A few days later, Wendell invited me to lunch.
He said he wanted me to see how much he'd finished.
I told him I could bring sandwiches.
He said he'd already bought food.
I asked what kind.
"Food you can eat," he replied.
I laughed.
"That narrows it down."
We drove out separately again.
By the time I arrived, the garage was open, but the radio was turned down low.
The ramp had been swept clean.
Wendell stood near the workbench, putting his tools into a metal box.
"You're early," he said.
"You're the one who invited me."
"I know. I was hoping to have the garage tidied before you got here."
I looked around.
It was neater than my own kitchen drawer.
"You could have fooled me."
He grinned.
I walked up the ramp without holding the rail very tightly.
My knees were aching that morning, but the slope made the walk easier.
I didn't tell Wendell.
He had enough to worry about without measuring every step I took.
Inside, he'd set out sandwiches, sliced tomatoes, and a bowl of potato salad.
The yellow bowl sat near the window.
I smiled when I saw it.
"That thing is becoming part of the furniture."
"I thought you'd like that."
I put my purse on a chair.
We ate at the kitchen table.
He told me he'd finished most of the work near the entrance and was checking the final measurements.
I asked whether he planned to paint the ramp.
"Not yet," he said. "I want to make sure everything's right first."
"That's sensible."
He looked pleased.
I had spent thirty-four years working with people who were frightened, confused, or in pain.
I knew what it meant to have somebody take their time rather than rush through a job.
Wendell had put that same care into the ramp.
After lunch, he showed me the last section he was working on.
He had marked a few places in pencil and was checking the distance between the rails.
I watched him measure.
"How did you learn to do all this?"
"My father taught me some things. The rest I learned by making mistakes."
"That's how most people learn."
He smiled.
I leaned against the doorway.
"Did you always like working with your hands?"
"Most of my life."
He explained that the electric co-op had required him to learn how to solve practical problems under pressure.
A mistake could be dangerous.
You had to pay attention.
You had to check your work.
You couldn't just decide something looked good and walk away.
I looked at the ramp.
"That explains a lot."
He glanced at me.
"What does?"
"Why you keep measuring the same thing."
He laughed.
I watched him put the tape measure away.
There was something comforting about seeing a person care about a task without needing an audience.
I had spent too many years watching people promise things they never finished.
Dwight had been one of them sometimes.
That didn't make him a bad husband.
He'd worked hard, loved his family, and done his best with what he had.
But life had a way of leaving unfinished jobs behind.
Wendell seemed determined not to leave this one unfinished.
We returned to the kitchen.
I washed my hands, then reached for a dish towel.
He took it from me.
"I'll get that."
"I can dry a dish, Wendell."
"I know you can."
He handed it back.
I laughed.
We washed the lunch dishes together.
Then we sat by the window with coffee.
I looked at the yellow bowl again.
"Can I ask you something?"
"Sure."
"When you first heard me talk about my mother's kitchen, why did you remember it so carefully?"
He rested his cup on the table.
"I don't know that I can explain it."
"Try."
He considered the question.
"You talked about her like you could still see the whole room."
I looked down.
"Maybe I could."
"You remembered the color. The table. The light coming through the window."
He paused.
"I liked hearing you talk about something that made you happy."
That answer settled into me quietly.
I had spent a long time thinking of my stories as things I told because I missed the past.
I hadn't realized that somebody else might hear them as a way of knowing me.
Wendell wasn't trying to bring my mother back.
He wasn't trying to rescue me from grief.
He was paying attention to the person sitting across from him.
There was a difference.
I reached for my cup.
"I suppose I talk about her more than I realize."
"Not too much."
I smiled.
We sat there for a while.
Then he asked if I wanted to see the little garden patch behind the house.
I followed him outside.
There wasn't much planted yet.
A few rows had been cleared, and the soil looked freshly turned.
He showed me where he planned to put tomatoes in the spring.
I told him tomatoes needed plenty of sun.
He said he knew.
I told him that knowing and doing weren't always the same thing.
He laughed.
I liked that I could disagree with him without worrying that the whole afternoon would fall apart.
We were two older people figuring out how to share our lives without taking over each other's.
That was new to me.
When I left, Wendell walked me to the car.
I stood beside the driver's door and looked back at the house.
"Thank you for inviting me."
He smiled.
"You're welcome here."
I believed him.
On the way home, I stopped at the grocery store.
I bought milk, bread, and a small bunch of yellow flowers.
I hadn't bought flowers for myself in months.
When I got home, I put them in a glass jar on the kitchen table.
Then I stood back and looked at them.
They weren't expensive.
They weren't a gift from anybody.
They were simply something I wanted.
That evening, Megan called.
She asked how things were going.
I told her about the lunch, the garden, and the yellow bowl.
She listened, then said, "You sound happy, Mama."
I looked at the flowers.
"I think I am."
"Good."
There was no warning in her voice this time.
No reminder about lonely people.
Just a daughter speaking to her mother.
We talked about the grandchildren and her plans for the next holiday.
When we hung up, I went to the living room.
Dwight's recliner sat beside the window.
I touched the armrest.
I missed him.
I would always miss him.
But missing him didn't mean I had to keep every part of my life exactly as it had been when he was alive.
I sat down.
The yellow flowers were visible through the doorway.
For the first time in a long while, the house felt like somewhere I was living rather than somewhere I was waiting.
Click here to continue reading: PART 11: My Daughter Came to Visit, and I Discovered That Even the People Who Loved Me Most Had Confused My Grief With Weakness
My Husband Had Been Gone Two Years, but the First Man Who Made Me Feel Alive Again Had Something He Wouldn’t Explain
Part 10 of 24
