Marrying George Clooney

our housekeeper, maria, doesn’t call often when we’re away. she doesn’t call because mainly, truthfully i am a worry wort. always have been. if i read that some guy has escaped from prison and is possibly, give or take 7 to 8 hours away from where i live in pennsylvania, honest to goodness, i imagine that he was made his way to my home and is now living there, torturting my cats and eating all my food. not necessarily in that order. so when the cell phone rang and maria said: hey, well, there’s a little problem… i didn’t go to a bright sunny place – i went straight to hell. straight. head first. apparently there was a hideous smell in our house, and it could be, although she was not one hundred percent sure, but could be coming from the oil burner. UGH. this all before boarding a plane, so i had a good 10 hours to imagine the worst. i am not good in situations like this. i imagine the worse, i envision dead animals, i see my house burned to a crisp and my cats hiding, huddling outside, shivering. no food, no love. and now i’m boarding a plane from LAX to Newark, and only one of us has ordered a vegetarian meal. under stress i can eat bad food. ken can not.

long story very short.

our house is coated in soot. dark creepy soot, not heavy coated, but a light dusting like a light black snow. the two cats, bella and lotus, are lightly dusted, where there once was white fur, is now grey fur, where there once was a golden stripe is now a brownish harsh stripe. where i once had white towels i now have grey towels, and i suppose, out of boredom, the cats needed to occupy their time with some activity, so lying face down were three mice. dead. stiff. dark grey.

ken and i cuddled all night. there was a distinct smell hovering. we opened the windows, made emergency phone calls to boiler people, heating people – prank calls to some nasty neighbors as an added throw in – and for a good 6 hours i felt like meryl streep in silkwood. of course, there was no whistle blowing…
but ken was hopeful.
he’s always hopeful when boiler tragedy strikes.

and there’s pretty much the same question, always, in situations like this: me freaking out, he calm and at peace:

“wanna have sex?”

uh. no.