The Look

One of my grandchildren has this particular expression that arranges itself on her face when I ask her to do something she really doesn't want to do. She is doing her best to be polite, while at the same time refusing my request. I see it most often in food related situations. Like when I prepare a snack or meal that includes, say, cheese. Then I get The Look.

Now she loves mac-n-cheese, if it comes from a box and not

from a casserole dish. And she loves Cheetos. She

insists they contain NO cheese whatsoever, in spite of their name.

Anyway, she gets this look that I have finally learned to read. And today I discovered that there must be a genetic component to such looks. Because today I recognized it on the larger, older, male version of a face. I've seen it on said face before, but not until today did the link occur in my mind. My grandchild inherited The Look from none other than National Asset himself.

The Asset has been incredibly busy for about as long as I can remember, but especially the last year or so. He spends most of his waking hours in his newly repaired office on the second floor of Sanctuary. He plans to build out various work stations for stuff like ham radio and genealogy and his other interests. And for his work work, of course. But since he has been personifying Busyness itself, he is making do with the wooden desk he used while we inhabited the Little House, a white folding table, and two ancient 2-drawer file cabinets that were rescued from a thrift store. I did force him to go to an office supply store one day to pick out a decent desk chair so he can at least sit comfortably. Oh, and he has a lawyer style bookcase, also a thrift store find.

Now, picture him in his man-cave/office. To ensure he has adequate fuel for his national treasure type brain, I bring him food at regular intervals. Somehow, in the rebuilding of Sanctuary we ended up with this unusual closet that doubles as a secret passage way. At least that is how I refer to it. It sounds so much more, well, interesting than 'telco closet', as he calls it. I open this average looking closet door in our bedroom, step into the 'telco' part that has about 300 wires hanging down from the attic above, open another door (which did not exist prior to the flood) and voila! I hand him his food laden tray. 

There is another door, a very normal type of door, into his office, of course. But I prefer to use this method so I will not be seen by all of his co-workers on the video teleconference. They have their backs to me, so to speak, when I use the secret passageway, aka telco closet.

So today I'm catching up on general paperwork.  I work down my pile and get to the renewal form for vehicle insurance. It says SECOND REQUEST on the top. I need to get the odometer readings for the two vehicles that have been living at Sanctuary since the flood. One is easy. The other is not.

Our camping van is happily housed in an over-sized garage that fits it like a glove. This garage was one of the amazing features that helped convince us that this unique, on-the-market-for-a-very-long-time property was meant for us. But today, as tends to happen when the van has been idle for some time, the battery is dead.

I go upstairs, quietly enter the secret passageway, and wait to be acknowledged by the Asset, who is (as always) in a conference. He presses the mute button, indicating that I may now speak. I quietly say that I am working on the SECOND REQUEST for odometer readings and we have a dead battery. 

That's when it comes. The Look. 

And it clicks. It is the please don't make me eat cheese look. 

Maybe because he really is a treasure, or, just possibly because I have some kind of look on my face that communicates I'm not leaving the secret passageway unless you come too, he came.

We rummaged in the big garage, found the battery charger, and I should have the SECOND REQUEST filled by end of day. Voila!

The List

Today we replaced one of the pieces of furniture we lost in the flood. It has been a year since those twisty old pipes burst up in the ceiling of Sanctuary, and almost exactly a year since it was discovered and we made the long, sad drive up to see it for ourselves. Not an anniversary to celebrate, really, but I am very glad to be on this side of it.

I have been working away at The List. It is this wrinkled up scrap of paper I carry with me almost everywhere I go. It contains the names of the items that were lost and need to be replaced. Things that we have already found are crossed through with yellow and orange highlighter.

The remaining items on The List are things that, for one reason or another, we have not yet found. I know, I know. I thought we’d have gotten this taken care of much quicker, too. This should be one of the good parts of this whole experience, right? But for nine months, while the big house was under repair, we just didn’t have any room to store large items, and saw no point in purchasing them just to put in a rented storage unit or something. For most other things, we had to wait until they were returned to us from the warehouse so we could see with our own eyes what we could salvage and what we couldn’t.

The List is pretty much down to the few remaining electronic items that National Asset doesn’t trust me to pick out on my own and he hasn’t had the time to shop for, and the eclectic things we bought one by one over the course of a few years. You know, the one-of-a-kind treasures you come across at a yard sale, or in a thrift store on 50%-off-day, or occasionally even in an antique store. The kind of things you just can’t find on Amazon.com, and wouldn’t trust to buy anywhere, really, without turning it over and running your hand over the wood.

I have been looking. Honest. And I’ve just had to resign myself to the fact that I probably won’t be finding a 1930’s wooden cabinet for storing games that matches Grandpa’s old radio/record player. Or the antique padded stool Ron gave me for Christmas that just fit me perfectly. These serendipitous things are both hard to lose and hard to find.

Over the holidays we did some browsing with our kids and grandkids. Upstairs in a Nevada City antique store, Ron and I were checking out a dining table. Uncle Ray and Aunt Jo had passed on a wonderful, 40-something-year-old table that was large enough to fit our whole family. We worked puzzles and played games on it, and had one Christmas dinner around it. Then we found it standing in water, covered with wet, moldy insulation and drywall from the ceiling above and we couldn’t save it.

So I am on my knees, looking under this antique table to see how many extensions it has and how they work, when Ginny says: Too grand!!

I think it is an odd phrase for her to use, but reply: You think it’s too nice for Sanctuary? I think it would look fine…

Ginny: But for two grand! You could get a great handmade wooden table for two grand!

I giggle.  Nope, you can’t. I already did some research on that…

We have scoured thrift stores, antique stores, and today lined up with a small contingent to be the first at a couple of estate sales. Nada.

So I tried one more thrift-estate-sale-leftovers store. And I found a piece, an old, well-loved wooden cabinet. It doesn’t really look like any of the three on my list that I’m trying to replace. But it does look like us. And I think that will do.

Only nine things left to highlight on The List.