was where similarities stopped. Beth was a career woman; Cindy had worked but spent most of her energy raising kids. Beth was fit and had a healthy appetite for food and wine; Cindy visited a gym now and then and was forever trying a new approach to food. When the husbands were around, they did the talking. When not, Cindy tended to chatter about her grown daughter and Beth was most often silent.

Between the first meeting in 2014 and its anniversary, Lloyd and Joey had a bet about who could lose the most weight. Joey dropped more pounds but their loss-as-a-percentage-of-initial-weight was identical. The loser was supposed to host the winner for a visit, but the men decided the year was a tie, and extended the bet for another six months.

By the following spring, Joey lost the most pounds and the highest percentage. In total he dropped 112 of his 340 pounds (33%). Lloyd lost 78. His starting weight was 253 so his percent lost amounted to almost 31%.

Accordingly, it was up to Lloyd (and Cindy) to entertain Joey (and Beth) in Seattle. That visit occurred in July, and Cindy was telling us about it in October.

“It was a fiasco,” she declared. “They were like lumps of coal. I mean, we went out of our way to show them a good time. It was Beth’s fiftieth birthday, so Joey asked us to book a table somewhere special. We picked the restaurant at the top of the Space Needle (it’s been awful for years but it’s got new management now, and it’s turned into quite a place, and – you know – the spectacular view!). Anyway, they were hosting that one, but we offered to buy the wine. I couldn’t believe it! Beth just asked the sommelier to pick a good bottle of white. The price tag was $130!

“But that’s not the worst of it. Oh shit: I really shouldn’t be talking like this…”

We hurried to assure her that it was normal, natural. We wanted to hear the “worst of it.”

“They were with us three nights. We had a dinner party for them the first evening (we invited four other couples), and we did the birthday blowout at the Space Needle the next night, but for the final dinner I decided to cook. We bought beautiful salmon at Pike’s and I really did up a meal. They seemed to like it okay. But get this: Beth didn’t help, at all. She and Joey sat in our family room, on their iPads, while I cooked. Lloyd set the table. Afterwards Beth didn’t even offer to do the dishes.”

We ouched and wowed. I’m sure we exhibited enough empathy, because Cindy went on to repeat her complaints. Especially about the dishes: “I mean, can you believe it? Who doesn’t at least offer to help clean up?!”

After that, of course we paid attention to both couples. We could see they weren’t as friendly as before. They took most meals separately. We think they only dined together twice that week. Both times we were with them. Everyone was amicable but there wasn’t as much laughter as before. And we noted that Joey wasn’t hiking in the morning. Lloyd wasn’t doing the same training as before. In fact, both men appeared to be regaining weight, and neither looked like he was doing enough upper body work.

On the evenings when the couples didn’t dine together, Lloyd and Cindy found new friends and Joey and Beth looked for us. So at the two dinners when we didn’t ask for a deuce and avoid others, we shared the table with the Atlantans and, as it turned out, an amiable chubby couple – Paula and Rob – from Huntsville, Ala.

They were a cheerful pair. Rob was in aerospace (“I have rocket scientists working under me”) and Paula had a job involving food chemistry. I had no idea what it was like to live in Alabama, and talking to them sparked a little interest for me. My roommate and BFF had spent some summers in Mississippi with her stepmother’s family, Beth was originally from Florida and now Georgia, and Joey was a southern transplant from Massachusetts, so coastal me – born in New York and raised in California – was the odd guest out. I paid attention to their talk.

Not that it was regional. The first night the most memorable topic was phobic dogs. Joey described a firework-shy pooch so spooked on July 4th that he used to take her down to the windowless basement to protect her. He said after a couple of years, neither that nor the therapeutic vest worked well enough; he and the dog went to visit his nonagenarian mother in Boston, to get away from the ruckus. Paula and Rob outdid Joey’s anecdotes with stories about their two terrified pets; Rob described soundproofing a room for the animals and using it for Independence Day and also Halloween. My roommate and I learned that houses are far more spacious in Georgia and Alabama than where we live. When you occupy 7,000 square feet, you have room to create asylums.

I was hungering for some perspective then. I needed an order of magnitude. “Hold on,” I said. “I want to visualize.” I turned to Joey on my left. “What kind of dog?”

“Oh, Sally is an 80 pound German Shepherd.”

Then I looked right. “Ours are Chihuahuas,” Rob said. “One’s six pounds and one’s almost eight.” He pulled out his phone and showed us a picture of little matched black-and-tan couch-cuddlers.

I was quietly entertained. My BFF is a cat person, so I don’t think she appreciated the conversation like I did. But both of us noted and savored the table talk the next time we dined with those four.

It was the second to last night at the resort. Paula (and Rob) asked Beth (and Joey) how they met. I’d already enjoyed the story a year ago. I prompted Beth: “Come on! Tell them about that steak!”

So Beth spoke. Usually she’s the last to talk, but she narrated the story about how they met at the job, after Joey transferred from Massachusetts to Georgia. They clashed initially because he was in sales and she worked in accounting, and he didn’t appreciate her questions about his numbers. But after a while they started to enjoy one another, she asked him out, he chose a steak house, they went for dinner. Joey ordered a big steak, but Beth surpassed him with her 24-ounce ribeye. She’s a little slip of a thing but she plowed right through her entree and then looked around for dessert. Joey was charmed.

This year, Beth added to the story. She went on to describe her first visit to Joey’s extended Italian family. Everyone greeted her warmly. Joey’s father was impressed with her knowledge about college football. But the quality that really charmed his family, according to Beth, was when she got up immediately after dinner and started working on the dishes.

“It was no big deal,” she said. “I mean, of course I helped with the cleanup after my hosts fed me. Everyone does. But I remember it really opened the door for me with Joey’s mom and his three sisters.”

I loved it. Another situation where just letting a person tell her story hands me a narrative gem.

Back in our room, we discussed dishwashing. My BFF wanted Cindy to confront Beth about her unhelpfulness. Not because she thought Cindy would receive satisfaction or wisdom, but because she figured it would make an interesting next chapter.

I contended that Cindy’s locked into her own viewpoint – didn’t we also hear her complaints about Lloyd’s “crazy” sister and about her own estranged stepchildren? – In all cases, Cindy “knocks herself out” doing for others, and reaps nothing but ingratitude in response. Personally, I think my BFF wanted Cindy to speak up because that’s work my BFF is doing herself, with her therapist, and she may have tunnel vision about it.

I suggested that we let Cindy know how Beth charmed her future in-laws. Perhaps Cindy would notice that Beth isn’t socially deficient about dishwashing. Which means maybe Beth didn’t offer to help because she was having a terrible time and indulging in a little passive aggression. Then again, maybe Beth told us her dishwashing story because she’s been carrying the subject around, unresolved and subconsciously rued, since July.

Finally, I stayed silent too. I listened to my BFF when she opined that attempting to enlighten Cindy wasn’t going to help either her or Beth. And the fact is, I’m as into attempted enlightenment (my work) as my BFF is into speaking her mind.

Two days later we bid fond goodbyes to our resort friends. We couldn’t help but notice that nobody asked anyone else if she, he or they would be returning next year.

Mom is 90 and she hasn’t a tremor in her limbs. Her mind is still sharp and her memory is as good as ever. She complains about all the meds, but there are only nine (and as far as I can tell, none of them are crucial). I hope to age as well.

That’s not to say she’s easy. My mother is as judgmental and impatient and harsh as ever. She’s been without Dad’s filtering for a decade now, and she’s experienced what appears to be the condensation of old age, when personalities become more concentrated and inward-facing. So she can be tiresome, petulant, obnoxious, and simultaneously caustic and cold. She tests my patience.

She still travels. She takes a tour once or twice a year. Her companion is dear old Gussie, whose late husband was Dad’s closest friend. The two couples were close throughout their prime, and the widows now reside in the same retirement complex. Mom and Gussie eat dinner together (with selected others) three times a week at their residence, and they are each other’s regular date for Sunday night, when the place doesn’t serve a meal.

Every time they return from a tour, Mom declares that it’s the last one she’s going to take with Gussie. She doesn’t mean it in an enduring way; she always comes around and agrees to the next tour plan, but she loads my ears with Gussie-complaints. It’s like when she used to say “never again” after my ex-patriate brother (and family) would visit for a month in the summer, throwing towels on the floor and otherwise abusing her hospitality. And then she’d open her home to them again the next year, for the same sort of visit.

Mom complains about Gussie’s tardiness (“I have to tell her we need to be somewhere half an hour before we really do, or we’d be late all the time”), her memory loss (“I can’t believe how often I have to remind her about things we’ve already discussed”), and her hearing (“It’s getting to where I have to do all the talking, make all the arrangements, for both of us”).

I know. I know. Harsh complaints. I’ve worked with some disabled individuals in my time, and have experienced the inconvenience. I had to open all doors, carry most stuff, slow down, and/or do all the talking to others. Yes, it’s a bit of a drag. But it’s nothing compared to what the individual endures all the time. And it’s just not okay to express the complaint. But Mom doesn’t suppress herself. She subscribes to the philosophy that if she feels love in her heart (or an absence of ill-will), then it’s okay to say whatever enters her mind.

I don’t think she’s complained to Gussie. Even with the hearing loss, Gussie may have overheard.

But that’s not the idea I had last week, right before the old women left on a tour of eastern Canadian cities, Mom asserting that this would be the last time with Gussie. No, my penetrating glimpse into the obvious went something like this: Mom talks like she’s the only one with a problem in the relationship. Mom doesn’t seem to imagine that Gussie might find her an imperfect travel companion. Why is Mom so aware of her own complaints and deaf, dumb, blind, and unimaginative about any complaints Gussie might have about her?

Really. My mother is hard to take. She’s abrupt and judgmental. She uses words like “nonsense” and “stupid” just like my son-in-law uses “shit:” as a catch-all from a vocabulary-challenged individual. At best, Mom collects compliments about how good she looks for her age, how much she just accomplished, and what a character she is. She notes those. She never catches the facial and verbal expressions about her cruelty.

So, yeah, I’m sure Gussie has her issues with Mom. But I can also generalize the chemistry. I’ll bet that the combination of respect, contempt, love and disapproval I feel for my son-in-law is mirrored in his feelings about me. I’m sure my brother, who irritates me weekly, is just as frustrated by me as I am by him. I’m developing a theory.

We humans have more than five senses. We own a sense of place: where the body is positioned relative to surfaces and itself. And we have a nonverbal sense about others. We know when someone is staring at us across a room. We can tell when someone on a bus is reading over our shoulder from two rows back. I submit that we can read another’s emotional reaction to us, and that encourages us to respond in kind.

I decided to share my theory with my best friend Cass. She has issues with her brother-in-law. His name is Jeff and he’s been married to Cass’s sister for almost 40 years. Jeff and Cass have a decent relationship. He’s a good man. Cass “loves him to pieces, but…” he drives her nuts. She says he’s a know-it-all. She complains that he condescends to her. A couple of weeks ago, when she and he and her sister were hosting a visiting cousin, Cass says she tried to advise Jeff about a driving route. They were traveling through her part of Oakland, where there’s been all kinds of recent road work, and from the back seat she tried to tell Jeff which street to take. At first he acknowledged her words and may even have been listening. When he didn’t make the lane change she expected, she reiterated her advice. Cass says he snapped at her.

It hurt her feelings. She even commented to her sister and cousin, when they arrived at the restaurant and Jeff was parking the car, apologizing for causing tension, and both women reassured her, saying Jeff had been an asshole. That’s how she told me the story.

So the other afternoon, when we were walking across campus to our favorite bistro, I described Mom’s complaints with Gussie, and my theory about mutual contempt. Cass stopped walking. She looked at me with shining eyes (but that may have been her new, post-cataract lenses) and said, “That’s brilliant. You’re really onto something. Of course Gussie has complaints too.”

Then I tried to bring it home. I conjectured that my brother Gary has as many issues with me as I have with him. Then I said I’ll bet my son-in-law’s attitude toward me mirrors mine toward him. And I likened her relationship with Jeff to mine with my son-in-law. “I’ll bet Jeff feels a mixture of love and resentment toward you,” I offered. She agreed. I stepped further into it.

“I want to tell you something.” I said. “You know how much my brother Gary loves you. You guys get along great and he really enjoys spending time with you.” She nodded. “Well, I have to say: Gary has complained to me about your back-seat driving.”

“What?!”

“No. Really. Gary’s a good driver. But I’ve been in the car when you have gasped at a lane change from the back seat. Or recommended a route when he knows the roads better than you. It’s like if you gave me advice about how to write a sonnet. Surreal.”

“Wow.” Cass took a breath as we walked. “I never realized.”

“Yeah. So I’m guessing Jeff was annoyed when you suggested a driving route.”

“But my sister and cousin…”

“I know. They backed you up. Privately. I think that was the only way they could respond to your ‘apology.’”

She got it. I could tell Cass was listening.

I was satisfied. I liked it that she understood and agreed with the theory. But I was mostly proud of the way I delivered the message. I’m learning that the direct approach rarely works. It’s like bopping someone over the head with logic. Couching the subject in the anecdote about Mom got Cass in a narrative mood. Encouraged her to leave her ego out of the discussion. Made room for her to learn.

She got the message, but not the manner. Last night we met for a quick dinner in a local café and she told me about her interaction with Jeff, the day before.

Her sister is away at a spa, with girlfriends. Cass took Jeff out to lunch for his birthday. As they were enjoying coffee and shared cheesecake, she opened the subject.

“You know I love you,” she began, and I’ll bet he felt a little stab of apprehension, because no one starts a happy conversation that way. “But there’s no denying I get snippy with you sometimes. I don’t know what it is, but you can really push my buttons. And I know that you get annoyed with me at least as often as I do with you. It’s a mutual thing. I can’t tell you how to feel. But I want to say that I’d like to put that annoyance stuff behind me. Behind us. I think it’s time we acknowledged that we can each get on the other’s nerves, and found a way to stop it. Or at least laugh when it happens.”

Of course he agreed. According to Cass he appreciated her taking the initiative. She says they enjoyed the rest of their time together (a 15 minute drive to her place). She feels quite satisfied that she spoke up and cleared the air.

But I wonder. My BFF tends to grab the bull by the horns sometimes, and be so direct she’s almost in his face. She’s been known to speak with such assertiveness she’s been called draconian. I wonder if that’s one of the buttons she pushes on Jeff. He may just have had an ironic experience.

I’m not proposing indirectness, exactly. But the older I get, the more I appreciate suggestion instead of statement. And the more I notice how much everybody likes a story. If a point can be made with narrative, it tends to stick.