Ken

I've never written about a boyfriend before, but this one's different. This one's made of the real stuff. So enjoy.....

I have a new boyfriend. His name is Ken.

Ken lives in Hawaii and came to the "mainland" (which is what they call the continental U.S.) for a conference. He arranged to visit Omaha and me while he was here. I'm not good at planning visits. Ok I am good at it, but it's hard for me to combine planning with fun. My entire life I have either been in charge or I have had fun, but I've never done both in combination. So imagine my surprise when this weekend turned out not only well, but astoundingly so. It was like something out of a romantic movie. That's how I knew it couldn't have been me. It had to be this new combination called "us".

We've been planning this visit for months. I've been very excited and as the time drew closer I was imagining all sorts of romantic things we could do. Then out of nowhere, after calling me 2 or 3 times a week every week, Ken suddenly stopped calling the week before his visit. Actually I hadn't heard from him in almost 2 weeks because he'd been working in a remote location.
I knew he was at his conference.
I knew he was busy.
I was fine.
I was calm.
It was no big deal.
I knew Ken, and he had probably left his cell phone charger back in Hawaii and his conference was in Chicago. I've done the same thing myself.

By Tuesday night I was distraught. Where was he? Why hadn't he at least emailed? I was becoming frantic with worry. I consulted a friend. "No offense", she said, "but why is he coming all the way from Hawaii to see YOU?" (This is the same friend I wrote about in "Independence Day". ). That was her idea of "support".

Well I'd asked for it. It was either talk to her or stress out over not talking to him. Finally she had some good advice: "Just email him" she said, and I did. He emailed me back within minutes. First I was relieved and happy....then I was pissed! He was sitting right there in front of his computer and he hadn't even bothered to email???

On Wednesday night I replied back to his email with one word..."OK". I was trying not to seem upset, but he knew. He called the next morning and apologized. He understood and he didn't try to deflect the blame back onto me with a "you're overreacting" the way most guys would. He'd been busy just like I knew he had. Seas were calm again.

By then it was too late to do any of the stuff I'd been considering. There was no time to go to the grocery store to get the ingredients for a home-cooked meal perhaps by candle light. I had wanted to spend our first evening together on Friday night in the romantic, curtain-enclosed booth at "Spezia" but when I called the booth was already taken. The girl insisted I couldn't have it for the entire weekend. I kept insisting that she check again and finally she found a spot for us on Saturday night at 8:30. Not what I had in mind but that would have to do.

I waited for him at the airport, watching as people de-boarded, searching for his face in the crowd. Finally I spotted him. "Ken!" I yelped. He had the most elated look on his face when he hugged me. "Oh no" my mind panicked "he's going to kiss me". I looked away and held up a hand. "Sorry I can't do PDA" I said softly, trying in vain not to ruin the moment. He gave me a look of disappointment but understanding and he followed me down to baggage claim. I didn't know it but he had no idea what "PDA" meant. Hours later he was trying to figure out why I didn't want him to use a personal digital assistant.

First stop 7 Monkeys for dinner. It's a bar and grille, but the dinner menu is decent, and since I'd been too distraught to plan I figured I might as well show him my world. We couldn't get the little room where I'd had my birthday party. It was full of some other women. Ken pointed out to me that it was called "the Frolic Room". "Really?" I asked. It turns out there is a sign above the door of the room. I'd never noticed. We had a good time and the waitresses who knew me even stopped by to say hi.

Next we went to "Micks". I wasn't sure about taking him there. Not quite friends, not quite family, it's hard to understand or explain my relationships there. It's one thing to tell Ken about the place, but it's entirely another to take him there and expose him to it. Would he be jealous of the time I spend talking to other people? Would he feel left out? He was neither. He was cool and mature and took it all in stride. I hugged all the people I normally hug and hung out with all the people I normally hang out with and Ken slid into my world as if he'd been there for ages and his comfort and ease became mine. It was nice to have him there, a date I had neither to protect nor avoid, but instead expanded my world and enhanced my relationships with my friends.

The next morning, to my utter delight and amazement, Ken took my car and went to the grocery store to get food to make me breakfast. As he headed out with my car keys, I hopped into the shower to get ready for my tennis lesson. I had given him strict instructions: he had to be back by 10:15 am for me to get to my lesson at 10:30. Little did I know he was outside having a showdown with my car, Alexia, my white Land Rover, who refused to let a stranger mount her. The key wouldn't turn in the ignition and the car alarm went off. He struggled with her for a while pushing any combination of butons and finally got the car to start. How I never heard any of this I have no idea.

Next he tried following the directions I had given him for getting to the grocery store. He made a wrong turn right away. (It was my fault) Out here where I live you can go from civilization to farmland in a matter of minutes and have no idea how to find your way back. Somehow he found Mecca, aka Wal Mart, and got food and (here's the big miracle) found his way back again in time to make me breakfast and still get to the tennis lesson. When I came out of the shower, dressed in my tennis outfit, there he was frying eggs with not the tiniest look of distress on his face to let me know the ordeal he'd just been through.

He sat patiently in his jeans, T-shirt, and cowboy boots while we played tennis in the hot sun. Whenever I looked over at him to see if he was admiring my shots (or my shorts), he was doing neither. He was watching the instructor intently and I could see him mentally correcting and comparing his own game. I'd worried briefly about being self-concious or embarrassed. Normally I play pretty well but I haven't had a lesson in a month and here I was playing in front of my new boyfriend. I needn't have worried. After the lesson he met my friend and tennis partner, the married woman. "He's cute" she mouthed to me as we were leaving. She has no idea.

In the late afternoon, after lunch, we went to the Omaha zoo. I haven't been to the zoo since I was 8 years old and went to the Birmingham Zoo on a school field trip. I remembered it being hot and stinky and the monkeys wiping feces on the glass of their cage. Not my idea of a fun trip. I haven't been back since. But apparently Zoos have changed in the past 30 years. (Imagine that?) I've heard good things about the Henry Doorly Zoo in Omaha and I figured Ken would like it. Plus I've been dying to see the butterfly exhibit so we went straight there. We saw lots of butterflies but I admitted being dissppointed. "What's wrong?" Ken asked, "Were you expecting to be covered in a cloud of butterflies?" .................................................How did he know?

The place is really nice, covered in trees, like walking through a forest. We walked everywhere, to the giraffes and the big cats and bears, and there was a nice breeze throughout the place. The giraffes were tall, elegant and gorgeous, my favorite of all the animals. There were kids everywhere. I don't know why that surprised me but it did.

We went home happy and only a little tired and took a nap on my chaise. Then we got up and Ken went to his hotel room to dress for dinner and I went to shower and get ready. When he came back we only had a few minutes to get to Spezia and make our reservation in time. I was dressed in an elegant but simple little black dress with my hair up, and he was handsome in his navy sports jacket and slacks. He held the car door on the passenger side open for me and for an instant I thought "I should drive" but it was fleeting. If he wanted to be a gentleman and drive I shouldn't deter him. So I dutifully climbed into the passenger seat and he went around and got into the driver's seat of Alexia. As if it were scripted, the key wouldn't turn. "Ok," Ken said "This is what it did last time. Now what do I do?"

I had no idea.
It hasn't done that to me in years since the first months I owned it. "Just push the key in and turn" I said.
"I'm trying" he said, "it won't turn".
"Try pushing the unlock button" I offered.
Nothing he did worked. The car alarm went off and I pannicked a little.
"Oh my Gosh, We're not going to make it to our romantic dinner" I cried inside. I was beginning to get discouraged and impatient with the whole situation but Ken was being so good I tried not to show it. We switched places and I tried doing the same things I'd just watched him doing. Still nothing. "Hand me the manual" I said. He did and I read it frantically, finding nothing that would help. Back and forth we went, reading the manual, switching places trying to get the car to start. I was getting crankier and crankier and he was so calm it was calming me down, keeping me from melting down and giving up completely. Finally, a half hour later at 9:00pm I vaguely remembered something about turning the steering wheel to get the car to unlock. Sure enough it worked. Relieved we set out for the restaurant. "But they've probably canceled our reservation" I worried aloud. Ken, ever the gentleman and ever prepared to take care of things, offered to call them. He pulled out his cell, listened carefully while I spelled "Spezia" for him two or three times, and then called directory assistance for the number. I listened impressed as he carefully pronounced "Sss-Pee-zee-ahh" into the electronic voice system. Even he was surprised when the system understood his pronunciation and got the number right away. He contacted the restaurant. Our reservation was secure.

We had our romantic dinner, and afterward came back to my place and had a walk under the stars around the pond. "A starlight walk" he called it. The evening was cool. We walked slowly, me in my black dress and now wrapped in my shawl, and him in his navy jacket, looking up at the sky and straining so long my neck started to hurt. He pointed out the big and little dipper and I learned that what I had been calling the little dipper was really the throne of Cassiopeia.