Learning to Love, a Story

We’d finally decided to try living together. We’d been seeing each other for about nine months and it was starting to be a hassle going back and forth from our respective homes, either late night or early morning. The problem now was how to fit in one apartment and yet keep our stuff separate, if we didn’t make it. We owned duplicates of practically everything. Being a solutions person, I suggested we rent one of those self-storage units. “Great idea!” he said and immediately took charge of the matter.

Did I mention that the cohabitation was his idea? You know, now that I think about it, he might have actually suggested that we get married. I think my response was something like, “Let’s take this one step at a time.” Thus we are combining households.

I’m just over 30 and most women my age would be thrilled at a proposal. I mean, I do love him, but I really want my marriage to last. How can I be sure he’s the right one? How does one know? What are the sure-fire signs? He was happy, healthy, handsome and had a good job. “What the heck are you looking for?” asks my friend, Joan. She makes me laugh when she says, “I can’t find a guy to meet my one exacting requirement - that he likes me back.”

My parents had met him and adored him. My step-father, who rarely dished out advice, took me aside one day and said, “He’s a good man. If this relationship doesn’t work out, it’s gonna be on you.”

So, here we are going through our stuff, deciding what to keep, what to sell. The selling on Craigslist was his idea. “We can start saving for a downpayment on a house,” he said. Everything we owned suddenly had a price tag attached to it. He’s not cheap exactly, but he’s definitely conservative with his spending and saving. I’m the opposite. You see what I mean?

My soon to be live-in-boyfriend's car was much newer than mine. Will we keep both cars? His response was that he could easily switch to using transit for work and I could drive his car. “Besides,” he laughed “I’ve been worried about you driving that eggbeater of yours.” The joke being that my beat-up car was powered by an old-fashioned, hand-cranked, rotary eggbeater.

And then we came across the extra window air conditioner. At my workplace people post wanted/for sale notices and I’d happened to notice that someone had posted a request from a needy senior citizen looking for a used air conditioner. The note mentioned that it would be necessary for the donor to deliver and install the air conditioner. I posed this to my boyfriend and saw his brow furrow. “Well, I was hoping we could get a good price for this unit...” “Oh, for goodness sake,” I replied rather crisply “money isn’t everything. He quickly acquiesced. 

One week later on a busy Saturday afternoon my boyfriend carried the air conditioner to Charles' 3rd floor apartment. Charles was about 85 and lived in a small studio crammed with his possessions. Charles showed us the window where he wanted the unit installed. My boyfriend went to work, talking with Charles the whole time. I don’t even remember what they were talking about, only that they occasionally laughed. The reason I don’t remember, is that in the light from the window, my boyfriend began to morph. Remember, I said he was handsome. But now as I watched him lift the air conditioner into place and carefully install it, securing it well to the window frame, he looked different. Was it the sunlight which backlit him, or did he have a halo? I don’t know, but suddenly he looked beatific. Like what I’d picture in my mind that Michael the Archangel might look like. Had I stopped breathing? I shook my head to clear it. Yeah but, there’s his tightfistedness, I thought to myself. I know he wants to buy a house and all, but still...

We were driving home, when he turned to me and said, “Let’s go take a look at our self-storage unit. I bet there’s some more stuff we could give to Charles or somebody in need” 

learning to love, learning to give,

yearning to love, yearning to give...