Sometimes Being Poly is Just Funny

We've been paying premiums for Aflac insurance for years. Every now and then the duck coughs up a check for $25.00 or $50.00, which we happily cash, but we've never collected anywhere near what we've paid in. That is, until this last surgical adventure. Between the two surgeries and the hospital days for Master and for T, Aflac finally came through for us. We took the insurance settlement money and used a chunk of it to go shopping for some furniture items that we've been wanting for a very long time. We just figure it is our way of participating in the economic recovery process.

So there we were, the three of us, at our local Ashley Furniture store, in search of two sofas, a couple of nightstands, and a new dining set. We first encountered a sales lady who asked what we wanted, and when we told her, she waved vaguely at the huge space and said, "It's out there somewhere. I'll be glad to help you when you find what you are looking for." BIG mistake on her part.

So, we wandered for a bit, until another sales person, Walter, spotted us and came to see if he could help us. Turns out Walter is a heck of a sales pro. He stuck to us like glue, affably wandering with us from place to place, showing us whatever it was we told him we were interested in. Too, Walter was a talker. He and Master got into a running conversation about this and that, and were just like a couple of long-lost best buddies. Walter seemed absolutely convinced that he knew Himself from somewhere...

Shopping with the crew of us is a little like herding cats. T tends to wander off and then come scooting back with news of whatever she's found. Master is highly distractable in a big shopping environment, and so tends to carrom from one thing to another. It looks pretty random if you aren't clear about how His mind works. Me? I hate to shop with a passion, and so I tend to wander along behind Master, resignedly enduring the sensory overload that hits me the moment I walk through the door of the place.

Walter, as it turns out, is a retired cop. He doesn't miss much, and he spent a whole lot of time with the bunch of us. Finally, as we were parked on the sofa that was to become T's, happily bantering back and forth, our sales guy just couldn't resist it any longer. He looked at T and I, and then looked at Master and asked the $64 million dollar question: "Which one of them are You with?" Master just shrugged and replied, "Both of them."

Walter sputtered for a minute, but recovered quickly, and then asked Him, "How the heck do You pull that off?!?!?" From that point on, things got seriously zany as he became quite convinced we were the most interesting and intriguing bunch he'd dealt with in a very long time. Because the things we purchased are technically being delivered to two addresses, there had to be two transactions, and as it turns out, there is more furniture coming to "my" side than to T's. Walter clearly found that to be a mental stretch -- "Did we really mean for the other woman to get more out of this transaction than the WIFE?" He didn't ask, however. Just shook his head and rang it all up.

We had a great time imagining the conversations that our friend was likely to have with the other sales staff (especially with the gal who blew us off), and later with Mrs. Walter as he described the really big sale he made to the crazy family of three...

swan