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Previous Neighborhood stories
Perk and Ione were listening to Old Time Radio one night, and Bob and Ray were doing the routine about the guy who collects weird-shaped vegetables and saves them in paper bags. Ione was laughing her head off but Perk didn't see the humor.
“There's nothing funny about a guy having a hobby,” he said. “A person should have some interests.” Which kind of surprised Ione because Perk had never seemed the type to have interests except his job—some—and football—a lot.
“It's not having a collection that's funny,” she said. “It's the kind of collection. Think about it. Weird vegetables. In bags.”
Perk did think about it for a minute, and then he said, “Yeah, fruit would be a lot more interesting.”
Well, the next day Ione came home from the supermarket and Perk said, “What did you buy?” This surprised Ione so much she dropped a half-gallon milk bottle which, fortunately was plastic and only bruised one or two toes.
“Perk,” she said, “in seventeen years you have never asked me what I bought for groceries until it was time to ask what's for dinner.”
“Well,” said Perk, “I'm just trying to take an interest. Did you buy any fruit?”
Uh oh, thought Ione. “Yes,” she said, “but it's all real normal.” And she stuffed the bags into the refrigerator as fast as she could. Perk was heading right for the refrigerator himself but Ione reminded him pretty quickly about what her feelings always had been about people messing around in her kitchen, so he went into the living room instead.
Perk turned on the TV, and Ione started cooking. Normally when it came to the fruit salad she would have left the grapes whole, but this time she cut each one in half to keep them out of Perk's pockets. There's no fanatic like a convert, she thought, and Perk definitely had a gleam in his eye.
Dinner went as usual, but later that evening Perk said, “I guess I'll have a snack.”
Ione was off guard, and she thought he meant cheese curds and beer as usual, so she didn't think anything of it until she heard the plastic bags rustling out in the kitchen.
“Perk, what are you doing?” she said. “Nothing,” he said. “Kid me,” she said. And she went out to the kitchen, and there was Perk with all the fruit bags open on the counter, looking disappointed.
“This is all regular fruit,” he said.
“Of course, it is,” she said. “When have I ever fed you anything weird?”
“I wasn't looking for stuff to eat,” he said. “I know,” she said.
The next day Perk came home with a package of small paper bags, two kumquats that were egg
shaped, and a nectarine that had a kind of coin-shaped mark on the side of it.
“I don't think that's a collector's item,” said Ione.
“It isn't normal,” said Perk.
“Sure it is,” she said. “That's a bruise, probably from somebody's thumb. Also, kumquats are supposed to be that shape.”
“Oh,” said Perk.
After that he took to showing Ione all of his finds so she could tell him what was normal and what was a good bet as to future interest and possible appreciation in value. Ione went along with it, but she wouldn't let him keep the stuff in the paper bags. “Remember the vegetables in the radio show?” she said. “Got a little hard to live with, didn't they?”
“Yeah,” said Perk, “but the refrigerator's gonna get full, and I don't want to find something really good and have to pass it up just because storage is tight.” Then he had a flash. “What if we can the stuff?” he said.
“Great,” said Ione. “With everything else I've got to do?” But Perk looked a little hurt at that, so she said, “Okay, this once. I'll put everything in little jars, and you can keep them on the shelves in the fruit cellar.”
“Aw, gee,” said Perk. “This is a collection, remember? It's supposed to be where you can see it.”
“Oh,” said Ione. “Right.”
That weekend Ione got out some jelly glasses and she canned Perk's collection. Trouble was, the only way she knew how to can fruit was in heavy syrup which, as everybody knows, makes things kind of swell up and change color. Perk squinted at the jars.
“Gee,” he said, “canning makes it kinda hard to see the unique features of the items.” Ione had to agree.
“Yeah, she said, the nose on that plum doesn't show up very well, or the fact the strawberry is umbrella shaped.” Perk nodded glumly. “There's got to be a better way,” he said.
The next day Perk brought home a two-liter bottle of Russian vodka. “Don't know why I didn't think of it before,” he said. “I can just fill up the jars with this.”
“That could get expensive,” said Ione.
“If you're gonna have a hobby,” Perk said, “you've gotta do it right. Else it's no fun.” Ione didn't say anything.
After a while Perk decided that the jelly glasses just weren't classy enough for a collection that had peaches with lips and long-haired kiwi fruits and was done up in Russian vodka. So he brought home a few dozen fancy little glass candy jars from the craft store in the mall. Ione was thinking this could get really expensive.
“How are you going to seal those?” she said, hoping there was no way. But Perk was ready for her. He said, “With these lids that come with them. I can put some caulk around the tops so they’re sealed, and then, well, maybe a little ribbon around the top would be nice. I kinda liked the way they looked with the dried weeds in the store.”
And guess who gets to put the ribbon on, Ione thought, but then she decided it was easier than canning so she did it. She had to admit the jars ended up looking cute. She also thought a little cuteness could go a long way.
Perk put up some shelves in the living room so he could show his collection to anybody who happened to stop by and notice it. Noticing actually was tough to avoid because he put up the shelves directly across from the davenport and then moved all the chairs around so there was no place in that room where you could not see those shelves unless you got face down on the floor. He didn't think the smell of the caulk really stayed around too long, either.
About the time Perk had his hundredth jar—which was an inside-out raspberry he'd had to go to three pick-your-own farms to get—the shelves in the living room were all filled up. Have to put up
some more he said.
“There's a lot of room in the basement,” Ione said. She was thinking that maybe a hundred jars of collector fruit in the living room was about ninety-seven too many. She had been thinking this for a while.
“Oh, no,” said Perk. “Any real collector gives his collection the best place in the house.” And off he went for the lumber and he put up four more shelves in the living room even though Aunt Bertha's breakfront did have to go into the hall and that meant the hall table went upstairs into the spare room and the table from there (that was in the family) had to go in the attic. Ione could just imagine what her sister, Mitzi, would say about that after giving up that table just because she had bronchitis at the time and Ione could out-yell her.
Actually Ione was coping—although the blueberries with eyelids gave her kind of a strange feeling and she couldn't quite believe that a double-ended persimmon was something children ought to see—but when Perk reached his hundred and sixty-second jar she had to rethink the situation.
It was fall by now and although Perk had shown the interest she would have expected in the harvest of apples and pumpkins, so far he had not watched one single football game.
Omigod, she thought, fruit collection has turned the man's brain. How could I have let this happen to him? And what am I going to do with myself all the time I'm not making popcorn and chili dogs?
Ione called up Mitzi and carefully didn't say anything about tables. “So what's the problem?” said Mitzi. “Get your own hobby. That's what I did when Ed took up sandblasting.”
“Was that the carnivorous plants?” said Ione. “Yep,” said Mitzi.
“But doesn't Ed hate them?” said Ione.
“You bet,” said Mitzi. “So at least there's one room in the house I can go into that isn't full of grit. That's the secret, see? You've gotta get a hobby Perk hates.”
“I don't exactly have a green thumb,” Ione said, “but I'll think about it.”
The next day while Perk was at the farmer's market Ione took down one of the fruit jars. She took it out of the back row, and anyhow it was an early effort she didn't think Perk looked at any more. The caulk came off pretty easily with a paring knife and the fruit-flavored vodka tasted better than she would have expected. It was even better with ice and even better than that in a wine glass. Ione opened a couple more jars. She sat on the davenport and contemplated the fruit shelves, which, by now, looked as if some pack-rat recluse had had his newspaper subscription cut off and got desperate for something to keep around.
Good-looking shelves, actually, she thought. Good-looking ribbon on the jars. She toasted the shelves. She toasted the jars and the ribbon. Great collection, she said, and toasted it, too. Then she went to call Mitzi again.
“Come on over tomorrow,” she said. “You can have that table you wanted, and I'll show you my great new hobby. I've gotta tell you, you steered me right on that. Perk's really gonna hate it.”