It was sometime around 1995 when the dads in my South Jordan suburb got really into Magic Eye posters. You might remember the craze. Stores around the country began selling large prints of colorful patterns that, with some focus and patience, could reveal basic 3D images.
I don’t know what exactly launched the interest. It seemed like overnight the mustached men of our neighborhood began plastering the walls of their homes with framed copies of the latest optical illusions. They would call one another whenever they acquired a new one and invite the other dads over to gawk and admire it, like they had secured an authentic Monet.
They all supported one another in word, but make no mistake, this was a pissing match. A confusing, guttural, almost subconscious quiet competition. A low-stakes battle to outdo one another.
“Did you hear Bob got his hands on a 12-by-8 print of the shipwreck?” we might have overheard someone say at church on Sunday.
“Oh?” another man would respond with a slight air of superiority that only the most seasoned in Mormon mannerisms could ever recognize. “He went with the small size, then?”
Go fish
(Trevor Tondro | The New York Times) A 700-gallon aquarium hangs from the ceiling of a New York apartment.
Eventually, Magic Eye posters were replaced by fish tanks. The fish tank craze was a decidedly more expensive and inconvenient hobby. But it did free up the wall space so the neighborhood moms could again display those Latter-day Saint temple photos and outdated family pictures with children in Easter dresses and mullets.
There were two ways to one-up a neighbor in the fish tank war. The first was to buy the largest fish tank available. The tanks were measured by gallon size, and this was the information the dads would lead with when announcing their latest acquisition. The second way was to purchase an unmanageable number of these receptacles in various sizes, placing one to three of them in each room of the house. Several of our neighbors’ homes essentially became aquariums.
The fish tanks had to be cleaned once a month by hose to nearly empty them and refill with fresh water. My dad regretted getting sucked into the testosterone-fueled peer pressure the first time he had to do this with the 50-gallon tank that took up residence in our family room for the rest of the decade.
Tank size and quantity weren’t the only status symbols worth bragging about. The tanks were filled with exotic fish — the rarer the better. Strewn about the base were artificial choral, half-buried miniature shipwrecks, and, for the tackiest dads, clamshell-brassiered mermaid figurines.
As a ‘90s tween, I joined the army of my contemporaries in feeding the neighborhood fish whenever a family went on vacation. That is, until one unfortunate episode in which I had forgotten about the new eighth tank in the Morleys’ basement, and they returned from Disneyland to a rotting swamp of decaying rainbowfish. (I can’t confirm whether this really was the reason my low-paying career in fish-feeding ended, but I’ve always assumed the reports of their death were greatly exaggerated, and it was for this reason I was never asked to be an aqua shepherd again.)
I assume the boomers of South Jordan moved onto a new collective hobby after the fish tanks, but I grew up and moved away before I could ever bear witness to it.
I’ve chuckled over the years thinking back to the Magic Eye posters and the pride they summoned from my dad’s friends. What an odd thing in which to root one’s self-esteem. And why would they feel superior to one another based on the size of their living room fish tank?
I suppose men have always been this way. When the first caveman met the second caveman, I’d bet my house the first thing they did was compare bone clubs and patronizingly compliment one another.
Forest trump
A few years ago, my husband and I got hooked on houseplants. We raided plant stores weekly, looking for anything colorful or distinctive. Before long, every surface in our house was covered with greenery, and I suddenly found myself tacked with a relentlessly time-consuming chore to keep them all on life support.
I realized what we were up against long before my husband did and began protesting new acquisitions, shouting “when will we have enough?” each time he brought home a new plant. He eventually had to start sneaking in plants and then gaslighting me when I noticed them, assuring me the new plant had always been there and expressing surprise that it took me this long to notice.
Some people have to find empty liquor bottles hidden throughout the house to discover their spouse has a problem. For me, it’s receipts from Cactus & Tropicals.
I had to admit there was something thrilling about inviting friends over and giving them an unsolicited tour of our indoor forest.
“You’re in luck,” we found ourselves saying. “The Christmas cactus is in bloom. Two months early this year.”
A few weeks ago my husband came home from a friend’s house he had just visited.
“Brian has a lovely little olive tree planted in a pot on his kitchen table,” he told me. “It’s about a foot tall — makes a nice centerpiece.”
“Oh?” I said, looking over at our own olive tree, which is about to outgrow our house, an involuntary smirk growing on my face. “He went with the small size, then?”
(Pat Bagley) Eli McCann, Salt Lake Tribune guest columnist.
Eli McCann is an attorney, writer and podcaster in Salt Lake City, where he lives with his husband and their two naughty (yet worshipped) dogs. You can find Eli on X, formerly known as Twitter, at @EliMcCann or at his personal website, www.itjustgetsstranger.com, where he tries to keep the swearing to a minimum so as not to upset his mother.