Traditions

When we moved back to Washington State Peter and I started a tradition of meeting each Wednesday for Lunch at a wonderful little Greek place in downtown Issaquah. It is a quite and cozy restaurant with , great food and wonderful service and its the perfect setting for intimate conversations or a nice place to sit and chat with friends. We considered this place as our own private restaurant. When we are at Tantalus we are young lovers. Tantalus was our secret and we only went there together. Each Wednesday Dale greeted us the same way with a huge smile and offering us our table which was located up a couple stairs with a nice window and a bit out of the way from the rest of the lunch crowd.

May 25 , 2006 our anniversary fell on a Wednesday and I new what I wanted to get Peter for a gift but I had been too busy to get to the store to pick it up. I figured since the store was next door to where we have lunch I could leave early and grab the gift, have it wrapped just before meeting Peter for lunch.

Revolution Art Gallery is a place that sells art by local artist a lot of the art is created from recycled products , its a great place to find one of a kind gifts and lets you support a local artist. One of the artists that is featured at the gallery makes fantastic clocks out of corrugated cardboard they have personality and charm. There were two clocks that had been on display for awhile but they were a bit pricey for cardboard. One of the clocks seemed to really fit my personality and the other one seemed more like Peter. After thinking about it I really wanted to give Peter the clock that seemed to represented myself. It's a small square clock about 6 inches tall and by 6inches wide. The different colors of cardboard that make the sides have a unique design and around the face of the clock there are old postage stamps. The stamps all have something to do with various types of air travel from hot air balloons, airplanes , space travel , blimps, all things I really love. So it seemed like the perfect gift to share with they guy I love. So I went ahead and spent $125 on a cardboard clock had it gift wrapped and told the clerk I was meeting my husband for lunch and was giving him the clock as an anniversary gift. I left the store and headed to our private meeting place.

Little did I know that as I was walking around the front of the building Peter was coming around the building from the back side. We were later told that we were only about 30 seconds apart. He too had a mission as he had also seen the clock with the air travel stamps and thought it would be a perfect gift. When he got into the store to purchase the clock it it was gone. He saw the other small clock that instead of stamps of airplanes and reference to air travel this clock had had music notes positioned creatively around the face. As a lover of music he decided he would purchase this clock and share with me something that he really loves. He bought the clock had it gift wrapped and told the sales clerk he was meeting his wife for lunch and would be giving her the clock as an anniversary gift. He then rushed off to our meeting place.

What we both found out later was the clerk at the art shop was really wishing that see new where we were having lunch. worried that we would want to return one of the clocks she called the owned of the store to share what had transpired over the past ten minutes. Both the clerk and the owner agreed that when we returned we could have a refund on one of the clocks.

Who in there right mind would want two cardboard clocks at a $125 each? The owner and the clerk where sure that once the gifts where opened we wouldn't want to keep 2 6ich square cardboard clocks for a total of $250. The owner told the clerk that it t would be okay to do a refund. So the clerk sat at the store and waited for our lunch to end to see if we would be back.


Once Peter arrived at the secret meeting place we ordered our lunch and traded gifts. We laughed when we saw what we each had picked out for the other. Peter and I shared our stories about how we had both just purchased them. Our waiter Dale was amazed as he looked at the almost identical one of a kind clocks that we had placed on the widow sill. He said, " you too think a lot a like you are meant to be together. " We had a hard time not laughing every time we glanced at our gifts.

After lunch we walked back to the gallery and as soon as the clerk saw us she told us she had called the owner and had permission to return one of the clocks. She couldn't believe that the clocks had sat in the store untouched for over 6 months and then purchased the same day. We explained that we were not there to return our gifts just to tell her it was pretty funny and to thank her for her part of making our anniversary memorable as it was obviously not easy for to keep a straight face when she was selling the 2nd clock.

The clocks are kept in each of our offices and each time I look at the time I remember a special day that was full of love and silliness.