Tag: Wes Blalock

Flea Market

I recently visited my good friend, Wes Blalock. My wife and I were invited to San Jose to spend the weekend at his home and we immediately took advantage of the opportunity to abandon our children for three days.

When we arrived at his house, he asked where EM1 and EM2 were. I told him they were unfortunately busy and couldn’t make the trip with us. It was easier to lie to him than to admit we snuck out of the house without telling the kids where we were going.

While we were visiting, Wes asked if my wife and I would like to go to a local flea market the following morning. The market is open on the first Saturday morning of every month and there are typically vendors from all over the region that set up booths and tents in the parking lot of a local community college. Since I love digging through other people’s stuff and I have no problem spending money on garbage I don’t need, I immediately agreed to go.

The market opened at 8 AM sharp. As I am all about punctuality, I rolled out of bed at 8:45, brushed my teeth and threw on some clothes, then wandered into the kitchen looking for something to eat. I found my wife, Wes and his wife in the kitchen waiting for me.

My wife glared at me and said, “We’ve been ready to go for an hour.”

Wes threw a bagel in my direction, picked up his car keys and headed for the front door.

The drive to the flea market was uneventful. Mostly because no one was talking to me. I sat quietly and gnawed on my bagel while my wife made comments that were little more than thinly veiled attacks. “I hope we still get there early enough to get parking.” “I hope we have enough time to explore before it gets too hot.” And, “I wish my husband had more consideration for other people.”

That last one wasn’t even thinly veiled.

When we arrived, we did indeed find parking. It might have been the last spot available in the lot, but we found it. We exited the car and wandered into the collection of colored overhangs, stalls, and booths, finding ourselves immediately surrounded by hundreds of items scattered over tables, laid on blankets, and occasionally just piled in open boxes.

Before we wandered in too deep, I went to an ATM conveniently positioned in the first row of booths. Due to my love of shiny objects, I figured I was going to need some cash, so I slipped my bank card into the machine and tried to make a withdrawal. Either there was a problem with my card or with my savings account, but either way, the results of the transaction were not what I had hoped. The machine spat out my card along with a receipt full of zeros then asked me to go panhandle somewhere else.

Gripping my receipt in one hand and what remained of my dignity in the other, I returned to the rest of my group and told my wife the ATM was broken. I asked Wes if he could lend me a few bucks, and he said, “I’d be happy to, just as soon as you pay back what you already owe me.”

He could have just said, no.

The rest of the day went about as you would imagine. Walking through a flea market with no money is a lot like … well, like being anywhere with no money. Feel free to look, but don’t touch. Whenever I found something I was interested in, I had a conversation with the vendor that went like this:

“How much are you asking?”

“Twenty dollars, sir.”

“Will you take a dollar?”

This would be followed by either laughter or profanity. In one instance, I got both.

Needless to say, I did not end up purchasing any of the fine goods available at the market. My wife, on the other hand, purchased a couple of orchids from a vendor selling plants. I didn’t ask her where she got the cash to buy the flowers. I was worried if I made her mad at me again she might not let me ride home in the car with everyone else. Instead, I just put out my hands and asked if I could carry her stuff.

I’m not the brightest husband out there, but I have figured a few things out. Such as, if you’re still alive after poking the bear once, don’t go back and try it again.

The rest of the weekend passed much more smoothly. I enjoy hanging out with Wes and his family quite a bit and it was a nice break from my own rotten kids. In addition, I got to nap on the couch and watch TV while Wes did all the cooking and household chores. How could that not be a great weekend?

The only downside is that we did eventually have to go back home. I don’t think Wes felt that was as much of a downside as I did. I’m not saying he was eager to see us leave, I’m just saying that my car doesn’t actually need to be push started. Still, there he was, leaning against the back of the car, yelling, “Go, go, go!”

He’s always ready to lend a helping hand.

That’s why he’s such a great friend.

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Moving Day

My good friend, Wes Blalock, gave me a call recently. He told me that he and his family were leaving their current home and moving into a bigger place. During the past nineteen years that they had been in the current house they had accumulated quite a bit of stuff and he wanted to know if I would be available to drive down to San Jose and help him move.

There is an old adage that says: A friend will help you. A good friend will help you move.

Wes and I have known each other since we were kids, so when he asked if I could help I, of course, immediately told him, “I can’t. I’m busy that day.”

After Wes pointed out that he hadn’t told me what day he needed help, I realized I had inadvertently wasted the only excuse I had. With no other plausible reasons to say no, I agreed to participate. I really need to learn to be more patient and time my responses better. If I could simply learn to wait a few seconds before answering a question, I would have more friends and my back would hurt a great deal less.

When my wife got home from work, I told her that we had agreed to go to San Jose and help Wes and his family move into a new house. She put down her car keys, forced a smile, and asked when we were going.

“Next weekend,” I told her.

“Oh shoot. I’m busy next weekend. But you boys go ahead and have fun.”

Have I mentioned that my wife has much better timing than I do?

I don’t know exactly what my wife was “busy” doing during the weekend. Maybe she had plans to hand out clothing and food to the homeless. Perhaps she was volunteering her time at an orphanage. Or, it’s possible she was working her way through a couple bottles of wine in celebration of having the house to herself for a couple days. Regardless of her actual plans, the end result was that I had allowed myself to get sucked into helping someone move, and I would be doing it by myself.

When I got to San Jose, I received my first bit of good news. Wes told me that we were not going to be moving any furniture that weekend. He had hired a moving truck and a couple workers who would show up the following week and take all the furniture, appliances, and items too large to squeeze into a car. He said, “Today, we are going to be moving mostly dishes, books, and some potted plants.”

I figured I had lucked out, at least until he pointed me to the backyard where all the “potted plants” were arranged. There were about two dozen pots, each about the size of a garbage can, and a collection of flora that would be more correctly classified as trees rather than plants. Weighing in at about a hundred pounds apiece, they required two people and the assistance of an industrial-sized hand truck to get them into our vehicles.

As we relocated Wes’ portable forest into the backs of our pickup trucks, I made several suggestions regarding how to load them more efficiently into the vehicles so we could minimize the number of trips we needed to make to the new house. Wes then made a suggestion of his own that was decidedly less polite and may not even be physically possible. I took the hint and stopped talking.

Because I did not know the location of his new place, Wes had me follow him there. To get to the new house, we had to use the freeway. I must admit that this part of the move was by far my favorite part. At sixty-five miles per hour, the plants in the back of Wes’ truck reminded me of watching natural disaster shows on television. It was like observing a hurricane as it moved through a tiny tropical forest. The only thing missing was a troupe of monkeys fleeing for their lives.

Unfortunately, the show only lasted about fifteen minutes. Then we were back to the back-breaking chore of removing everything out of the truck and relocating it to its new home in the backyard. At least unloading the vehicles was a quicker process than loading them had been. Mostly, because by that point I had stopped caring whether or not I broke something.

When the trucks were empty, Wes felt there was still enough time in the day to go back to his house and move one more load. I told him that sounded like a great idea and I would meet him there. As soon as Wes’ truck was out of sight, I jumped onto the freeway and headed back for Sacramento. I will have to come up with some kind of an excuse for disappearing the next time I talk to him, but for now, I am just glad to be back home.

I know this makes me sound like a terrible friend, but I am at peace with that, because frankly, I am a terrible friend. And, Wes would be the first to tell you that.

Wes, if you are reading this, I just want you to know that I love you dearly. There isn’t anything I wouldn’t do for you, but from the bottom of my heart, I promise you that I am never going to do this again.

If you ever decide to move someplace else, don’t bother to ask. I’m going to be busy that day.

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Enjoying Deep Dark Thoughts? Follow me on Facebook so you don’t miss a post. Just go to my page and click the “Like” button to receive updates on my blog and other projects.

And you can follow me on Twitter @gallenwilbanks.