Air Pressure

"I asked her what the problem was and she answered, "Air pressure."
I'd heard this theory before. Apparently she is so sensitive to the changes in air pressure that it's convenient to blame all her bad moods on it. It sounded like more bullshit to me so I made myself scarce and went out to the shed. I can smoke away my bad moods but not in the house." With a heavy sigh he sat down in the chair closest to the window and lit a cigarette.

"In 1972 I bought the house and the surrounding fields for $35,000. Now it's worth 3 million and change, not that I would ever sell it. I suppose I'm planning to die here but that wasn't something I'd even begun to think about until last year, about this time, when I had a heart attack, right here in the shed. I'd been working on my boat, a model, not the real thing, when my mind kind of went blank and I couldn't see my fingers anymore. I thought I was just tired but when I tried to stand up my legs gave out and the next thing I knew I was in an ambulance, staring at the blinking lights and the two paramedics who were doing their best to save my sorry ass. I'd always thought it would hurt but I was blissing out and didn't care what happened to me anymore. I suppose that that's the only real long term side effect, not caring, I mean. I don't give a shit what happens to me and its been a wonderful turn around."

I said nothing. He wanted to talk and so I let him.

"After thirty years as a shipping clerk for the government I retired. They gave me a fat pension and now I've got no worries, except for my darling wife who's driving me nuts. I love the woman completely. I always have. It's just that since my heart attack I don't care what she has to say anymore; the problem is that she has plenty to say. I swear she can talk for hours about a colour or a smell. She could stunt the growth of children with words. I always wondered why she could never keep a plant alive until I realized that she was boring them to death. They'd stop sucking nutrients from the soil rather than sit and listen to her rambling, mostly incoherent ideas about the weather, the state of the world or the reason hydrogen peroxide is a better antiseptic than alcohol. She gets her ideas from the magazines and periodicals she subscribes to by the dozens. I sometimes think she's trying to finish the job the heart attack couldn't."

He had an easy way of talking that reminded me of my own father, someone who has grown confident rather than having been born that way. He set the bag on the table and waited for me to say something. I took the bag and set it on the floor beside me without looking inside.

"I need some quiet time. Do you understand that? I need some time to be alone with my thoughts. That's it. So, when can you start?" He leaned forward, his hands on his knees and waited, for an answer, for a word, for a sign that each second that ticked by was adding to and not subtracting from the years he had accumulated, just like dollars in the bank, wondering how he could spend them all and just live, without leaving anything behind to indicate that he'd been here at all.