An Ordinary Man Steve did all of his thinking in the shower. Sadly for him, he preferred taking baths so he rarely got much thinking done. His life was one of an ordinary man. He wasn’t very smart but he wasn’t quite the idiot. The great blue marble that he lived on did not care very much for him, nor he it. Such was the life of this ordinary man. He lived in a house of a moderate size with a wife of a moderate size. She was the sort of woman who reminded Steve of a cheese grater: big, boxy, and possessing the uncanny ability to grate on his nerves. Her name was Helen and her two hobbies were vacuuming in the middle of the night and improving the self-esteem of plants. Steve called her a gardener but she preferred “plant therapist” because she thought it had more class. Now Steve and Helen had been married for five years and during that time each realized how boring their partner was. One day, after Steve saw the water bill, he decided to forgo his customary fourth bath of the day and take a shower. And during that shower he started to think, as he could not help but do, and he thought about his marriage. When thinking of his blessed union the image of an open fridge appeared and brought up memories of the only thing he and his wife had in common: food. His fridge always seemed to be fully stocked on Monday with enough food for a week but then Sunday would roll around and she would have to go grocery shopping. How odd was it that the food would magically run out by Saturday night? Steve wondered, while reaching for the soap. What could she possibly be doing at the grocery store once a week? Shopping? But that didn’t make any sense! Steve let out an exasperated sigh and said out loud, “A person doesn’t just go to a grocery store to shop! She must be doing something else while she is there!” Now Steve hadn’t been to the grocery store in months and as he wracked his brain trying to think of what his wife was doing there, he suddenly remembered something. His wife had thanked the bag boy after getting her groceries! As he rinsed the soap from his hair, Steve had two thoughts: either his wife was
Pillars of Salt 17
