Too good not to share

What follows is from my son-in-law, Jeff, who claims he is too low tech or lazy to blog. It's a great story, too good not to be posted...

By Jeff Tigchelaar

The moral of this story (let’s just get it out of the way at the beginning) is the moral of so many stories: Listen ye to your wife.

I’d just got back from chatting with the lady at the rental office after showing an apartment (which is the worst and hardest part of the job for me – the chatting with the lady in the office, that is) when Jana said, “Why don’t you go back over there with a couple pieces of cake for Sherry (the lady in the office) and Ken.” Ken is the maintenance man. He was out snowblowing. The cake was apple. With caramel frosting.

Since what Jana’d said was technically in the form of a question (I excluded the question mark above to stay true to the inflection/tone), I kept with the format and responded with an answer. “Because…because…I…the cake…so delicious…for me…cake…my…cake…” To which Jana responded, rightly and admirably although at the time to my great chagrin, “Oh just bring them some cake.”

Which I did. Sherry was famished, it turns out. (“How did you know I didn’t have any breakfast!”) And on my way back I crossed paths with a neighbor, Irina, whose husband, Vladimir, died unexpectedly last week at age 47. I hadn’t talked to her since it had happened, mostly because I didn’t know what and when would be appropriate to her situation. It was something I’d been anxious/nervous about. Apparently now was the right time. She was headed to the office to find out who to make the rent check out to. She invited Jana, Charlotte and I over for tea that night.
And all was right with the world.

Epilogue\Addendum:

“Tea,” we learned, apparently means, in some cultures, “tea and vodka.” Irina invited us to the table, upon which sat two majestic see-through bottles, right there next to the salt and pepper, acting casual. I don’t think they’d just been set out, the bottles. It’s where they stayed. Setting out three glasses along with the coffee cake and candy bars, Irina motioned toward the bottles and told us to help ourselves. “Very nice vodka,” she said. “Clean vodka.” (Which meant, of course, “very expensive vodka.”) “Is not impostor. No headache.”
So after saying a toast to Vladimir, we sat and had tea to his memory…

The Moral (guess I couldn’t resist after all):

Maybe it’s not so much Listen to your wife as Do what you know is right, what’s kind, what’s good…. (Or, Listen up – and then act – especially when what you’re being told is any or all of the above. You could be serving a higher need…)