Moments That Make Me Smile
Copying two of the stories:
Back in college in 2009, I was a member of the Philosophy Club. In the club, there was this smart-as-an-engineer, witty, loved-theater, over-all great woman who was 25 years old, and I say woman because she already had a little boy, 2 years old, with her fiancee.
The fiancee was a full head of hair, mutton-chopped, leather jacket wearing mechanic, who rode a self-built motorcycle, yet he had a touch of the musical muse within him. He was in a cover-band and he could give the most amazing Bon Jovi impressions on stage -- you could literally close your eyes, raise your beer to the heavens and the nostalgia was overwhelming.
We became drinking buddies for the next two years. When we were alone or with the guys, he always had a devilish smirk and a wholehearted laugh. However, when I was at his home with him, his fiancee, and son, he was sober serious: never wore the leather jacket, he nurtured over his son, the boy constantly followed him around, he combed his hair, he was "yes, mam. no, mam" to his wife to be. Every-time I locked eyes with him at home, there was this aura of desperation about him. A feral aching that could be seen at the middle of his wrinkled brow or as he impulsively scratched at a phantom itch on his collar. I never addressed him about my observations and he never inferred it to me either: the "don't ask, told tell" code of manhood.
At the end of our friendship in 2010, his fiancee, now wife, got her second pregnancy and they both left to live in her home state, Arizona.
In 2012, I received a Christmas card from his wife. It was a picture of them on a sunny day standing before a loose gravel canyon. She was smiling, showing off her swollen belly of what would be her third child, as she held hands with her son, also smiling. To her side was her two year old daughter, clinging to the skirt of mother's summer dress while sucking her fist. And then there was the husband, standing just far enough from the mother and her brood to create a gap of negative space, as far he could distance himself without disrupting the family unit. He looked ten years older: he buzzed cut his hair, trying to hide the thinning hair line on top of his head, the wrinkle in his brow had successfully bridged his hairs into one furry uni-brow, and the only facial hair he had (or was allowed, most likely) was a short, salt and pepper chin-beard. Though he was wearing colorful summer greens and blues and reds, it could not conceal the obvious expression of utter defeat upon his face.
That family picture is forever burned into my cortex and is the precursor to the lighter nightmares I have (no poetic joke there). Looking at that picture at that the moment was when I chose to Go My Own Way.
I can't listen to Bon Jovi either; not without thinking of him.That's the first, here's the second:
I was working with a guy, really cool dude from southern Spain. He could make a zombie smile.
Anyway, I was sitting next to him and, this is no exaggeration, he was on the phone to his wife (who had no job) for 20mins.
He only muttered, with a blank stare on his face:
"Ah huh. Yes. Hmm. Yes. OK. Aha. Yes. Hmm. OK".
She was going nuclear, why?
BECAUSE HE ASKED HER TO TAKE CARE OF THE HOUSE, SHOPPING AND STUFF WHILE HE WAS WORKING.
The bitch was unemployed! And she didnt want to help out.
Guess what happened 5 months later? You guessed it.
SHE GOT PREGNANT.
So there you go. Now she has something to do.
FUCK IT. If your married, your doomed.Remember. Be aware and mindful of their unspoken pain.
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