My partner has impaired vision. It’s kind of a shame, particularly since we dumped several thousand dollars in one of the laser surgery centers to correct his vision several years ago.

Technically the results were superb. He went from 20/800 with thick glasses to 20/20 and no glasses at all. But there are still lots of things that he just doesn’t see—with or without glasses.

For instance, when he washes his breakfast dishes there’s always a reside of butter or jelly on the plate that requires rewashing. He just doesn’t see it. Similarly, Jasper, our ten-year-old cat, threw up last night and Howard cleaned the mess up. But the next morning I had to repeat the process to get the residual Howard didn’t see. Some of it wasn’t so residual and didn’t require much visual acuity. I stepped in it with bare feet—and it was cold.

Actually Jasper upchucks a lot at night—almost regularly, and invariably between 3 and 5 a.m. That, of course, is my favorite time to be out of bed and cleaning upchuck. At times I feel as if I’m breast-feeding, and am grateful for those occasional nights when we both can sleep through. The vet’s taken x-rays, prescribed hairball remover, and we’ve finally decided that Jasper simply wants company and knows how to get it.

It’s not that Jasper’s spoiled. It’s just that he’s a genuine JAP, Jasper—American Prince. We keep the sliding doors to the balcony open a bit so the cat can go in and out at will, and the Florida Power and Light Company loves us for it. There’s nothing like air-conditioning the outside to keep a cat happy. What we squander on air-conditioning for the cat could be saved for Jasper’s bar mitzvah. By the time he learns how to meow in Hebrew, and we rent a local cathouse for the reception, we’ll need all the money we can muster.

There are times, however, that I must admit Howard’s vision is better than 20/20. The first night that he spent in my apartment when we lived in Washington he complained that the bathtub was dirty. What he said was that it was filthy-green. Well, it wasn’t green but since I always shower I must confess that I hadn’t paid much attention to the tub. My last tub bath was around age nine and I didn’t see a tub bath as a therapeutic ritual as he did. I didn’t realize then that the man I was falling for had a bathroom fixation.

Howard would have done fine in the court of Louis-the-something-or-other with servants to scrub the tub, polish the mirrors and keep the floors spotless. He cleans the floor with Babo, Ajax, Clorox, Muriatic Acid, Windex (which according to My Big Fat Greek Wedding is good for arthritis when rubbed on the elbow), and whatever’s new at Home Depot. I think he’s trying to prove that the tiles really aren’t ceramic so he can get his money back. He uses my lack of a super-clean bathroom standard as evidence that my vision’s not so hot either.

What I want clean is the kitchen. If guests are offended by seeing cat footprints on the glass dining room table we can cover them with a tablecloth or we can eat on the kitchen floor. It’s clean enough. And since I don’t use Windex on my elbow but do use it, almost daily, on the dining table, we seldom use a tablecloth.