How Sex with a Garden Gnome Landed Me a Wife
A true story you shouldn’t try at home.
It was the summer of 1992 and I was in the prime of my life. I was a fit twenty-something male, not overly unattractive, well built and sporting my own teeth and hair.
I was eminently single, as all my married friends kept telling me. So eminent it was becoming an issue. It wasn’t something I lost sleep over, but the nagging voice was never too far away.
My charm was part of the problem. It landed me in bed, more often than not, with a bevy of young ladies. Young ladies who although on the surface may have appeared comely, really weren’t marriage material. Beer tends to hamper your visual acuity and may also impair your judgment, especially after the fifth one.
One of our great English pastimes is gardening. We love our gardens and will spend disproportionate amounts of time on them. My parents called, more specifically my mum, asking for help pruning a rampant creeper that had invaded the eaves of their house.
“Has to come down Rob. It’s going to lift the whole roof and you know what your father's like on the ladder."
I did, and rather than driving him to casualty again for another broken leg, I agreed to attack the offending plant that weekend. I dutifully showed up the following Sunday morning armed with pruning shears and a monumental hangover.
Over the course of the next two hours I managed to remove most of the offending plant and was taking a break when I noticed Elvis. He’d been a firm favorite of mine as a child. Elvis was a garden gnome and his pride of place had been the stones beside the fishpond, keeping watch over the birds and the bees.
The creeper had latched on to him and pulled him over during its gallant attempt to remove the roof. Along with some of the roof tiles, the creeper could now also lay claim to Elvis as a victim. He was broken in two. I could remember him in glorious bright detail from my childhood and found his current sad state unacceptable. I decided there and then to fix him.
I picked up the two halves, de-creepered him as best I could and set off in search of glue. My father was, as always, prepared. He disappeared into his tool shed and emerged with a small pot. I took one look at the size and shook my head.
“That’s never going to be enough.”
“Oh yes it will”, he replied. “It’s that newfangled superglue stuff.”
Looking suspiciously at him I took the tin and headed for the table in the kitchen. I was only wearing a pair of swimming trunks, having shed my shirt earlier. The combination of the summer sun, the work, and the previous evening's beer had taken its toll and I was sweating.
Elvis has come apart around his midriff. An almost perfect circular break that looked as though it may have been where his parents initially joined his two halves. I cleaned the dirt off and then set about smearing the runny glue onto the crack. Wanting to ensure his wellbeing I dosed both sides with liberal amounts, ignoring my father's advice to ‘take it easy’.
I reassembled him on the countertop and sat and waited.
“How long”, I asked my father, referring of course to the glues setting time.
“Pretty much straight away. It’s really potent. Give it a try.”
Dubiously I lifted Elvis by his chubby arms. His bottom half obediently followed. I was suitably impressed. Not wanting to place too much stress on the new joint, I gingerly picked Elvis up and headed for the back garden. Halfway out the door, my mum yelled.
“It’s Jack on the phone, he wants to talk to you about the wedding.”
I sighed and reversed into the lounge, picking up the handset on the server table. My brother was one of my favorite people, but his timing wasn’t good.
I was now cradling Elvis in one arm, his belly pressed firmly against the front of my shorts and my leg pinned under his feet to stop him slipping. I’d taken one look at the white rug and decided putting him down wasn’t the brightest idea. Jack only had me on the phone for about a minute. Sometimes a minute is all life needs.
When I hung up it was with a dawning awareness that not all was well down south. A warm rather unpleasant feeling was spreading through the front of my shorts and Elvis seemed to be to blame. I had the distinct feeling my shorts were being pulled off. I looked down with growing concern at the face of the grinning gnome.
Trying to move him confirmed my worst fears. The excess glue had spread through the front of my shorts, more or less melting them and Elvis was now firmly attached to my manhood. You never ever, and I do mean never ever, want to use those four words in a sentence. Glue, gnome, firm and manhood.
I yelled, not in pain although it certainly wasn’t comfortable, but out of sheer panic. How was I going to get the gnome off? I had a date later that evening and I was pretty certain she wasn’t going to up for a threesome.
My parents came running of course and that just added to my problem. My mother clucked worriedly and my father immediately ran out the room, returning moments later with his new digital camera. He was suffering intermittent periods of intense mirth, mixed with outright howls of delight as he took photo after photo. Looking back now, if Facebook had been a thing I would probably have had to hang myself.
When the fits had subsided into mere giggles, he tried to help. He poured first cold and then hot water on the gnome, no good. I was duck-walked out to the pool and submerged with the gnome. No good. It was stuck and it had no intention of coming loose. There was only one solution and that was the local doctor’s surgery down the road. I sighed and nodded with a look of resignation. My life was over. It was a small village.
I was bundled into the back of their Volvo. Sitting was impossible given Elvis’ position and I lay across the back seat with the gnome on top.
“You guys all right back there? Need a little privacy? A blanket perhaps?”
My mother slapped him on the shoulder and he erupted in another gale of laughter, lasting the entire mile down the road to the surgery. When we arrived I was told to behave myself and they set off in search of a doctor.
They emerged about five minutes later, accompanied by a young woman who it turned out was the doctor’s new nurse. She was in her early twenties, drop-dead gorgeous and despite my situation I couldn’t help myself. As she lent into the car I asked.
“Fancy a double date tonight?”
She smiled and in that instant, lying in the backseat of a Volvo with Elvis astride me, I lost my heart. All thoughts of glue, gnomes and incapacitated penises fled my mind. All I could focus on was this angel bending over my gnomehood (I’d coined the phrase whilst waiting in the car) and nodding understandingly.
“Let’s get you inside first,” she said and stuck out a hand to help me up.
"We can discuss your weird mating habits later.”
It turns out I am not the only idiot to have glued something to himself. I may very well be the only person in the history of humanity to have glued an actual gnome to his penis, but I am not alone. It also turns out that doctors have a magic ointment that neutralizes the glue. Applying it proved a problem. My young nurse looked over at me with a cheeky smile and asked politely.
“Do you want to try and save him? The two of you are obviously quite attached.”
I thought about all my fond childhood memories of Elvis, his red-painted cheeks and happy smile always waiting for me beside the fishpond.
“Cave his skull in,” I replied, smiling back. No gnome was coming between me and Mr Happy.
Two hours later I was pronounced gnome free. The last bit had been painful but I was assured I would have no lasting after effects. I was given Elvis’ remains in a bag to take home for proper burial, and more importantly I had the number of the young nurse, clutched tightly in my hand.
Over the next few weeks, my nurse and I dated a few times and by the following spring, we were married. As a wedding gift, she bought me a brand new gnome for our garden. It’s one of my favorite things.
So the moral to this story, dear reader, is never pass a gnome without winking at him. He can help you in ways you never imagined.
About the Creator
Robert Turner
Published author and Founder of Cre8tive Media. Outspoken advocate for a better internet. Follow me on Twitter @robturnerwrites
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