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One Spring Sunday
Shnnick! I depressed the button on my key ring and my Blazer became a fortress of solitude, capable of keeping all of humanity from violating her sanctity. Well, all but those whose own key ring button was tuned to the same frequency, that is. But, it would have to do. If a thief felt the need to carry hundreds of key ring buttons around the parking lots of America, hoping to steal my John Prine CD’s, well, I guess I’d just have to suffer the loss and notify my insurance agent.
Thus started my yearly odyssey to the Achmed Bernstein Greenhouse, perhaps the only retail establishment in the United States with Farsi and Hebrew checkout stands. Considering the current political climate in the Middle East, the mere fact that the place is still standing gives cause for celebration.
My wife loves this place like no other greenhouse in the area. As we walked from the parking lot, I saw her eyes brighten and a hint of a smile flash across the permafrost of her lips. I’m still trying to decide whether they were tears or if she was just starting to thaw a bit. I suspect she’s the only woman in the world who keeps her lipstick in the freezer.
As we made our way across the tarmac (Yes, the place is located on an abandoned WWII landing strip… no one ever said that Achmed didn’t know how to make money. In forty years in this location, he hasn’t spent a dime on the parking lot!), we passed dozens of couples leaving the establishment. Invariably, the women were smiling contentedly and the husbands were either scowling or staring vacantly into the distance. I think the sticker-shock combined with the reality of the bottom line did permanent damage to their collective psyches. Worse, I was next! Frantically, I called upon the ancient Gods of The Lost Cause to protect me during the upcoming trials. Walking through the door of the first green house, marked Perennials, I knew the depth of Dante’s emotion upon sailing the river Styx and seeing, for the first time, the warning sign on the Gates of Hell… Ye Who Cross This Portal, Abandon All Hope.
The greenhouse itself offered an antithetical presence. The fragrances combined to enchant and enrapture, each individual plant possessing a frequency tuned genetically to the brain waves of every female within a two hundred yard radius, calling out You KNOW you want me… just step a little closer. I am witness to the fact that a woman can touch every plant in a four-acre tract in a time frame not exceeding thirty minutes… that is, if her mate is capable of pushing the rapidly-filling shopping cart at a sufficient rate of speed to keep up.
Suddenly, and without warning, she motioned for me to follow her. Had some horn (heard only by her) sounded, beckoning her presence in another location? When we reached the line of other husbands waiting to be checked out, she gave me the steely-gazed stare of instruction and told me that once I had written the check, I was to meet her in the greenhouse marked Annuals.
Well… silently I took my place among the other Zombies. I watched as each poor sap in front of me accepted his fate. One of Achmed’s minions (an enchantress no doubt) totaled up the bill for each of the condemned, flashing her pearly-white teeth and blood-red eyes at the poor bastard signing his life away. I half-expected a braying laugh to escape from her now-slathering mouth as she witnessed trembling hands attempt to grasp the pen. There wasn’t a solitary woman in the line… no doubt there was a secret salon of some sort provided for those chromosomally in league with Achmed, where the transaction was accompanied by tea and scones; enjoyed while a manicurist took care of any nails which might have inadvertently been chipped during the brutal selection process.
In time, I adopted my own vacant stare as the walk of shame commenced across the tarmac. I could feel the stares of the legions of husbands attempting, in vain, to make eye contact. Never have I felt so helpless as every fiber of my being silently called out to them Run away, run away while there’s still time!
Shnnick! For the first time in three years, I wished the button hadn’t worked. Silently, I shoved the potted tendrils fashioned of pure gold into the rear hatch. Strange… there didn’t seem to be as many as there were earlier, as I pushed and pulled the two shopping carts to the Blazer. Were they evaporating in the face of reality and re-animating once transported back inside Achmed’s Greenhouse for re-sale? Was this but another trick of the demon?
Buckling my seat belt (although I considered it a waste of time… how could the day get worse?), I glanced at my wife. It may have been a reflection off the copious numbers of plants collected in all habitable regions of the Blazer, but her face now seemed… well… pretty. And her nails were gorgeous! I even felt my own spirits start to brighten as I eased our vehicle onto Wanamaker Street.
She inched closer to me and took my arm. “Thank you, Sweetie… now let’s go see what they have at Wal-Mart.”
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