It Happened on Maple Street

“We could do something else if you want.”

“I want to see your house. And watch you work out.” I got a little hot saying that, but I was going to be really disappointed if he changed his mind. I thought about him all day and all night and I didn’t even know where he lived. Where he slept.

Besides, I’d spent my whole life watching guys do their sports. If not in person, then on television. The male domination in my household insisted, collectively, that a sporting event, any sporting event, took precedence over any other show being broadcast on television.

I was actually looking forward to the weight-lifting part.

The reason I was tense enough to split in half, which he must have picked up on, was because I was going to meet Tim’s mom. She wasn’t going to like me. I just had this feeling.

I was too sure of my opinion. I said what I thought.

Yeah, not good.

And when I wasn’t saying what I was thinking, I didn’t say anything at all.

I just wasn’t good at social pleasantries. Mostly because I thought they were duplicitous and a waste of time. I’d tried to make casual conversation a time or two, but the words just sounded dumb and I’d embarrassed myself.

Tim’s mom was going to hate me.

“Have you ever seen the Rhoda show?” We were driving forever. Really far from home. Out into the country. There were no towns around. Not a fast-food hamburger joint anywhere for miles.

I was completely out of my element.

And I wanted to be with him so badly. I focused on his hands on the steering wheel. They made me feel safe.

And excited me at the same time.

“Yeah,” he said. He was excited, too? Had I said that out loud?

And then I remembered the Rhoda question. That was so me, having three different conversations going on in my head at one time.

“With Valerie Harper?” I asked. The Rhoda question came from my earlier thoughts about sports reigning supreme in my house.

Watching Tim lift weights sounded . . . erotic . . . but I did not want to saddle myself with a guy who thought life revolved around sports.

What I did want to do was saddle myself with Tim. I knew that already. I was thinking about a future with him. Wanting a future with him. A lifetime’s worth of future.

I might not have dated before, but I knew what I wanted. I’d always been that way. And I was generally right—about what I wanted.

“Yeah, Rhoda with Valerie Harper.”

“Really?” I asked.

“Yeah.”

“Rhoda, as on Mary Tyler . . .”

“Moore,” he finished, sitting back with the ease of a man comfortable with the powerful machine he controlled.

“You watched Mary Tyler Moore?”

“On Saturday nights.”

So had I. Every single Saturday night all through high school. Whether I was babysitting or at home.

“Did you see the one where Rhoda’s mom stayed with Mary?” The episode had aired in the first season back in ’70 or ’71.

“Ida? Because Rhoda wouldn’t see her? Yep.”