Once upon a time we used to throw parties at the drop of a hat. We’d invite everyone we knew and everyone we were working with. We’d march up to the Beachwood Market and buy ten pounds of shrimp for the barbeque and two dozen cheap wine glasses that would inevitably break over the course of the evening. Now, the gentlemen of the household would always stay up later than I would and I’m guessing they bid the last guests goodnight somewhere around three in the morning.
The morning after one of our hopping parties our friend reports he woke after just a couple of hours of sleep to my husband knocking at the door of his room. This is what he said, “You should get up.”
“Oh, noooooo.”
“No, you really… you need to get up. There’s a message for us in the living room. Help me.”
My husband and our friend walked down the hall past my closed bedroom door and then out into the entry. They looked down the three steps to the post and beam living room surrounded by soaring glass and awash in early morning light, and on the parquet floor this was spelled out in chips and bottle caps and crumpled napkins in two foot tall letters:
CLEAN ME.
Strangely enough, I have no recollection of this incident.