Strewing Petals on Troubled Waters

I'm generally not much for buying flowers for women.

But once upon a time, in a life long ago, I was told it would be advisable.

My college president had the misfortune (or fortune, as the case may have it) to get divorced from a woman whom I'll call Barbara. They had been married for some time, and he came to the college with her. She was by his side at ceremonial events, and she presided over parties and other social obligations. But she started to lose her mind. She attributed this to the pressure of being a college president's wife, but she was probably going to lose her competence anyway.

Several years later, the president remarried--a woman whom I'll call Judith.

I am notoriously lackadaisical about names (I shouldn't be), and I happened to call his house after he had been married to Judith for several years. I had met her and talked to her. She was a tall, rather harsh-looking woman, who seemed to have to try to be pleasant. But she also came from money and seemed impatient with people who did not (like myself). When I called the house, she answered the phone, and I inadvertently addressed her as "Barbara."

The conversation went something like this, me being chipper and friendly, her becoming more angry and impatient:

"Hi! Barbara, it's good to talk to you."
"Harry! What planet are you on?"
"Wha---?"
"I'm not Barbara. Barbara is gone."
I hesitated, confused. But I persevered.
"Come on--we've met. We've talked. I know you're Barbara."
I enlarged my mouth as my foot enlarged to fit into it. My insistence on being right astonishes me now, and should be a good object lesson: whenever I'm absolutely certain of my ground, I have no ground whatsoever and should back off.

But no, I forged merrily on, insisting that she was Barbara, though she was, in fact, Judith, and had every right to be perturbed with me.

Finally, not admitting defeat, I asked to talk to Jerry, and she huffed off. I began to think something might have been wrong and asked Jerry what his wife's name was:

"Judith--we've been married a couple of years now."
"She sounded pissed."
"Send flowers."

I got the address and squeezed out about $50 for a bouquet to be sent to the house.

I don't know if she remembered the incident, but years later, when I happened to be near their new home in Naples, Florida, she and Jerry invited me and my girl friend to the house for dinner. The evening passed pleasantly enough, though she recalled, with some acerbity, that another refugee from the college, the former chair of the photography department, Bob Vigiletti, had also dropped in, unannounced, a year earlier. They seemed to have gone underground. Jerry was running a gallery connected to a large hotel in Naples, and Susan (that's her name!) was occupying herself in various charitable pursuits, including a throwaway newspaper about local arts activities. She was quite bitter about events in Detroit, and I only put my foot in my mouth once, relaying what I thought would be well-received greetings from another colleague--Diane Voss. Susan spat out that Diane had savaged Jerry mercilessly as he was getting ready to resign. I decided there were stories that I didn't know and was better off in my innocence.

Flowers. They weren't roses. I couldn't picture what the florist told me the bouquet would consist of. But I thought I'd better trust his judgement, since mine had betrayed me so effectively.