Today's highlight, Reader-friends, was pounding three nails into my office wall. And then hanging frames from them.
This is what constitutes excitement these days — getting art on the walls.
And, sure, partly that's because COVID made a direct hit on our house for the first time since the pandemic began. Our younger son landed a positive test shortly after New Year's, and has been isolating in his room down the hall.
("I've set your lunch/water/at-home-antigen-test just outside your door!" has become our frequent yelling-through-the-door refrain.)
So far, Jay and I are still gloriously virus-free — but since the beast is in our house, we've been avoiding other people and places, too. Thus today's wild-and-crazy hammer-and-nails excitement.
At any rate, what is a lifestyle columnist supposed to write about when the lifestyle is on hold?
Well, this particular columnist is going to tell another throwback Bemidji story. Because that's what I've got, people.
And that story is called:
How My Husband (Kinda-Sorta-Almost) Asked Me Out, Part I
The year is 1994. I was sitting in the Bemidji State University student union between classes, fifth table in on the right. Solo.
Jay was also sitting in the union, at a bigger, round table kitty corner from mine. A bunch of his friends — people I knew or knew of or recognized or wished I knew — had been sitting alongside him, but had scattered for class.
I can't remember what we were wearing, but I can venture an educated guess.
It was February, so Jay was probably in yellow, steel-toed work boots, jeans and an open flannel over a T-shirt. No coat. The flannel may have actually been tied around his waist. Because he was burly like that.
Meanwhile, I was probably in a pair of Sorel hand-me-down boots from my sister (that I still wear to this day — and I do mean, literally, this day), Russell Athletics pants with the nylon shell, and a giant wool sweater with twigs in it that I'd bought from the lady who traveled to colleges selling handmade Ecuadorian sweaters and bags and stuff.
True fact: 95% of BSU's student population wore sweaters that made them look like Ralphie's brother from The Christmas Story, and LOVED it.
Anyway.
There we were, in the union. Dressed like we were. Probably looking in our Franklin Planners and finishing last-minute assignments and eating breadsticks from the Pizza Hut kiosk.
At some point, Jay called over to talk to me. We knew each other enough for some small talk — we had a couple of mutual friends, and we had been to parties at each others' houses.
Wait. Are my kids reading this?
Then what I meant was that we had seen each other studying at the library.
At any rate, we chatted a bit about classes, our friends, what was going on that weekend ... and then that cool cat got up from his table, his flannel flowing in the breeze behind him (it's my memory, and if I want to remember a breezy flannel, I get to remember a breezy flannel, dammit), his long, curly hair shining in the winter sun. And he set a single 5"-by-7" piece of checked, Franklin Planner paper on the table in front of me.
It read: "Jay 751-7108."
"Give me a call if you want to hang out sometime," he said, before walking back to his table to grab his backpack and make his exit.
"I will!" I said.
And then I didn't.
But it was a start.