All Her Buttons

Rolling the clock back to 1973, this was when Dutchman, Swede and I first all met one another through a Christian college group.  At first only Dutchman was a Christian but Swede and I followed along shortly after joining the group.  As I have mentioned in the past, the change was so abrupt and obvious in my life that the church we all went to made me their high school group's youth pastor!  (bad idea! i was way too young!)

Now, one of the girls in that first youth group of mine was to grow into International Banker Girl, whom I told you about perhaps two years ago when Dutchman flew her over for his birthday and sure stunned the two us!  (what a joyous reunion!)  Back in 1973, she was just an awkward teenage girl, certainly nothing like the accomplished self confident woman she is today.  And she had a problem back then - an older brother whom both Dutchman and I classified as a sexual preditor - and history was to prove us correct.

So, we would tag team trying to keep her safe while her parents were not around and more than a few times had to trash said older brother (once within an inch of his life!).  But, apparently he never learned and the justice system was the one whom eventually had to deal with him.  Hence, she viewed us sort of as something between older brothers or pseudo father material or maybe shining knights.

Fast forward to this past weekend and you can better understand the context of this tale.

It is nine a.m. on Saturday, the gun show had just opened and Dutchman gets a call on his cell phone.  Sort of odd, as everyone knew he would be at the show and could not really talk.  IBG is screaming on the phone so loud that not only could I hear every word but so could some guys on the aisle behind us!  (Dutchman is going deaf, but you never mention that topic - gees!)

In summary, her husband and her had a fight ending with him storming out of the house.  Just before calling, she had gone online to pay some bills and discovered there was NO money in her accounts and all of her credit and cash cards were missing!

Dutchman and I mused over this for about an hour without coming to a conclusion  It really did not sound like something her husband would do.  But, then again, he recently had been told that he is going blind - so could he have gone insane or been so foolish to as to decide to go on a trip to Vegas or something equally as stupid?  About an hour later, he walks up to our table and sheepishly says hi.

So for the next hour we hear the real tale, from his viewpoint anyways.

He had thrown his back out the night before and had taken a big pain killer.  He was in so much pain and fell asleep so fast that he forgot to put 'HIS' dog in its kennel for the night.  About five in the morning, the dog pees on the carpet at the foot of the bed, and an irate IBG wakes him up to clean up the mess.  But, he is so tired that he only throws a towel over it and goes back to bed.  A few hours later was the fight, which began over his not shampooing the carpeting at 5:00.  She storms out of the room, he cleans out her wallet to make a point and takes off.

Now his father is with him through this conversation, standing there with his mouth hanging open most of the time and saying things like, "You said what!" "You did what!" and my favorite, "Are you insane?"

They amble off and Dutchmen and I are simply stunned - to the point of having NO response.

A few hours later, he comes back.  "I really screwed up, didn't I?"

We agreed.

"What do you think it will take to get her over this?"

Dutchman went with flowers, I went with the most expensive chocolate he could find and flowers too!  And he trundled off muttering at how it was unfair he should have to buy her flowers and chocolates really were not her thing.......

Dutchman and I both smacked our foreheads.

So, Saturday night, I call up Gaelic Girl and told her about this whole incident, which had become a running gag at the gun show in our table area.  So I said, "Now I probably know you better than anyone alive and let us say that one day I decide I am going to push all of your buttons at once - what would it take to make up for this?  Flowers? Chocolates? Cash if I sold all of my guns?  What?"

There was a long silence.  "Flowers, chocolates and you better save one gun and a bullet because I will still kill you!"

Next morning, 9:00 another call on Dutchman's cell.  This time it is her parents calling to get Dutchman to please talk with their daughter and the husband because she had called them and was all hysterical over him not coming back home last night.

Dutchman explained the previous day's conversations and at how neither were looking objectively at the situation and how they are adults and do need to work this out on their own.  It was hysterical.

But then the truth sort of worked its way out: husband had come back the night before but had not brought flowers or chocolates, just handed her an envelope with the contents of her bank accounts.

She slammed the door in his face and he spent the night at his dad's.

And, strangely enough GG is now not talking to me either because I would even think of pushing all of her buttons on purpose!