Wednesday June 10th, 2015

The exercise:

Write about: the fixer upper.

This morning I weeded one of our sections of carrots and then I used the rototiller to clean up the paths between several rows of plantings. It was glorious to do something other than pick strawberries.

Oh, and then I picked two more pints of strawberries for a customer who was coming by this afternoon.

Because of course I did.

Tomorrow though! Tomorrow I shall pick no strawberries.

Rebecca got off to a late start today, as her parents home flooded this morning. She stuck around to help out and do some plumbing (sounds like we've got a handywoman around the farm for the next while - I could get used to that) and then she hit the road. She didn't arrive until just after dark (she was dropping a friend off in Penticton and stayed to visit for a bit), but she did at last arrive.

Hurray!

Mine:

"So... what do you think?" The real estate agent gave us her best smile and flourished her arm with an ease and grace which spoke to countless hours of practice in front of her bathroom mirror.

"Of the house?" I asked. Other reasonable options: of her, of the choices we'd made in our lives to reach that place and time, and of our chances of escaping with our sanity still intact.

"Yes, silly! Of course the house!" She laughed then. I was reminded of girls in my high school that laughed like that. I hated them all.

"Well, where should I begin?" It was an honest question, as it was difficult for me to pinpoint a starting point in that mess. Thankfully my wife was more prepared for the occasion.

"Maybe the hole on that wall, where I would assume a safe was once located?"

"Oh, that..."

"Or perhaps the pile of ash in the corner which, if I had to guess, was where they piled up all the furniture in the house and burned it. You know, judging by the smoke stains in that area."

"Nothing a good-"

"No, no. Let's just start with the man in the leg cast, who utterly reeks of booze, sleeping on the mattress in the middle of the kitchen?"

"Darlings, you did say you were in the market for a fixer upper, didn't you?"