Finish of the first day

Day one cont.

We got back to Laura's house in the early evening, where she showed me her home. It was marvellously eclectic, with surprises everywhere...yet it all seemed to work. For example, she has live fish on the wall in bubbles in the bathroom (a half-bath attached to a whole bath--first time I had seen that arrangement.) In the room where I slept, she had put up pictures that spoke to her - hundreds of them in no particular order except to her. Tons of books, just like me, arranged in a fashion that made sense to her but without her telling how she had sorted them, I never would have guessed it. She had a lemon tree, an orange bush, and other flowering trees in her backyard, along with a pool that was being used by the neighborhood frog for a dating site. All of these touches made for an artistic, flowing sense to her home. Even on my last day, I kept finding artistic things or influences that I had not noticed before -- and I have a good eye for detail. There were Chinese influences with Mayan and Modern Art. There were lots of plants, growing or not growing-- her motto on that "Only the strongest survive..." Yet, I did not feel out of place in her home. She told me later, that Abigail,my other daughter, was the first overnight guest and I, the only more than one night guest they had ever had. They are jealous over their privacy and basically never invited anyone there before. I feel honored that they trusted me enough to let me in. I tried to be a good guest and respect their space...but there were a couple of misteps that I will mention later.

Her house is about the size of mine, 1600 sq. feet, but I was astonished to learn that they bought it for about half a million dollars. That they had managed to purchase for less than the owner had wanted due to the whole housing bubble bursting. Wow. Our home is worth about 70,000 so houses in CA are about 10 times what they cost here. Ouch! How does anyone afford to buy a home? If Laura's husband not had a trust fund from his father, they would not have been able to do so either.

Laura was concerned that my being there would disrupt her sleep routine, and told me how fragile it was, and how necessary to her work. Yet very easy to get off track, and how hard to get back on it. (I am exactly the same, so I did understand. I am just lucky that I work at home so it doesn't matter when I sleep, nor does my boss care when I start work.) So her plan was to have me stay the first night, then put me up in a hotel for 3 nights, then back at her house for the rest of the visit. But this plan was not able to happen because her brother was suppose to help her with the reservations and he went incommunicado after the second day of talking with her about it.

I promised her that I would not try to keep her awake past her bedtime and to respect Trent's gaming time on the sofa (another concern of hers) as well as the winding down period that she needed before bedtime in order to get ready for bed. For the most part, all that was successful. I had to tell her three times the first night to 'go to bed', even though she still wanted to chat--and because I did that, she felt like I could stay and not be a disturbance, so I ended up staying all the nights with her. There was also a plan for me to rent a car, but that wasn't needed either, which gave me money to do other things with later in the week.

We had a funny conversation that first night, where she said, "do you remember where you said you wanted to wait until you came before you bought us gifts...?" I said, "yes." She goes, "I know what I want, if you are willing, I want to get a tattoo." I told her that if I did not have to pay for the motel or for the rental car, I would have more money for things like tattoos..." And I left it at that, because we had already broached the subject of my possibly not having to get a motel room. I had never been asked for a donation to a tatoo fund before...

Oh, Laci. I completely forgot about her. I am not crazy about dogs in general. I get to like dogs after a while, after I get to know them. Laci was a rescue dog that Laura and Trent had adopted and after a year still had a lot of fear issues that they had been working with her about. A mutt with Labrador influences, white all over except for two lines of eyeliner black around her eyes, 50 pounds maybe, and a little over knee high, she was a beautiful dog. Would act friendly towards newcomers, but if you reached to pet her, she would suddenly become a barking, fearsome beast. Laura would have to dominate her to get her to quiet down (The dog whisperer is her hero) and then Laci would be okay as long as you ignore her completely. She barked at me a little the first night, and after that, only if I startled her unexpectedly. By the last day, she was allowing me to pet her for longer and longer periods. Giving her multiple pizza and cheese crusts helped quite a bit with the process, which she'd take delicately out of my hand. On the next to the last day, Laura had to tell me that Laci had stolen one of my uh, used, undies...and that she had found it gnawed on in Laci's dog bed. After that, Laci treated me as one of the pack.

I told Laura later, that she could have just trashed the underwear and I never would have known the difference... Maybe, by next year, when my embarrassment has faded a little, I'll find the story funnier. Well, actually, it is a funny story *now.* Except, I wish it had happened to someone else....

More to come.