My apartment

A few days ago I had a conversation with Marie that started like this. It didn't end like this, and in fact we are still talking. But it's something I guess I have to think about.

You know, my love, your place is really bare:
No love seat, armchair, wifi, or TV.
A kitchen -- table -- bed -- that's all that's there.
No place to house your boys -- no place for me.

 

Do you suppose that's why they'd rather stay
With your ex-wife, when back this way they roam?
She's sick and bat-shit crazy, so you say.
But maybe her place looks more like a home.

 

For thirty years, weighed down by all her hoard
Of heirloom trash, we "made a home," you see.
I finally broke out, and -- oh my Lord! --
I want to travel light and travel free.

 

But do you now? Take care. For it's well known,
You travel fastest when you fly alone.

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Little blue pills

I just put Marie on the plane to fly home, after she visited me here for a couple of days. This makes the ... what? fourth? ... time she's visited me. I've visited her once (twice if you count the trip to her family's vacation home). I'm sure she has noticed the discrepancy and is mulling it.

It was fun having her here. Two nights ago we had my neighbors over for dinner, drank plenty of wine, and talked for hours. Yesterday she and I had lunch with one of my friends from work (well OK, my only real friend from work) ... and again, talked amiably until I had to get back for a meeting. She liked all of them; I haven't heard any feedback on her yet, but everybody seemed positive enough. It was all good.

The sex was mostly good, but I use the word "mostly" with care. As I've mentioned before, I've broken down and gotten a prescription for Viagra. And the erections have been great: solid and very durable. Marie, who is in her 50's but never had much of a sex life before getting together with me, was ecstatic. Many times, and very happily. She keeps making discoveries that if she moves like so and I pitch the angle there, ... oooh, aaah, that's really nice!

What I didn't do was come. Ever. I don't know if it is old age, or the medication, or one of my other medications, or just that I wasn't in a sufficiently rutting state of mind. But whatever it was, I could keep going until after a while I'd kind of lose interest and stop. Not with a bang, but a whimper.

Last night Marie asked me if I thought I'd ever want to live with someone again. It sounds like she really hasn't given up wanting to be "Mrs. Tanatu". I told her I couldn't vouch for the future, but today No. Today I love visiting with people, having them over for dinner, talking long into the night, even fucking ... and then having my own private space I can retreat into, where I can rest and recuperate. She sighed and said Yes, she'd read advice that when you enter a romantic relationship you should never do it with the expectation that the other person is going to change in this or that way for you. I agreed, adding only the modification that the other person might indeed change -- but it's still a bad idea to hope that that change is going to be in the exact direction you want. So we cuddled until we fell asleep, and this morning she caught a plane home.

But yes, I think that's what she wants.
    

Thinking like a Tanatu

Son 2 phoned me from school about an hour ago, in high dudgeon. He said he was mad and had to vent steam at somebody. What was he so mad about? He had just gotten out of his freshman humanities class, where they had had a discussion about the Euthyphro, the Apology, and the Crito. Son 2 had tried to make an argument about how people’s understanding of justice depends on the government they live under … and nobody understood what he was talking about. Literally nobody. He said he was frustrated to the point of bursting at “trying to make them think like a Tanatu.” (Not that we Tanatus have any corner on that market, of course, but I guess in his class it was starting to look that way.)

 

I told him that actually I could see some nits to pick in his thesis, and he accepted that. Of course there are nits to pick! That’s what drives the conversation forward. But that nobody could even understand him …!

 

So then I went on to add two other comments. (1) Welcome to large public universities. (2) Not to put too fine a point on it, but … welcome to [the state where he’s going to school]. Yes, they have a fine agriculture program. But they’re not known as a beacon of philosophical learning.

 

Meanwhile his best friend from high school is attending a liberal arts college in California, and says people introduce themselves with both their name and their preferred pronoun (he or she) … rather than leaving it to you to guess, I suppose.

 

That may encapsulate the whole red-state/blue-state thing right there ….

 

 

Pay attention, dammit!

About a month ago, I tripped and fell on my way home from my volunteer work. Here's how I described it to Marie:

I tripped and fell while walking home from [my volunteer work]. More exactly I was watching a CNN segment on my iPhone and not watching where I was going, so I set my foot down wrong and my right ankle folded under me the way it did in Peru. (I told you that story, didn't I?) So I landed on my face in the middle of a residential side street. Fortunately there were no cars coming by. I pulled myself up, retrieved my phone (which had skidded a couple feet away, still playing), turned it off, and walked slowly the rest of the way home with exaggerated caution. The end result was a bruised and bloody nose (though it's not bleeding any more) and one scraped knee (which actually looked worse once I cleaned off the dirt because you could see the blood). I wiped the knee clean with a washcloth and put a bandage on it. My nose has stopped bleeding.

The moral of the story is to watch where the hell you're going. Also that I am not immune from damn-fool stupidity and inattention.

Since then I have been walking much more slowly and attentively. But do I sometimes think of other things? Of course! I've always thought about things while I walk! So it happened again last Thursday.

... I fell again. I was looking for a place to cross the street in the middle of the block, didn't watch the unevenness of the curb, and crumpled. It was better this time: I was moving a lot more slowly so I had effectively no forward momentum, and my hands were free so I could cover my head. I just crumpled in place, right next to a sign giving the parking restrictions. A man was unlocking his bike from the same sign, and he helped me right up. I had banged up my left knee again, but it wasn't bleeding this time. 

So I made my way on to Sangha. [One of the two that I try to attend weekly, when I'm in town.] And that was a good thing, because it gave me space to calm down. Because while I was physically in much better shape than after my fall 33 days ago, I was upset and scared. Twice in just over a month? What's the common factor? I have NOT been having more generalized balance problems. In fact I have walked on dirt trails between then and now, just fine. But also in the last month I have been far more aware of the pavement under my feet; I have walked a lot slower than before; I take more care to look where I'm going. And I still fell, because I was watching the traffic and not my feet. Do I have to watch my feet for every step? Ain't gonna happen. Or just never step off sidewalks into the street? Intriguing idea but still impractical. Do I need to see a foot specialist? And do what -- encase my right ankle in a brace that prevents it from bending? That doesn't sound right. I don't know. I'm very confused and still a little bit scared of it. 

Marie is very worried, because she doesn't want me to faceplant in front of oncoming traffic. I told a friend at work and he just kidded me about it. What do you want, a walker? Trust me, it's just that you weren't paying attention. It's nothing worse.

Yeah, I'm sure he's right. So this evening I was walking home from my volunteer work again, paying exaggerated attention to the sidewalk (or so I thought) but also mulling how to respond now that Wife is demanding more money again ... and I stepped in a pile of dog shit. With the same foot that twice crumpled beneath me ... three times if you count Peru.

Somebody is trying to get my attention -- a Somebody with a remarkably sophomoric sense of humor. And I think the message is, Watch where the fuck you're going! Pay attention! Be mindful!

I'm starting to think that I need to turn every walk into Walking Mindfulness Meditation. Just bloody wonderful.
    

First day of school

It's late and I have a 7:00 am meeting tomorrow so I'll keep this short. But I talked with Son 2 this evening. Classes started today. He had the first meeting of his Chemistry class and his Land Management class; one had 300 students, and the other 200. A bit of a change from Durmstrang, which had 96 students in all 4 years.

He also joined the Fencing Club. When they went around the room introducing themselves he discovered that he actually has the most years of fencing behind him, though he's 4 years out of practice. (He fenced from about 7 or 8 through the end of middle school.) Also there's a guy in his dorm who offered to teach him to box. WHAT??? (Dad panics.) Hey, I don't want you getting a concussion! Yeah, yeah, Dad, don't worry. I promise not to get a concussion. 

And of course there's nothing I can do about it. Who'd a thunk of boxing as a form of college rebellion?

Meanwhile he has lots of plans to exercise regularly, as a reaction to the heavily fried and potato-based cuisine.

His roommate still hasn't shown up, so he's planning to spread into the other half of the room.

And that -- plus his mailing address -- is what I learned in a quarter hour.

Time for bed. Night-night.

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Son 2 goes to college

Son 2 moves into his dorm today. 

His school is a good two days' drive from home. Actually we took a little longer because we drove out to visit Schmidt and his mom en route. Son 2 likes the Schmidts, they like him -- it's a good match all around. But now, here we are.

I should clarify that "we" means me and Son 2. Wife stayed home, partly because I can't stand to be around her for several days any more, and partly because Son 1 was due home from his summer internship the day after Son 2 and I left. So she drove to the airport to pick him up and house him. Also I think she's going to help him get his driver's license. For all her faults, Wife taught both boys how to drive over the last couple of years, and I'm grateful.

But now both of them will be in college. Still costing money, but ever more independent. That's a good thing -- it's what we raise them for. Also, as I suggested in these pages years ago, I think I was reaching the limits of how much I could do as a father. It will be good for me as well as for them that I no longer have to maintain quite the same role. Boarding school achieved something of the same thing (thanks be to God) but it will be ever more so from here on out.

It will be a busy day, but I have great hopes for it to be a good one as well. And then after this I round out the week by going to visit Marie....

On the beach

The last week, I've been vacationing with Marie and her family. The family owns a cottage on Lake Michigan, and Marie has many fond memories of growing up there. So for some time she has wanted to show me the places she so loved growing up, and she has wanted me to meet her family. This seemed to be the perfect time.

Her parents are both dead, and her brothers weren't there this week because of their schedules; but her sister was there -- let me call her Cuñada -- along with Cuñada's husband and teenaged son, one of her son's friends (emphatically not a girlfriend, I was told), and a family friend of Cuñada's that acted for all the world like Boyfriend 4. I'll call this friend Brian, if I need to talk about him.

Actually I found myself wondering about Brian. He acted like an adult authority to Cuñada's son and his friend, much as if he were an auxiliary parent. On the other hand his orders were often not very smart, and half the time Cuñada directly undercut him. He addressed Cuñada with endearments when her husband wasn't there ("dear" or "darling" or something conventional like that) and at least once I saw him pat her knee affectionately. So is he her lover? Is this really a Boyfriend-4 situation? I asked Marie one afternoon as we strolled along the beach. She said she had the same questions but had never asked her sister directly. She sure didn't rule it out, though she did allow for at least one other possibility -- namely that Brian might want a relationship with Cuñada, but not have one. Yet.

Cuñada is a big, loud, friendly, outgoing woman. She was the chief organizer of the week, and clearly the boss. She was also very welcoming. What she told Marie was that she was glad of the chance to tease Marie about having a boyfriend, because I am quite literally the first boyfriend Marie has ever brought home to meet her family in all her 55 years. What she told me, in addition, is that she is delighted Marie is so happy. Up till now Marie had been happy plenty of times, of course -- but all her normal range of emotions were like an overlay on a bedrock of something that was not happiness. Now she still has the normal range of emotions, but they are an overlay on top of profound Joy. Apparently there really is something to the old cliché that getting laid improves your mood. Who knew?

And there was plenty of sex this week. Marie and I were in the same bedroom (of course) and spent every night holding each other, fondling each other .... The night I arrived we were both exhausted from travel and I wasn't about to get hard, but I fondled Marie to a long string of rolling orgasms that she had been sure she was too tired for. Then we woke about 3:30 in the morning and fucked properly before finally falling back asleep till the morning coffee. Cuñada teased both of us because she had the bedroom next to ours and the cottage wasn't built to be soundproof. Marie insisted, "But I was biting my hand hard to stifle myself so I'd be quiet!" Cuñada answered, "Mi hermana, if that's what you call quiet ... well, let me just say you've never tried to have sex when you've got small children in the house." Marie and I heard a lot on this theme over the week.

A week or two before this trip I saw my doctor and got my first-ever prescription for viagra. After years of progressively rarer and softer erections, I figured it was time. And so Tuesday afternoon, when we had some time and could plan half an hour ahead, we decided to try it. The results were remarkable. I never actually came, but I stayed hard for longer than I have in many, many years -- probably the better part of an hour. Marie, who has usually made do (very happily) with my fingers and tongue, was beside herself. Since I had plenty of time, I varied angle, depth, and tempo; she said afterwards she had had no idea how different each different angle inside her was going to feel. She was exhausted and giddy. I've often said that women are at their most beautiful lying back sweaty and flushed, with their hair a tousled mess. By that measure, Marie was very beautiful that afternoon.

Later that evening, after dinner, she and I decided to walk down to the beach. It was dark but warm, and we took a blanket to sit on. So we sat in the warm night and looked at the stars. After a while we lay back. Then we started kissing. I began to stroke her hair, ... her ears, ... her neck, ... her throat, ... her breasts. My hands slid down her sides and pulled up her loose sun dress. She had no panties for me to pull aside, and she was very wet. We were completely alone, so I massaged, and prodded, and opened, and rubbed until Marie was gasping and jerking and trying not to yell. And then ....

I checked again. We were completely alone. So I slipped off my own pants and slid inside her. It was the afternoon all over again. But we were on the beach, in the open air. Isn't this what teenagers do, fuck on the beach? It was warm and close and exciting. Maybe tonight I could come? I got closer ....

Completely alone? Well no, in fact. There were voices, and a light. Were they coming our way? Yes! Had they seen us? No way to tell. I slid out of Marie and lay on top of her, as still as I could manage. The voices and the light got closer to us, and closer still. We lay quietly, almost holding our breaths. And then we saw them, two teenaged girls walking along nonchalantly, talking casually about their own concerns, reading their cell phones while also using them as flashlights to find the way. They passed ten, maybe five yards to one side of us, giving not the slightest indication that they ever saw us. We waited till they were well out of sight and out of earshot before we carefully pulled ourselves together and found our way giggling back to the cottage. 

Hey, another first. Fifty-four years old and I've finally had sex on the beach!

What else did we do this week? We watched fireworks, we cooked, we barbecued. Teenaged son had a birthday so we all got cake. We swam in the lake, strolled through the woods, visited the local tourist attractions. I read to Marie and she showed me old family photos. We talked and hung out. It was relaxing and a lot of fun. Life on the beach.

I also found out a few days later that she wrote a poem there about some of our discussions, but somehow I never got around to posting it until 2022. You can find it here: Hosea's Blog: Roads not taken (hoseasblog.blogspot.com). 

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