writing doodle - it was a dark and stormy night - chiromancer continued

Tuesday nights, I like to catch up on ironing and mending of laundry.  Yes, it speaks of the old poems of my grandmother and great grandmother's generations, each day of the week had its own chores.  But systems make getting things accomplished more efficient.  Besides, very little of my laundry needs to be ironed, but I like looking things over to make sure the seams are in good shape.  I can resew a button or clip the odd thread and I don't like going to put something on and realizing one of the seams has either just given up or is about to.  Sure, if I had a drycleaner, they might handle some of this for me, since most of my wardrobe could be considered to be disposable, it is a moot point.

The last of the pile to be put away was my lingerie, not that most people think of passion killers as lingerie.  I keep a few sentimental things in the bottom of that drawer, I don't display everything I own in the living room.  When I was a girl, it was where I hid my diaries, Christmas presents I was going to give my friends.  Nothing exciting, but private things.  Now the bottom of the drawer contains a couple of bridal magazines and an old cash ledger from the 1940s.  It wasn't like Grady (note to self, change name of Jacob to Grady - overuse of Jacob in a lot of fiction right now) ever opened any of the dresser drawers to do anything except extract his own clean clothes.  Left to his own devices, nothing would ever be put away; I, on the other hand, lived with my grandmother's white glove inspections from the time I was six or seven.  After I moved out, I read a book on Feng Shui, it was so much like living with my grandmother: everything has a place and everything to be in place.

Basically, if I couldn't put it away, I didn't keep it, and this was something I wanted to keep.  

I sniffed the book; it smelled of the lavender sachets I made during a crafty phase.  The olive drab volume was one of the few relics of my great-grandfather's Navy career.  He used ledgers instead of scrapbooks because they were cheaper, slimmer, portable, and wouldn't stand out in his trunk.  He was one of the few married guys who had actually known his wife for more than twenty minutes before the war; most of the other guys married the first girl who said yes after they got drafted.  

This was my favorite of the three ledgers.  This one had pictures from their second honeymoon; the trip resulted in the birth of my grandmother.  It also had pictures he'd sketched of the dream he had for the life they'd make when he finally left military service.

They looked young, happy, and vibrant.  The worst of the wars privations were over and so was the worst of the fear.

I looked into the mirror to see the differences between them then and me now; I looked younger and more naive, they looked wiser.  I credit cosmetics, hair dye, and better lighting.  Despite working two jobs and wondering when Grady would finally commit to a date to marry me, I still didn't feel ready to be in charge of my own destiny.

Would he ever?

A long time ago, Grady's mother, Sylvia, told me that he was someone who wanted everything in his life to be perfect before he got married.

What more did he want?  We carried virtually no debt except for the lease on his car.  He had health insurance through my job.  We already had stuff to more or less furnish a cottage.  I didn't want a big wedding, just one that was legal and wasn't presided over by an Elvis imitator   Well, maybe I'd cave on the Elvis thing if it was young, hot Elvis in black leather.

About six months a month ago, I thought I might go off the pill. An accidental pregnancy might have moved things forward, except Grady periodically monitors the pills left in the pack and when the count was two days off, he flew off the handle.  It wasn't even like we'd had sex more than once or twice a month in the last year.  Like the lottery phrases say:  you can't win if you don't play.  Well, you can't get pregnant if you don't have sex, much.

~~~ insert back story dialog with massive fight ~~~

** author's note ... images are from my FIL's military career ... WWII vet who survived the bombing attack on Pearl Harbor ...