Doug Marlow

Yay! I made it through the pandemic.

Cleary, so did you.

Guess who else made it? Doug Marlow.

You probably have no idea who the hell that is. I didn’t either until last summer.

Doug is 82 years old, lives a mile down the road, and has his own personal billboard campaign.

Scattered across his yard were signs that read “My yard is bigger than my house! You believe that?”

One afternoon, I stopped by while he was pruning the weeds from his sidewalk. He was hunched over in torn denim shorts, wearing something aquamarine that looked like a cross between a bra and a parasol.

“Couldn’t help but notice your signs.” I said. “All hundred of them.”

Doug perked up like I was offering a moth collection worth six billion dollars.

“If your house was bigger than your yard, it would spill out on to the street,” I told him.

“God darn!” Doug whistled. “Cars would ram into it, wouldn’t they?”

“Sure would.”

He invited me in for some red velvet cheesecake, which he claimed to have made from scratch on his pristine marble countertop.

As we devoured two slices each, his TV tried (and failed) to broadcast some game show–mostly, it just fizzled out in static.

I know nothing about fixing TVs. So, I suggested he shoot a bullet through the screen and call it a day.

That got us both laughing.

And that’s how my friendship with Doug Marlow started.