Love Is a Mix Tape: Life and Loss, One Song at a Time by Rob Sheffield Page A
Authors: Rob Sheffield
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involved doctors, lawyers, a small town full of lovable eccentrics, or Kirstie Alley.
Getting a Dog: She won this one easily, as I’ve already mentioned; I thought my graceful surrender would win me a concession or two down the line. I was wrong. Renée saw the dog not as a personal victory for her, but as a huge favor she was doing me by teaching me the joys of being pissed on by an animal. This is just one of the adorable quirks of the dog, the best friend God ever gave humanity in this crazy little world. Thanks, God!
The Air-conditioning Commercial: You know this one. It comes back every spring, like the gypsy moth caterpillar. The husband and wife sit sweating at the kitchen table. She says, “Honeeeeeey, why don’t we have aaaaaair-conditioning?” He says, “I’ll call tomorrow.” She says, “You’ll call today?” He smiles and says, “I’ll call today.” Then he’s on the phone, giving her a hearty thumbs-up, while Renée sits frozen, knuckles white on the remote, and asks, “I’m not like
her
, am I?” This question is like the cowboy in
Mulholland Drive
, who you see again one time if you do good and two times if you do bad. Answer the question wisely, and you won’t have to hear it again for another year. Try to give a clever answer, and you have bigger immediate problems than the humidity index.
The Cure’s “Let’s Go to Bed”: Similar to the above, but when she gets depressed and asks, “Honey, is this song about us?” the strategic answer is, “Yes, but so is ‘Just Like Heaven.’”
Fighting: As with most couples, probably, most of our fights were not
about
anything, but rather about fighting itself. We negotiated the rules, slowly, stupidly, over time. The word “sulk” got banned early on, in the summer of 1990. “Pout” was soon to follow. “Don’t start” was banned in the fall of 1992. “What is that supposed to mean?” got banned, reinstated, and banned again. “Not that again” took a few years to go on the index. “What are you thinking?” never did get banned, despite my intense lobbying efforts.
Whenever we had a fight,
I could never get to sleep, so after it was over I got up, moved to the couch, fixed a sandwich, and watched TV with the sound down. One night I watched this intense Bette Davis movie,
A Stolen Life
. Even without sound, I could still follow the basic gist. There are twin Bette Davises, a good twin and an evil twin. Both are in love with Glenn Ford. They’re in a boat; it’s stormy; the boat capsizes. The good twin sinks under the waves and desperately reaches out her hand. The evil twin reaches down, but instead of grasping the hand, she just slides the wedding ring right off her sister’s finger. Damn. That’s cold-blooded, Bette Davis. Back in town, she pretends to be the good twin and gets to have post-shipwreck sex with Glenn Ford. I fell asleep, so I never found out if she got caught. After Renée died, I kept meaning to go back and watch it with the sound on, but I never did.
One night, after some fight I’d thought we’d both forgotten, Renée woke up trembling and cold. She gave me very detailed instructions about what she needed. I was to get up, go into the kitchen, open up her stash of pizza dough, and make her a pizza. This would take half an hour or so. I asked if she’d be okay by herself for that long and she promised she would call me if she couldn’t make it. She was shaking. I got up and went to the kitchen.
When the pizza was done, I carried it back to bed and we ate it. Renée told me the whole time she was alone in bed, she sang a song over and over to comfort herself. She sang: “The only one who could ever reach me, was the Makin’-the-Pizza Man.”
dancing with myself
AUGUST 1993
O
ne day we were at the
Barracks Road Shopping Center when Renée called me over to the cosmetics aisle. We stared at a
Getting a Dog: She won this one easily, as I’ve already mentioned; I thought my graceful surrender would win me a concession or two down the line. I was wrong. Renée saw the dog not as a personal victory for her, but as a huge favor she was doing me by teaching me the joys of being pissed on by an animal. This is just one of the adorable quirks of the dog, the best friend God ever gave humanity in this crazy little world. Thanks, God!
The Air-conditioning Commercial: You know this one. It comes back every spring, like the gypsy moth caterpillar. The husband and wife sit sweating at the kitchen table. She says, “Honeeeeeey, why don’t we have aaaaaair-conditioning?” He says, “I’ll call tomorrow.” She says, “You’ll call today?” He smiles and says, “I’ll call today.” Then he’s on the phone, giving her a hearty thumbs-up, while Renée sits frozen, knuckles white on the remote, and asks, “I’m not like
her
, am I?” This question is like the cowboy in
Mulholland Drive
, who you see again one time if you do good and two times if you do bad. Answer the question wisely, and you won’t have to hear it again for another year. Try to give a clever answer, and you have bigger immediate problems than the humidity index.
The Cure’s “Let’s Go to Bed”: Similar to the above, but when she gets depressed and asks, “Honey, is this song about us?” the strategic answer is, “Yes, but so is ‘Just Like Heaven.’”
Fighting: As with most couples, probably, most of our fights were not
about
anything, but rather about fighting itself. We negotiated the rules, slowly, stupidly, over time. The word “sulk” got banned early on, in the summer of 1990. “Pout” was soon to follow. “Don’t start” was banned in the fall of 1992. “What is that supposed to mean?” got banned, reinstated, and banned again. “Not that again” took a few years to go on the index. “What are you thinking?” never did get banned, despite my intense lobbying efforts.
Whenever we had a fight,
I could never get to sleep, so after it was over I got up, moved to the couch, fixed a sandwich, and watched TV with the sound down. One night I watched this intense Bette Davis movie,
A Stolen Life
. Even without sound, I could still follow the basic gist. There are twin Bette Davises, a good twin and an evil twin. Both are in love with Glenn Ford. They’re in a boat; it’s stormy; the boat capsizes. The good twin sinks under the waves and desperately reaches out her hand. The evil twin reaches down, but instead of grasping the hand, she just slides the wedding ring right off her sister’s finger. Damn. That’s cold-blooded, Bette Davis. Back in town, she pretends to be the good twin and gets to have post-shipwreck sex with Glenn Ford. I fell asleep, so I never found out if she got caught. After Renée died, I kept meaning to go back and watch it with the sound on, but I never did.
One night, after some fight I’d thought we’d both forgotten, Renée woke up trembling and cold. She gave me very detailed instructions about what she needed. I was to get up, go into the kitchen, open up her stash of pizza dough, and make her a pizza. This would take half an hour or so. I asked if she’d be okay by herself for that long and she promised she would call me if she couldn’t make it. She was shaking. I got up and went to the kitchen.
When the pizza was done, I carried it back to bed and we ate it. Renée told me the whole time she was alone in bed, she sang a song over and over to comfort herself. She sang: “The only one who could ever reach me, was the Makin’-the-Pizza Man.”
dancing with myself
AUGUST 1993
O
ne day we were at the
Barracks Road Shopping Center when Renée called me over to the cosmetics aisle. We stared at a
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