I like to think after 38 years of marriage I know when my wife, Mary, is playing a mind game with me. Recently, however, I discovered she has me right where she wants me even though I think I am in control.
Case in point. I was getting ready to watch the first Minnesota Vikings game of the season a couple of weeks ago. Like all good Vikings fans, all day long I was anticipating that night’s kickoff to the new season.
The game wasn’t starting until after 9 p.m. that night, giving me ample time to have everything done for the night and ready to settle into the chair and enjoy the game.
Five minutes before kickoff, as I was sitting in my chair with popcorn bowl in my hand, Mary sticks her head into the room and says, “Do you know where my wedding dress is?”
I responded with “I haven’t seen it in 38 years. Why?”
As soon as the word “why” came out of my mouth, I knew I shouldn’t have asked.
Mary told me our daughter Jenna wanted to have our granddaughter Brooke’s baptism dress made out of it.
So I took control of the situation by saying five minutes before the game, “And you want me to help find your wedding dress. We would have a better chance of finding Jimmy Hoffa.”
Mary responded with one of those “Well, I was just asking,” knowing full well she had just planted the seed.
The seed she planted was the one in my head, causing me to think of nothing else but as to where that darn dress might be.
Well, as Vikings fans know, the Vikings stunk that night, and I couldn’t watch much more than the first half of the game, so I went to bed.
I was so upset I couldn’t sleep. It wasn’t the Vikings game that was bothering me. But for the life of me, I couldn’t figure out where that darn dress might be.
The next morning Mary started cultivating the seed she planted the night before in my head by saying how nice it was for Jenna to ask if she could make her daughter’s baptism dress out of Mary’s wedding dress and how special that would be.
By the time I left for work, nothing else was on my mind but to find that dress.
I had a good idea where it might be, but it wasn’t going to be easy to get to it stored in Mary’s hope chest buried in the back of our storage closet.
Hindsight being 20/20, I now know Mary knew darn well where the dress was and how hard it was going to be to get to it. So she went farming for a sucker — she planted the seed and stood back to watch a bumper crop sucker flourish.
I hauled out boxes and boxes of books, pictures, VCR tapes, clothes we don’t wear anymore — just to get to the hope chest where the dress was. Finally I hit pay dirt. I pulled the hope chest out of the closet, opened it up — only to discover the dress wasn’t in there.
I wasn’t about to give up because there were two more boxes still behind the hope chest. Thank goodness the dress was in one of the boxes.
I laid the dress out on all the junk I hauled out to find it, took a picture of it and texted it off to Mary and Jenna.
I got a thank you from Jenna, and Mary texted back, “Good job.”
I can’t help but think Mary had a smile on her face and was thinking she just harvested the seed she planted only the night before. I hate when that happens.