The Easter Bunny has come and gone, and like many families, we have countless pictures and videos of excited little ones running around in colorful dresses.
Early in the morning, they collected Easter eggs in small baskets, by noon they enjoyed picnicking under trees and chasing bubbles blown all over the yard by a gentle breeze, and by early afternoon they crashed, taking long naps.
That evening, after tucking two little angels in bed and looking back at such a wonderful day, I had but one thought in my mind. What are we going to do with the three dozen unpeeled, hard-boiled eggs still in our refrigerator?
Why so many leftovers, you may ask? Just keep reading as we unpeel this story together.
It’s taken many years of married life, but I’ve come to realize that sometimes what The Wife says isn’t actually what I hear.
If asked, The Wife would say she’s known this since we were first married. Now I’m not blaming her for my poor hearing, mind you. I come by it naturally. I called Dad to see if he had the same issue when Mom was talking to him, but he never answered my question. Guess he wasn’t paying attention.
Paying attention just isn’t one of our greatest attributes. I try, but random thoughts enter my mind, the mind starts to wonder, and soon all concentration on the conversation at hand is hopelessly lost.
For example, the day before our family gathering, The Wife asked if I could make my famous deviled eggs. She said we would need enough for a dozen people because there would be three families. That’s what she said, but it isn’t what I heard.
Here’s how my mind works. As soon as I heard the words “deviled eggs,” I thought of paprika. That’s the spice I dust on top of my deviled eggs.
Back when we lived at 110 Flamingo Street, it’s also the spice that someone “accidentally” blew on top of Twin Brother Mark that had him sneezing for hours. What a great story that would make, I thought.
In the middle of her conversation, I started to write about the funny incident in my mind. So what actually did I hear The Wife say while I was mind writing? She said, “We will need three dozen eggs.”
An hour later, I returned from the grocery store with all the ingredients and started to boil eggs. For you novice cooks out there, there is a right and wrong way to boil an egg. That is if you want to be able to peel them without completely destroying the egg. Guess which way I did it?
An hour later, with only three eggs peeled correctly and eight totally destroyed, I made a second trip to the store and bought another dozen. Once home, I asked The Wife how to cook them correctly. She told me, but again I didn’t hear her.
This time it really wasn’t my fault. I had already finished the paprika story, but got distracted watching the Gray and Black one chase her tail and then pounce on a sunbeam trying to hold it down.
After boiling eggs incorrectly again, I tried to peel one under running water. For 10 minutes I tried, but again more egg than peel came off. After hearing me complain from all the way across the house about how the eggs just weren’t cooperating, The Wife finally came in kitchen to rescue me.
Seeing my frustration, she walked over, gave me a kiss, and said, “You do know you can buy hard-boiled eggs already peeled from the grocery story?”
Surprisingly, this time I actually heard her perfectly clearly and, no, I didn’t know. I made a third trip to the grocery story and bought another three dozen eggs that were already peeled and in a bag. They were twice as expensive, but at this point, I didn’t care.
After an hour of mixing and scooping, I proudly presented to her four platters of deviled eggs. That’s when she said something I also heard perfectly clearly, “I love you, but we only needed a dozen.”
I learned three things that day.
First, there’s a difference in what The Wife says and what I actually hear.
Second, sometimes it’s much better to pay the non-frustration price: the higher price to have someone do the work for you than you doing it yourself and getting frustrated.
Finally, you can eat hard-boiled eggs for breakfast, lunch and dinner for an entire week — especially if you have three dozen left over in the refrigerator.
[Rick Ryckeley, who lives in Senoia, served as a firefighter for more than two decades and has been a weekly columnist since 2001. His email is storiesbyrick@gmail.com. His books are available at www.RickRyckeley.com.]
