Goods

I’m having a good day. First, The New Yorkers came. I get two copies every week because my wife and I had our own subscriptions.

When we were first married, I would sometimes look for my New Yorker and find it on her nightstand and sometimes not find it at all until she showed up to tell me where it was. We had reached one of those stages in a marriage when, unbeknownst to the parties involved, something big was about to happen. Actually, it was unbeknownst to Janice and knownst to me.

I was an only child, and once an only child, always an only child. It doesn’t seem to be something I’ll outgrow, like an allergy. Although I don’t usually mind sharing my toys, and I can too play well with others, I want my New Yorker when I want it and wherever I put it last. I’ll share money and food and most other things, but leave my magazine alone, except for Janice.

At that point in our relationship and my life I wasn’t gonna tell my mate to keep her mitts off my mag. I was 45 or -6 and still not mature enough to tell her no. Like diamonds, retardation is forever, as are mates, so I bought my wife her own subscription.

The New Yorker’s arrival makes for a good day because I know I’ll find something good to read—quite possibly something to laugh at, at least the cartoons—and I’m reminded of other useful things I did with and for Janice, which suggests that her life with me maybe wasn’t unending misery and I just didn’t know the difference.

A good thing about winter in our house is that the walnut tree is bare and the sun is low enough to get under the roof overhang, so the back rooms get direct sun, which doesn’t happen in other seasons except for a few minutes just after daybreak. I can actually lie on my bed in full sun and about 10 ayem that’s what I’ll be doing.

Meanwhile I’ve got a jalapeño-cheddar bialy waiting for me, and the little chocolate things Jeannie sent from Minneapolis are killer, melt in your mouth and caress it on the way out. Outside it’s rainy, windy, and Chico-cold, a perfect time to be inside.

I’m grateful for all this comfort—no fear to speak of and not a figurative cloud in sight. I have pleasant memories, positive expectations, and warmth on command. I’m even grateful for PG&E.