COLUMN: He Gabs So I Don't Have To

By Tobin Barnes
Saw my wife’s brother-in-law Chuck last weekend. He married my wife’s sister several decades ago. His antics have been conversation starters ever since.

Many of you have met him before in my columns. Although he’s related by marriage to my wife, he’s not my brother-in-law…technically. And with regards to Chuck, I like to abide by technicalities in case push comes to shove.

As I’ve said before, keeping him out of my immediate family gives me deniability, as in “Hey, I just know the guy, it’s not like I’m related to him.”

Anyway, he and his lovely-but-long-suffering wife were out in the hills visiting his daughter who is an attorney currently living in Rapid City. Uh huh, I’ll likely be seeing a lot of Chuck here in the near future. He’s kind of clingy with the people he’s related to. (Once again, my relationship-phobia point is well made.)

They called us up to see if we wanted to drive down Spearfish Canyon with them to see the fall colors. Unfortunately, or not, depending on how you look at it, we’d just gotten back from doing that very thing. (It’s a fall ritual for us, as with most others around here.) So we told them to stop by the house when they were done.

We thought it would be two, three hours before we’d see them. It would give us a little relaxation time, as well as an opportunity to steel ourselves. So we had time. After all, most people like to slow down while taking in nature’s grandeur in one of the best drives in America.

Chuck, on the other hand, must have run into Mario Andretti there at the head of the canyon and challenged him to a race, he showed up on our doorstep so fast.

“Did you actually see any leaves on your drive,” I asked, somewhat startled by their unexpectedly rapid appearance.

“Yeah, it was nice,” Chuck replied, somewhat underwhelmed.

It sounded like the scene with Chevy Chase in “National Lampoon’s Vacation” where he walks up to the rim of the Grand Canyon, briefly takes a gander, says “Uh huh,” and then walks away to resume the trek to Wally World.

Chuck considers us somewhere left of the average tree hugger.

“What’s that in your garage?” Chuck asked without missing a beat.

“Did we leave the garage door up?” my wife asked. We like to keep it down.

“No. Your cars were parked outside, so I looked in the window.”

We have a couple big boxes in there that we haven’t unpacked yet. But we didn’t want to discuss them at this point, so I tried to sidetrack him with, “How about checking out our medicine cabinets while you’re at it.”

“Later,” he said.

Now don’t get me wrong. We enjoy Chuck’s company. We’ve gone on vacation with him. He’s a gregarious guy, and there’s never a lull in the conversation.

He’s a hit with little old ladies at funerals and weddings. You know...he’s that kind of guy. He’ll take the time to gab with anyone. He reminds me of my old man in that way. Me, on the other hand, I’m a conversational wallflower in comparison.

Nevertheless, I’ve always admired those who are willing to take the time and have the stamina to gab with gabbers.

Chuck’s daughter is living in an apartment in Rapid City. Next door lives a guy who’s literally starving for conversation. Yeah, poor soul. He’ll sit outside by the mailboxes hoping to snare passersby into talking about the weather and whatever else he can get out of them.

Chuck’s daughter is busy right now with her new career. She knows she doesn’t meet this guy’s craving for casual conversation, and, frankly, she doesn’t really want to try. Her relationship with him may have developed into one of those deals where you peek out the drapes before you leave the apartment to make sure the coast is clear.

But almost immediately after Chuck stepped out of the car on the first visit to his daughter, he and the neighbor were like soul mates. It was an immediate competition to see who could talk the other guy’s ear off. Yeah, it became a battle of the Titans, and it will undoubtedly be a continuing epic.

I’m sure Chuck can now tell me all the details of this guy’s life, probably down to underwear preference: boxers or briefs.

But I think I’ll save it for later. In case I’m ever paralyzed and have no other choice. Then I know there will be at least one guy to come visit me—Chuck.