Cantankerously Yours

More Closet Space. Sort of.

By Wendell Abern

Dear Readers,

Prologue:

I became a widower in 2009, and was fortunate to have wonderful kids around to help me through the ordeal.

My daughter Amy, the family’s heir apparent to feminine fashion, stayed around for a week or so to help me sort through my wife’s wardrobe. Amy kept some things, and we brought the rest to Goodwill.

It took me more than a year to sort out everything in the condo, throwing out some items, keeping others and – operating strictly on whims – rearranging sundry chochkes and other bric-a-brac.

Suddenly, I realized what all of my efforts had provided:  lots of closet space!

Then, after two years, I met a snowbird named Nancy.

Chapter One: Nancy.

Nancy, it turns out, became a wonderful friend and companion. Some delicious dinners out; some I cooked. Movies. And many shopping trips.

Nancy is a world-class shopper.

When she visits, I drop her off on Mondays at the Festival at about eleven in the morning, drive back to Tamarac to play bridge, call her after the bridge game at about four to tell her I’m on my way, and she says, “I’m not through shopping yet!”

Nancy visits two or three times a year. After a few trips, she asked if she could leave some of her clothes here for the next trip.

“Of course!” I said. “No problem!”

I took my suit, my sport jackets and pants and all of my long-sleeved shirts off one rack and put them on another, leaving an entire rack for Nancy.

Then my daughter Amy started visiting twice or so during the winters.

Chapter Two: Amy.

My kids and grandchildren all live in Chicago. As you know, Florida is Valhalla to northerners during the winter. (My son, daughter-in-law and grandkids also visit, but their sojourns here are not relevant to this tale.)

Amy started coming a few times a year shortly after Nancy’s first visit. I hadn’t told her about Nancy.

One day, Amy came out of my closet, holding a nightgown.

“Uh, dad,” she said, I didn’t know you were in to cross-dressing.”

I explained about Nancy.

“And she leaves her clothes here!” Amy said. “What a great idea!”

Before she left, she left some clothes, too – and also asked if I could provide a drawer.

“Of course,” I said.

I scrunched Nancy’s clothes together in the closet, and made room for some of Amy’s dresses and blouses. Then I combined two drawersful of my sweaters and sweat shirts into one, and gave Amy a drawer for cosmetics, hair products and whatever else she wanted to leave here.

Chapter Three: Nancy’s Next Visit.

That year (I think it was 2013), Nancy arrived for her January visit shortly after Amy had gone home to Chicago.

While she was unpacking, she asked, “Can you spare a drawer for me? I have a lot of cosmetics and stuff, and a drawer of my own would really help.”

“Sure,” I said. I emptied my drawer of sweat shirts and other heavy shirts, and hung them in the back closet. When I returned to the bedroom, Nancy was holding up a bra.

With a frown, she said, “This isn’t my size.”

“Oh, that,” I said. “Amy left it here. My daughter.”

“Your daughter.”

“Yes. Remember? She has dresses and blouses hanging next to yours. She just left. I gave her a drawer, too.”

“Uh huh. Your daughter.”

Then, while cramming moisturizers and conditioners into her new drawer. Nancy mumbled (thinking I didn’t hear her), “She certainly is well-endowed.”

Chapter Four:  Amy’s next visit.

Whenever Amy comes, she insists on playing Boggle. For the uninitiated, Boggle is a word game, played with dice that have letters on each face instead of dots. You shake the letters into a tray, then make words out of the letters facing upwards.

I happen to be outstanding at this game. On this particular visit, we played fifteen games and I won one. One! 

I am not a good loser.

“Okay,” I said, “you choose. Do you want to give up your drawer or your closet space?”

“Dad, c’mon. It’s just a game.”

I sputtered. And fumed. She finally talked me into letting her keep her drawer and closet space.

But I wrote her out of the will.

Chapter Five:  Nancy’s Next Visit.

Spring, 2014. Balmy skies. Warm, gentle breezes. Temp in the 80s every day.

Perfect weather for Nancy to go Christmas shopping.

“But it’s only May!” I said.

“I know. I like to get most of my Christmas shopping done before summer.”

“When it comes to obsessive compulsiveness, you’ve just raised the bar.”

The only problem Nancy had with all the Christmas gifts she bought that year was she didn’t want to take them back home with her. She promised to pick them up during her next visit in early December.

Needing a place to store these, I carried all of my shoes into my back closet and put them on shelves next to computer paper. Then, we jammed Nancy’s gifts onto my closet floor as carefully as possible.

She did retrieve them during her December visit, but Amy returned two weeks after Nancy had gone home, and claimed the closet floor for boots and other winter footware, including soft, warm slippers featuring a cat’s face.

Epilogue.

Today, my suit, jackets and pants are crammed together tightly because I recently had to make room on my rack for new dresses and outfits that won’t fit on Nancy’s; I can’t ever remember which closet I decided to keep my shoes in because I’ve shifted them around so many times, and I’ve lost track of where my sweaters are.

Fortunately, however, since I now live alone … I have plenty of closet space.

Cantankerously Yours,

Wendell Abern