Can You Grab Me a Cold One? 7/7/09

It’s hot outside. I’m raking granite baserock away from the house to create a level bed for a flagstone patio, digging out rock hard clay to make a walkway to the garden. I put the sprinkler on and let the water soak down into the dry adobe so that it’s easier to dig. It’s late morning. The sun beats down on me. My t-shirt is wet with perspiration.

I stop digging, lean the shovel against the stucco wall of the house and walk over to the sliding glass patio door. I have a small bottle of mineral water sitting on the door jam and every few minutes I stop raking and digging and take a drink. This time when I pick up the glass bottle, it’s empty. I look down at my shoes. They’re caked with mud.

Inside the house, I can hear someone in the kitchen moving things around inside the refrigerator. Its probably Ella. She’s old. I’d ask her to get me a full bottle of water, but its easier to take off my mud-caked shoes, go in the house, and get it myself. The refrigerator door closes. I hear footsteps, and I wait to see who appears. In a moment, Morgan steps across the kitchen, places a package of sliced meat, a package of sliced cheese, and a bottle of mustard on the counter beside the sink, and then takes a loaf of bread from the cupboard.

I’m glad its not Ella. I won’t have to take of my shoes and go inside. I reach through the open sliding glass door and hold the small empty bottle in front of me at arms length.

“Hey Morgan, can you grab me a cold one?”

He turns and looks at me.

“I’m not your slave,” he says, turns away, and begins making a sandwich.

I’m stunned. I lean into the family room through the open patio door and watch as he methodically spreads mustard, removes thin slices of turkey and cheese from plastic bags and places them between slices of bread.

My pulse surges. I imagine throwing the empty bottle across the family room and smashing it against the cabinets above his head in the corner of the kitchen. I don’t. He’ll get the water for me when he finishes making the sandwich. That won’t make it good but it won’t be as bad. I stand outside waiting silently, watching as he finishes making the sandwich and puts the bags of turkey and cheese, and the bottle of mustard back inside the refrigerator. I hear the refrigerator door close. If he doesn’t get the water for me, I’m just going to stand here and watch him eat, but he waks passed the dining room table and leaves the room without saying anything.

Anger, flashing lights, contracting muscles, constricting airways, pulse racing. I take off my mud caked shoes, step into the house, walk across the family room, go to the kitchen, open the refrigerator, take out a bottle of water, and go looking for Morgan.

I need to get control of myself. Don’t say anything caustic, anything I would regret, but I need to confront him, to hold him accountable.

I look in the front bedroom. Matt is folding his shirts but Morgan’s not there. I walk down the hallway to our bedroom expecting to find him sitting at the computer. He’s not there. I turn around. I see the door to Caitlin’s room is partially closed. Caitlin isn’t home. When she isn’t home, the door is always open. I look through the small crack in the doorway and see Morgan sitting on the edge of her bed. His back is toward me. He’s looking out the window and eating his sandwich.

I go in and silently sit down on the floor in the corner of the room at the foot of the bed. He continues to look out the window eating his sandwich. I watch him. We sit for a long time without saying anything.

I breathe deeply. I have myself under control. My heart rate begins to drop. I think about what to say. Don’t be critical. Don’t be judgmental. Don’t lecture.

“In my world the norm is that when someone asks someone else for a small favor and the person complies with that request, it doesn’t make that person a slave. It’s just a small act of compassion and kindness.”

He keeps eating his sandwich. I watch, and wait, and then continue.

“Apparently, in your world, complying with a small request for help from someone is somehow degrading.”

“You know that, huh?”

“I only know what I see and hear.”

I think about what to say next and add. “If there had been a total stranger standing in the kitchen, and I asked him to get me a glass of water, and he said what you said to me I would have been shocked and insulted.”

He says nothing. He never says anything. I’m not going to let him of the hook. I can sit here longer than he can. He’s uncomfortable. He only has three choices. Talk to me, sit here for hours, or get up and leave. I can sit here.

“I need a response.”

He sits silently. He finishes his sandwich. Time passes. Every few minutes I look up at him. His eyes are red and swollen.

Finally he says, “You don’t need a high powered screwdriver to build a fence. You don’t need stream conditions to be perfect before you can go fishing,” and then he stops.

These are references to things I’ve said within the passed few days. The first refers to the fact that yesterday was my birthday, that I got some money from Ella and my mother, and that I said I might use it to buy a power screwdriver so I could fix the fence. The second refers to the fact that we’ve been talking about going fishing, and that I said we would have to wait awhile because the streams were too high.

So what gives you the right to judge me. I don’t want to wonder if what I do meets you’re standards. I don’t have to. Apparently, your passion for individuality doesn’t apply to anyone but yourself. Who are you to judge me? If anybody judges anybody then its me judging you not the other way around. But I don’t. I avoid judging you. I support everything you do or don’t do. Besides these things, power drills and stream conditions, are so inconsequential, that’s why it’s so alarming. For this you’d refuse to give me a drink of water? How much contempt do you have for me?

“I don’t get it,” I say.

He says nothing.

“Well you can either explain it to me or you can leave it open to my interpretation. I think its in both our best interests if you explain it to me.”

“You can’t buy skill and craftsmanship. Either you can do something or you can’t. And if I thought doing things for people was degrading, or whatever you said, I wouldn’t have taken Mom’s car down to the gas station yesterday and filled it up for her, and I wouldn’t have a stranger in my house anyway and if I did, I wouldn’t ask him for water especially if there was a hose right beside me.

“That doesn’t explain anything to me, Morgan.”

“Well that’s all I have. So I guess you’re just not going to get it.”

He gets up, leaves the room. I stay in the bedroom sitting on the floor in the corner. I can hear him walk down the hallway. I hear Valerie out in the living room.

“Oh, there you are.” she says. “What have you been doing?”

“Bullshitting.”