After the bank visit, I bumped into my brother-in-law Guy, the youngest of Edmund’s siblings, and learned that his wife is miserable in Stratford, which she finds intolerably provincial. Then last winter happened, and she took it personally. The egregious snow load damaged their roof, causing extensive interior damage as well as totalling the shingles and flashing. Twenty thousand dollars later, Jan wants to sell that house and get outta Dodge.
I’m sorry for her, but not that much. Jan is the youngest of our generational cohort in the family, and by far the most rigid. She also holds grudges over trivial differences of style and opinion, so I never know whether she’s nursing a grievance. My Dad would say she’s “not suitable for small ships.”
The guy who bought the Kamado Joe forgot the cover, so I drove all the way from Stratford to Hamilton (and back) to take it to him. He didn’t ask me to; I offered, probably because I want everything I do these days to be completed without loose ends.
When I got back to town, I went over to Jan and Guy’s house to see Jan and maybe do something to cheer her up. (Guy was tending bar at the Festival Theatre.) She was surprisingly glad to see me, so I asked her if she wanted to go downtown for supper. Well, she talked a blue streak through a beer and a Cobb salad, probably more in one evening than she’s said to me in the last five years. She should probably go back to Toronto, but it’s possible she’ll never be happy anywhere. Too bad.
Serious house-hunting in Ottawa begins next week, at 0845 on Tuesday. Agent Jeff has a must-attend medical appointment on Monday, so he won’t have time then to run around town with me. That means I don’t have to blast out of church tomorrow and immediately charge down the eastbound side of the highway, and I’ll be able to put the garbage out before I leave.