doodledee

Last Sunday I spent an hour or two racing around the yard in frantic attempt to cross a few fall chores of The List. At some point I noticed this middle-aged couple turn the corner and start walking down our block, but thinking nothing of it, I stayed kneeling in the grass, head down, gutting window boxes with a handheld garden rake.

Suddenly my manly intuition kicked in, and sensing something wasn't quite right, I sideways-peeked at the couple and noticed that the woman was now hurrying across the street, right towards our house. Almost bubbling over, she hopped into our boulevard and blurted out, "Do you remember me?!"

"Uhh, no," I thought, glancing around and taking inventory of my kid.

She presses, "I'm Kathy, the lady who used to live here! I was just in the neighborhood, blah blah blah."

That's when Libby clicked. "Sure, I remember you. How have you been? [other niceties, etc, etc]."

The lady was pleasant enough. She went on for a bit about the observable changes to the house (paint, etc) and asked if we'd done anything to the inside (furnace, etc). She mentioned the horses she keeps at her 'new' country home and she shuffled her feet and kicked at the ground during the awkward silences. The conversation lasted maybe 3 minutes before she and the dude she was with – "he's not the same man I was with when I sold you this house" – headed on down the road.

After they left, I went back to bagging dead geraniums, but I wondered how often that type of thing happens to people. Is there a protocol I should have followed? Should we have invited her in for a tour? I hope not, because I wasn't about to. The whole situation kind of weirded me out. I went over and talked with Commie Mike about it, but he didn't really help.

Ah, well.