He of Little Faith

I have been basking in the luxury that is summer vacation for nearly a week now. This means I sleep in longer and stay up later than usual (and much later than Alex, the working stiff). Alex found his way to bed around 10 p.m. last night, and I stayed downstairs, glued to My Eroded Spot On The Couch, where I embarked on a new, easier knitting project and watched When In Rome (a stupidly cliche movie about two more beautiful than normal people rejecting, then finding, love, and living happily ever after; yes, a part of me loves the classic chick-flick, but the more powerful, cynical parts of me think it is all so ridiculous, and perpetuates our belief that finding "Mr. Right" solves the rest of our problems. Sometimes, he just brings more problems to the table :) But not my Mr. Right. He neither brings nor solves problems. He just cooks and cuddles - two of my favorite ways to be romanced).

With painstaking concentration I am teaching myself to "slip" a stitch before continuing down the row of regular knit stitches. I hear some people outside shouting. This isn't unusual, in itself. It's just unusual for me because I sleep like a log and snore like a lumberjack and never so much as rustle when my head is on the pillow regardless of what is going on around me. For example, I have slept peacefully curled up on a couch while friends bustled around me, including vacuuming, to get ready for party. I essentially slept all 18 hours during the bus ride from Mendoza to Bariloche, Argentina. And I very nearly slept through neighbors' shouts of "fire, fire, fire" and sirens when a house up the street went down in flames in Tahoe several years ago. So despite my concerted efforts to make a bulky yellow knit cowl, I was aware of the fighting underway just beneath my living room window.

Friendly Male Neighbor: "SUCK MY DICK, BITCH!"

Friendly Female Neighbor: "FUCK YOU, ASSHOLE!"

Friendly Male Neighbor: "WHY DON'T YOU COME OVER HERE, AND I'LL SHOW YOU..."

You get the picture. Lovely manners. And I thought I had the mouth of a sailor.

An hour or so later, I finish the stupid movie and all six rows of my cowl and make my way to bed. After tiptoeing to the bathroom to wash my face and "scrub my incisors," I carefully crawl into bed making extra effort not to wake Alex. He has to wake at 5:15, after all, to ride his bike to work and change the world by teaching Beaverton's less savory teenage population. The least I could do, in my unemployed-couch-surfing-free-loading state, is to let the poor man get a restful night of shuteye. He looks so peaceful curled up with the blankets tangled just around his lower legs. I lean over and kiss him softly on his back. And this small gesture temporarily interrupts his slumber.

His eyes still mostly closed and lips barely articulating his sounds, he grumbles, "Was that you shouting earlier? At the neighbors?"

I do my best to stifle an outburst of laughter. Seriously?!? It crossed your mind that the midnight-shouting-potty-mouth might be YOURS TRULY?!? When do you recall me shouting at strangers? In the middle of the night? Obscenity-laced derisions? No, babe, it wasn't me. I was not down here, below your open bedroom window, yelling at the neighbors, threatening violent sexual acts on them or their mothers.

Not me. I was knitting and watching a rom-com. Sorry to disappoint.