Date Night

My date keepsake: Key coders

Back in the day, when we were still young and footloose, I had certain requirements for date night. The location had to be special, expensive, and romantic.

Of course, that's not what I said when Not-Yet-Husband asked where I wanted to go on a date. What I said was, "Oh, I'm fine with anyplace." But I hoped it would be somewhere special, expensive, and romantic.

Last Saturday was the first one in months and months uncommitted to taxes, Christmas shopping, or some other life moment, so Husband suggested a date night. After 27 1/2 years, we've been married long enough that I could make my preferences known without worrying that I would come across as a greedy or manipulative.

"Oooh! Take me someplace special! Take me someplace romantic! Take me someplace expensive!"

Husband, bless his heart, knew the perfect location: The grand opening of a new Menard's.

It was special (Woo! Free painter's hats and coloring books!) and certainly it was expensive (even with grand opening prices those cheap hammers and bags of mulch add up, don't they?) but was it romantic? Well, two moments of the evening stand out.

Moment the First: I was the cart driver, and almost T-boned another woman's cart. She had not looked for cross-traffic as she came out of a side aisle because she was busy grabbing for a balloon her toddler had thrown out of her cart and trying to wrangle a couple more pre-schoolers, one running ahead and the other running behind. I heard her intone the international mother's mantra:  "I am so over this balloon."

Moment the Second: I hear from 50 yards away the father pulling a couple of kids away from the cordless drill display where they had been obeying the sign that urged "Try me!" "They didn't mean you," he was telling his young sons, "they meant people who had any chance of buying one."

We had just spent 20 minutes comparing the virtues of various storm doors, and not a single person had whined or hurried us. No one was complaining about being hungry or bored or asking if they could just go to the car.

I sighed happily and told Husband to go ahead and look for the replacement air hose that was on sale, and I'd meet him in the trash bag section.

Oh, yeah. It's plenty romantic.