The Grand -- If you cut me, I would shine. - the conversation i was having in my head

Real time

clock, originally uploaded by Mrs. Opus.

A little background: One of the interesting things about still living in the Grand--but now with just one boy instead of three other girls--has been finding a way to refer to the time and structure of the relationships when it was the four girls living here. Joie and I had a conversation not too long ago, and it occurred to me that we usually use the shorthand of "the house," as in "I never really thought of that before the house" or "Remember in the house when..." or simply "I miss the house." In every instance "the house" refers probably to the physical place but primarily to the relationships: even though I still live here, I often say "when I was in the house...," meaning when I lived with Brook and Joie and Charity. Jason and I have a slightly different shorthand: he'll say "when you lived here...," meaning, of course, "when you lived here before I did."

The other day Jason was trying to figure out how to change the air filter on the furnace, and finally he asked, "How did you do it when you lived here?" My immediate answer was, "I don't know; Brook probably did it." (Incidentally, he finally figured it out and the real answer must have been "nobody did it," because hoo-boy it was nasty.) And then I got to thinking about how often I answer these questions with "probably Brook": Who bought toilet paper when you lived here? Who changed lightbulbs when you lived here? Who tested the fire alarm (other than cooking disasters) when you lived here? Who changed the electrical outlet from two-prong to three-prong (impressive!). All Brook.

Why the clock: On Tuesday evening Brook, Joie, Alison, and Rebecca came over to celebrate Brook's job change. Toward the end of the night, Brook walked into the kitchen I assumed to put her glass in the sink. It took longer than it should have, though, so I wandered in to see what she was up to. I found her setting the third of my three kitchen clocks back for Daylight Savings Time (I might have gotten to it eventually). Classic Brook! And just one of the gazillion delightful things about her.

One more Brook-related clock story: When Lou and Brook and I lived together, Lou and I would always have our clocks set about five to ten minutes fast, which drove Brook crazy. She finally set the clock to the "right" time and put a big sign above the clock that said "Brook's World," to which our friend Kacy added "has nothing for me, and Brook's world has everything." Funny stuff, and even more so if you catch the reference.

Posted by Renae at November 2, 2006 03:30 PM