metanoia's Diaryland Diary ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I Could Be Dead When my husband was leaving me, staying out late or not coming home at all some nights, I was very lonely. I had to stay home with my son, so I would sit alone after son went to bed and watch The Love Boat and Taxi and other comedies; drinking a glass or two of wine and eating a KFC biscuit for dinner. I was in denial, big time, and clinically depressed. It was a dark, lonely, sad time for me. I emerged from it two years later, stronger and happier than I had ever been in my life; focused and self-assured; but I was living hell each day during that time. I thought of a boy I met during that time in my life; he made such an impact on me I still remember the encounter. It was one of the weekends my son was away and I was completely alone in the house. I had no car, we had only one and my husband had taken it, but we lived in a small beach community and the main street was just 2 blocks away. It was Saturday night and I was alone, again, and I could not stand to be in that house one minute more. There was a band I liked playing at one of the local bars, so I walked down to the bar. It was packed, no place to sit except for two chairs at one table with two older gay guys. I approached them and asked if I could share the table with them, they said sure. I ordered a beer and sat back, relaxing; letting the music soothe me and surround me. It felt pretty good. He walked to the table with a big, confident grin looking amused at a private joke. He had dark brown hair and warm brown eyes. He was very good looking, about 10 years younger than I and he was looking right at me. He reached for the other chair and sat down and nodded at the two other guys and said to me, smiling that smile, �I bet you thought you would be safe sitting here with these two gays. I bet you thought nobody would bother you at all, but you were wrong because I am with them and I was just in the restroom and now you have me to deal with.� I was stunned because that�s exactly what I thought. All I could do is smile weakly and say, �Yes.� He laughed, and with his smooth charm chatted with me for hours. He said, �I�ve had plastic surgery � can you guess where?� I looked at his nose, but it didn�t look �fixed�. If he had surgery, I couldn�t tell where. He smiled, �Not my nose, my ears�, he said �I had my ears pulled closer to my head. Don�t tell anyone.� I promised I would not. We talked and talked, he made me laugh. He was articulate and flirty. It was great. It was getting late, after midnight, and I was walking alone. I said I was going and he asked me to go to his car. I didn�t feel real safe doing it, but he charmed me into it so we went to his car. It was parked in plain sight of the restaurant/bar so I felt a little safer. He opened the trunk and pulled out a camera. �I�m doing a photo essay of women I meet in bars, maybe make it into a book. May I take your picture?� he asked. It was such a strange request. It had been a strange night. I said sure, and he took the picture. He thanked me and I left. Why I remember that encounter, I am not sure. Maybe because the young man was so unusual, maybe because it was kind of toward the end of my hell and I was awakening. I don�t know. I wonder if he ever published that book. If he did, my picture is in it. I was about 17, walking down the street wearing a button that said �UNI�. It was short for University High School over by UCLA. A friend had given it to me. I wore a lot of buttons on my clothes back then. I remember a couple of others � �Peace Now!� and �Long live the forever now�. Come on! It was the sixties! Anyway, I was walking down the street and this beautiful guy comes up to me and says in heavily accented, hesitant English, �What is this U.N.I.?� So I said, �It stands for the United Nuns of Italy�, because I was a smart ass back then. �Italy?� he says looking very happy with a huge smile �I am from Italy.� He then starts talking Italian to me. I had to interrupt him and explain that I wasn�t from Italy and did not speak Italian. We introduced ourselves and we began talking. His father sent him over to learn to speak English. He always had this guy with him, big bruiser type of guy who never said anything and just hung back about 4 or 5 feet from him � it was like he was his pet or something. Anyway, I told him I was on my way to shoot pool, and he said he did not know how to shoot pool, so I said I would teach him. We saw each other a few times, then he kissed me. I will always remember this kiss. It was the slowest kiss I have ever had. Perhaps it was because he was older and I was just used to the frantic, urgent kisses and gropes of my teenage counterparts. This � this was a mature kiss, long and lingering, slow and passionate. I will always remember it. My parents did not know I was seeing him. His father finally said he did not want him to see me anymore. We were sad, but he was very obedient to his fathers wishes. Looking back, I don�t think he was Italian. His name was Ahmet� he looked more middle eastern�. But I dunno. I�m sure the burly guy was his bodyguard, or servant or something. I was about 32. It was one of those late spring days in LA, a perfect �beach day�. I grabbed my stuff and walked down to the beach. It was a weekday so it was not crowded. The breeze was light, the sand was warm. It was quiet except for the sound of the surf. That was a period in my life where I had stopped shaving under my arms. I liked the soft curly hair � it was sensual to me. Shut up! I shave now. People thought I was from Europe because of my hairy armpits. That was very funny. People are so na�ve. This Afghani guy approached me on my beach towel and we began to talk. He leered at me and said, �I can tell you are a very mature woman.� WTF? I still don�t know what he meant by that. So he invites me over to his house. Asks me if I want to come over and do some lines (coke). I said sure, since I was leaving anyway. We walked back to his house. It was two streets over from mine. A couple of other Afghani�s were in the house. He took me upstairs through some French doors to a deck and said he would be right back. He then locked the damned door after himself. At this point I thought, �I am getting the fuck out of here right now.� And began eyeing over the edge to see how far a jump it would be off that deck. He came right back and I said I was leaving. He was so surprised and hurt and begged me to stay, but it all felt really, really weird so I just left. What do these three isolated incidents have in common? There is a recklessness that runs through me, runs through my life. I go along living a mundane life, predictable to everyone who sees me, but in there � I know it is � is a little piece of me that rears its ugly head every once in awhile and says, �Let�s just do this and see what happens.� I think these incidents have a little of that in them. Also, they are all times when I could have been murdered and chopped in little pieces and buried under somebody�s house and no one would have ever seen me again or known what happened to me. Really, I�m lucky to be alive. 9:47 a.m. - 2006-04-06 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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