A few months after Mardelle and I were divorced, I was busy one Saturday afternoon with my weekend home chores when my doorbell rang. I answered the ring and to my utter surprise a friendly acquaintance stood there in the person of Dorothy Phillips.

Dorothy was a long time acquaintance. Even when Mary and I went to Encore Theatre, Dorothy was often the usher who showed us to our seats. After Mary’s death and I married Mardelle, Dorothy was frequently our usher at the shows.

More recently, Mardelle was a Humane Society enthusiast and she and I worked at their bingo games to raise operating funds. Dorothy sometimes helped at the bingo games. She was a good worker and a friendly person, although she sometimes she seemed a little flaky. She liked to talk and could talk to a perfect stranger with no problem at all.

I worked the bingo games after Mardelle had left me just to keep in touch with people.. One night toward the end of the bingo games Dorothy tried to get a group of workers to agree to a get-together after the games at a bar and grill. Dorothy Bales and I heard the word and took up the challenge. Ms. Bales and I took a booth to wait for Ms. Phillips. We ordered some food and drink, and by the time we finished, Dorothy was still a no-show. We’d had our own private party and decided there had been miscommunication, and bid each other good night.

“Hello Dorothy,” I said to the acquaintance at my door, “Come on in and sit down. What brings you way out here to my neck of the woods?”

“I came to see you,” she said, “I could have called, but I wanted to get out of the house anyway. How have you been?”

“I’ve been getting along OK. Keep myself busy most of the time,” I said.

“I didn’t know until recently that you and Mardelle divorced”

“Well I haven't broadcast the news. I guess she was tired of me. She said she didn’t want to be married any more.”

“I’m sorry,” she said, “You seemed to be a good husband. You seemed to be good with Mardelle too,. I remember ushering you to your seats at Encore Theater.”

“Mardelle and Mary were very different,” I said, “Mary was much easier for me to please.”

We talked about various things for the next half hour, about work, play, food, likes and dislikes. Finally when it seemed that she was ready to leave.

“I drove past your house twice before I had the nerve to stop in. the real reason I came over,” she said, “was to invite you out to dinner. I won dinner for two at an Italian restaurant, and I wanted to share it with you.”

“Thank you, I’d be honored to accept,” I said and we made arrangements on the spot. She took a card out of her purse and wrote an address and a phone number on it and handed it to me as she left.

The day we were to have dinner together I checked the card she had given to me for her address. Dorothy was ready for our dinner date. she introduced me to her mother, Goldie Crider. After a brief chat we left for dinners of fine Italian cuisine. Dorothy told me of her years as an employee of West Ohio Gas Co. and of the shakeup in management that had changed her job from pleasant to disagreeable. She resigned her job and moved in with her mother while she looked for a new job. Though Dorothy had lived in Ohio all her life she was a southerner at heart. She went to Savannah in her quest for a job, but without success, so she came back home and took a job with Green Thumb, an on-the-job training organization for unemployed people.

We spent a pleasant evening, talking about many other subjects. Before we said goodnight she invited me to call her. I said that I would be more than happy to do that. I had begun to kind of like her flaky style.

In a week or two I pulled out the card Dorothy had given me and dialed the number she had written. Mo answer. A few days later I tried again. No answer. I tried a few more times without success. Finally I drove over to her house and rang the doorbell. Dorothy came to the door.

“Hi Don. Glad you got here when you did. I was just about to go out. Why didn’t you call?”

“Why didn’t I call? I did. I did. And I did,” I said and handed her the card, the one that she had written on.

“Oh, no!” she screeched, “That’s the phone number at the apartment that I moved out of months ago. Come in!”