Karyn's boyfriend is maybe 22, and sometimes he comes along to "help." This help usually manifests in him trapping me in interminable, stupid conversations. I don't know if he has older brothers or even friends, but the limited evidence suggests a scarcity of men in his life. I don't care about NASCAR, or paintball, or websites with revolting videos on them, yet Rob slings these topics into my life. If I know he's coming, I leave the house. I'd rather have him rob me than talk to me.
It's been six years since I last taught, and Metamuville ain't skewin' any younger, so Karyn is the only college-aged person I know well. As such, she's the recipient of anything I don't need anymore. She just received, for instance, a perfectly good Pottery Barn dish set, all for the low, low price of not making me help her carry it to her car. Thanks to my midlife allergy flareup, she's similarly gotten a couch, a never-used down comforter, and a really sweet vacuum cleaner. Karyn is over-the-top grateful and guilty-feeling.
Rob, an unwanted beneficiary of my gifts, has a different reaction. Peering into my cabinet and seeing some dessert plates, he asked "Do you still want these?"
"I noticed some computers in your bedroom closet," he actually said to me after "helping" "clean" my house. He dug his toe into my floor coquettishly. "Do you want to get rid of any of those?"
"The computers currently running? That my business uses every day? Not particularly."
Undeterred, he's continued to ask if I still want other things he covets. It can't hurt to ask, apparently. Mi casa es su smorgasbord.