I see now that the woman across the street has stopped pushing the lawn mower and is waving at me. I think it would be better if I looked at the weather information and recorded it inside. I close the door. Soon, my data will be complete.
After breakfast, I thumb through my voluminous (I love the word “voluminous”) data sheets, and I am correct: Before today, I have never awoken at 7:28 a.m. Today is a landmark.
Because I have many things to do today, including my weekly appointment with Dr. Buckley, I will have to put off my Internet time until later. I meet with Dr. Buckley promptly at 10:00 a.m., just as I have every Tuesday of every month of every year since I started seeing her, save for one.
On Tuesday, June 11, 2002, Dr. Buckley had to move my appointment to 11:00 a.m. It was a disaster. All I could think about was that the shuffling had put my 10:00 p.m. viewing of Dragnet—episode number sixty-four, “Frauds: DR-28”—in jeopardy, and so I could not answer questions about how my medication was doing or what projects I was working on or how my letters of complaint were working out. Dr. Buckley cut the session short, which mitigated against the damage done to my schedule, and we both agreed that from then on, we would meet at 10:00 a.m. on Tuesdays.
This is one of the things I like about Dr. Buckley. Although she sometimes makes mistakes, she is a very logical person.
My first stop is Home Depot, in the paint department. I have decided to paint the garage. I need a new project, and the ten-day weather forecast looks as though it will allow me to do this. I don’t like forecasts, though, as they are notoriously off base. I will have to wait for the actual data, and it is my hope that by then the garage will be painted.
There are more paint varieties and colors here than there were the last time I was at Home Depot. There must be an entire arm of the paint industry dedicated to coming up with new colors and combinations, and I instantly wish that I had looked at some possibilities on the Internet before coming here. I’m frustrated with myself for not thinking of this.
The man in the paint department, who is supposed to assist me, isn’t helpful at all. He asks many questions, faster than I can answer them, and he is talking about things like ambience, things that I don’t care about. I just want to find the right paint.
“Leave me alone,” I say.
The paint man trudges away, shaking his head.
Did you know that there are NFL team colors available in paint? I am intrigued by this. I like the Dallas Cowboys, but I don’t think that I would want their colors on the garage. I will have to think of a project that would work with Dallas Cowboys team-color paint. This is something I would like to do, sometime after I finish the garage.
After I spend a few more minutes looking at swatches, it’s obvious that the paint situation is hopeless. I cannot decide on a color, and I can feel the urge to rip these swatches from the wall welling up inside of me. I close my eyes, as Dr. Buckley has suggested that I do when I feel this way, and I try to breathe. Dr. Buckley says that when I feel overwhelmed by frustration, I should think before I act and find the path that will carry me away from the frustration.
Dr. Buckley is a very logical person. I do as she has counseled me, and my path becomes clear.
I walk over to the unhelpful man and say, “I would like three gallons each of the Behr mochachino the Behr parsley sprig, and the Behr bronze green.”
As the unhelpful man walks over to gather the supplies needed to mix my paints, he is shaking his head again.
I like Dr. Buckley’s waiting room. The walls have dark wood paneling, and the lighting sets me at ease. Dr. Buckley also plays soft music in her waiting room. I prefer rock music—my favorites are R.E.M. and Matthew Sweet—but I think that if Dr. Buckley played Matthew Sweet, some of her patients would not like it. Matthew Sweet has a song called “Sick of Myself,” and I am pretty sure that is exactly the wrong song name for a therapist’s waiting room.
I try to arrive at least ten minutes early for my 10:00 a.m. appointment, although I can never be sure exactly what time I will get here. Things like stoplights and the uncertainty of where in the parking lot I will find a place for my car affect it. I once asked Dr. Buckley if I could have my own parking space, but she assured me that was not possible.
I arrive early for two reasons: First, as I said, the lighting and wood paneling and the soft music help set me at ease. Second, Dr. Buckley’s other, less-organized patients are always getting the magazines out of order. I sometimes need the full ten minutes to organize the magazines by title and date. I would do it after our appointment, when I have more time, but Dr. Buckley prefers that her patients not linger.
Today, however, the magazines are not badly out of sorts, and so I have three minutes to just sit and listen to the music.
When Dr. Buckley emerges from her office to summon me in, I look down at my digital watch, and the time is 9:59:28. I tell Dr. Buckley that it is not quite time for my appointment, and so we stare at each other for thirty-two seconds.
There is a rhythm to my talks with Dr. Buckley. She asks many of the same questions every week, but it’s not by rote. She is interested in my answers. Dr. Buckley has never been less than professional, and she is a very logical person.
“How has your week been, Edward?”
“Very good, I think. My data is complete, and before I came here today, I bought some paint for the garage.”
“It’s a little late in the year for that, isn’t it?”
“The ten-day forecast looks good.”
“You’re trusting forecasts now?”
“No, but you’ve told me that I should have a little faith, right?”
“Very good. Have you been taking your medication?”
“Every day. Eighty milligrams every day.”
“Any problems with the Prozac?”
“I prefer the term fluoxetine.”
“Any problems?”
“No.”
“Excellent. Are you still writing letters?”
“I wrote one to my father last night.”
“But you didn’t send it, right?”
“No.”
“What was your complaint to your father?”
“I don’t think he’s even considered radiant floor heating. Do you realize how much money he could save?”
“Radiant floors are nice. Do you know why this is so important to you?”
“It’s not that it’s important. I’m frustrated that he hasn’t thought of it. It doesn’t speak well of him.”
“Do you think, perhaps, that it might be too much to expect that your father has thought of radiant floors just because you have?”
“I don’t know. Maybe. He makes me mad.”
“We can talk about that some more.”
Tuesday is also the day that I go to the grocery store. It just makes good sense. Dr. Buckley’s office is at Lewis Avenue and Sixteenth Street W., which means that I can go north on Sixteenth to Grand Avenue, take a right turn, and be at the Albertsons store three blocks later. After shopping, I can take a right turn on Grand, then another right turn on Sixth Street W., then another right turn on Clark Avenue, where I live.
I like right turns much better than I like left turns.
At Albertsons, I buy the same things every week: three packages of spaghetti, three pounds of ground beef (the kind with only 4 percent fat), three bottles of Newman’s Own roasted garlic spaghetti sauce, a twelve-pack of Diet Dr Pepper, a big box of corn flakes, a half gallon of milk, a quart of Dreyer’s vanilla ice cream, five assorted frozen Banquet dinners, and one DiGiorno pizza (usually spicy chicken).