The Old Blog in the Desert

Buddy and I take a walk most mornings. Buddy does the walking, and I do the thinking, which is a fair division of labor since he has four legs and I have doubts.

Our route progresses by a house where a man sits in the mouth of his garage. He is a quiet fellow. When we pass, we exchange the sort of greeting that requires no courage, just a small wave, and sometimes a nod that means nothing in particular.

Yesterday morning, though, things were different.

A small troop of men had gathered around the house, hanging decorations along the porch. One of them was standing on a ladder that behaved like a drunken horse. It leaned first one way, then the other, and the fellow atop it swayed with the kind of determination that suggests a man who has already made peace with gravity.

So I held the ladder.

“Thanks,” he said.

“You’re welcome,” I said, which is what a man says when he has no idea what he has volunteered for.

Being naturally curious and having a dog who refuses to mind his own business, I asked, “What’s going on?”

The fellow climbed down and looked toward the garage where the quiet man usually sits. Then he took me aside and spoke in the tone a man uses when the truth is both sad and delicate.

“The man who lives here lost his wife three years ago,” he said. “Every year, a couple days before the anniversary of her passing, something happens to him. His mind takes a turn. He starts believing she’s away visiting their son and that she’ll be home tomorrow.”

He shrugged.

“So we help him along with it. We decorate the house. Throw a little party. He talks about her all evening like she’s about to walk through the door.”

“And then?” I asked.

“Well,” the man said, “he drinks himself into unconsciousness. We put him to bed. Clean everything up. By morning he’s back to his regular self.”

He clapped me on the shoulder.

“Swing by tonight at seven and see for yourself.”

Now I am not a man who usually attends parties where the guest of honor doesn’t know the party is imaginary, but curiosity is a powerful vice. So at seven sharp, I knocked on the door.

Inside, the place looked cheerful enough to fool a census taker. Music was playing. Decorations hung from the walls. A table carried more food than a man should trust himself with. The quiet neighbor, who normally treats conversation like it’s taxable, was holding court in the middle of the room.

And talk he did.

He spoke about his wife with the enthusiasm of a man describing a sunrise he still sees every morning. She was beautiful, he said. A marvelous cook. The finest homemaker a man ever married. If angels keep house, they probably learned it from her.

The other men listened with the careful attention of doctors standing around a fragile patient. Now and then, someone raised a glass and said something kind about her. It was a gentle performance, and every man there knew his lines.

As the evening wore on, the fellow’s speech began to slur like a river leaving its banks. He leaned when he stood and stood when he ought to have leaned. At last, he tipped clean over and needed help into a chair.

Not long after that, he drifted into sleep.

The room grew quiet.

Without a word, the men lifted him and carried him down the hall to his bed. Then the real operation began. Decorations vanished, food disappeared into boxes, and the counters got wiped down until the place looked innocent again.

In less time than it takes to regret a haircut, the party had never happened.

The men filed out of the house, and I followed along like a man who had just witnessed a small miracle disguised as housekeeping.

This morning, Buddy and I came along the same route.

The quiet man was sitting in his usual place at the edge of the garage, holding a cup of coffee and looking out at the day like it had just been delivered fresh.

I waved.

He waved back.

And Buddy and I kept on walking, leaving behind the only party I ever attended where the purpose was not to celebrate a memory, but to protect a man from it.