Apollo

The following list is far from comprehensive, or remotely complete, but I am (as I have mentioned before) a lazy, lazy man.

First, there was Becky. The first girl in my love rodeo. The girl I lost my virginity to oh so many years ago. It was a mutual deflowering, and as you would expect it was (at least the first time) pretty brutal. It was probably like watching a killer whale taunt, and kill a baby seal. It was short, nasty, and I am not sure if either of us enjoyed it too terribly much. However, after a few more attempts, we got things in the right spot, and I found 'the' spot, and we began a wonderful, happy relationship. This was back before the war, and in the small town where I was reared, when you deflower a girl, it was only supposed to end one way. And that way, isn't recollecting events over 20 years later without Bethany in the room. It was SUPPOSED to end happily ever after, and it did for Bethany and another fine fellow (a former friend) they are happily married with 3 children, or at least they were the last I heard. She promised she loved me, and wanted to spend the rest of my life with me, clearly she was talking to the wrong guy when she told me that, and I wonder if she told him the same thing. She seems to have meant it, and least when she told him, me not so much. She left.

Years later, there was Yvonne. An exotic name for an exotic woman, from another country she was (and still is I suppose) some place that most of the people I grew up with have never heard. Did I mention I am from a very small, very redneck town? Not that it mattered, by the time Yvonne and I crossed paths, I had been out of that place for a very long time.  Yvonne was a very, very bright girl, which makes why she took up with me an even greater mystery. However, at the time it was not a mystery that I wanted to explore to deeply. She too, said a lot of nice things about and to me, and even offered to take me back to the exotic place of her birth to live our lives out together. She is still in this country, and dating a wonderful fellow, i.e. not me. She had a pretty bad accident, and was not quite the same woman after, she became a woman who did not suffer fools gladly, and I am, without a shadow of a doubt, a fool.  She too left.

Then there was Eileen, and as the name imply she was a redhead with a LOT of Irish in her. Tall, thin, pale, and young. She was (at the time) a walking embodiment of the perfect woman for me. However, while she had quite a bit of musical talent, she wasn't the swiftest horse in the stable. I am far from being a genius, but sometimes Eileen and I were reduced to awfully lengthy discussions about the colour yellow. Now, I like yellow as much as the next fellow, I even painted a bathroom yellow once, but there isn't a whole lot new to say about the colour yellow. But she was tall, thin, young, pale, and covered in freckles, so I managed to overlook the 'yellow thing' for as long as I was able.  She was another girl that I deflowered, and that really seems to mean a lot to women. She eventually became a long distance relationship, and I flew many a mile to see her. I came close to asking her to make it permanent, but the distance and the 'yellow thing' were just too much for me to cope with. She also told me, in different words, that she would have said 'yes' if I had asked. The other big problem with Eileen was I met Anna (see below) when she moved away. They were together the perfect woman, it was a damn shame that there were two of them. She is now married with three children, and happy as a clam. Good on her. She too left.

Then there was Lisa, Lisa was another fiery redhead that actually had 2 'bites at the cherry'. Round 1 was also many years ago, and it was more of a fling than anything else. She was, at the time, a long distance relationship, and I drove a lot miles to see her on more than one occasion. She was an exciting girl, and pretty sharp herself. However, the distance, and time were against us, and she faded into the mists of time. Then one day out of the blue, I got an email from her, I've no idea how she found me, or why she wanted to find me, but she did. It was an instant reconnect, but there was still distance involved. We talked for hours on the phone, and if you know me at all, you know I don't really talk on the phone. We planned almost our entire lives out during those phone calls. We fell back into love during those chats, and then it all when pear shaped. We talked about everything during round 2 of our relationship, and the breaking point was, of all things, Charles Baudelaire. She pretty much told me "It's Baudelaire or me." Well, on my bedside table is a book of Baudelaire's poetry. The whereabouts of Lisa, I do not know.  I like to think I made the right choice, but she promised she loved everything about me (including my love of literature), and she left.

Then there was Alice, Alice was a fellow student of history, and a lovely girl. However, Alice was a bit too frail for me. She had (and presumably still has) a fairly significant illness, that made our relationship a lot harder to conduct. It wasn't any sort of illness that prevented the good stuff, it just made her tired a lot. She once told me "if you asked me to marry you right now, I would say yes.' Guess what? I quickly changed the subject, and moved on to less dangerous relationship waters.  It was probably a wise decision, since after me Alice decided to revenge fuck my best friend. This is one of the reasons that I no longer have a best friend. She has recently became engaged, and I am happy for her, and hope that the lucky groom's best man isn't too handsome. She too left.

Then came Nancy. Fancy Nancy as I liked to call her. She was not amused by that nickname, and I quickly found out that Nance wasn't amused by much of anything.  Those who I allow to know me these days, will (hopefully) tell you that I am a pretty funny guy. Funny as in HA HA, not funny as someone who like to wear a lot of chartreuse scarves. I never really understood Nancy, and I don't think Nancy ever really tried to understand me. It was, in spite of all this misunderstanding, a torrid affair, and my roommate at the time was so impressed he once, clapped when she left the house after a night at the opera (as he liked to call it, I'm certain you can guess why).  She wasn't amused about that either, but she certainly did care enough to want to sign up as a permanent ticket holder, if you catch my meaning. However, operas have limited runs, and she too left.

Then came Anna, Anna was, when put together with Eileen (see above) the perfect woman. Anna was (and I am still sure is) one of the few women I have dated that was miles smarter than I am, and I don't date dumb women. Except for the fact that they have dated me, which causes their sanity, not their intelligence, to be called into question, I love intelligent woman. Anna was a fucking overachieving genius, and why she fell for me was completely unfathomable to me. She was smart, funny, well read, well spoken, and a a for sure keeper for almost any man in the world. Any man but, yours truly it seems. We had a really, really rocky relationship that was defined by, me still having feelings for Eileen, and one other fact that I have only ever told 4 people about. This is not the time to reveal what that fact/issue was. There may never be a time to reveal that fact again, and I hope that Anna has forgiven me, even though she said she never would, and I peg her as a woman of her word. She is also married now with at least one child. I heard from her about three years ago when her team, the Saints, beat my Vikings in the NFC championship game. It was not a consolation email, it was a gloating email. It led me to believe that Anna has not forgiven me, and truth be told, she probably shouldn't. I thought many a night how she was a keeper, and she really was. She too left.

Then came Esther, I married Esther, and that should tell you all you need to know. If you want to know more, I suggest you read "Portraits of a Marriage" by Sandor Marai. A good book that will tell you a lot of things about Esther and I, even if she's never read it, or is ever going to read it. She too left.

As I said this isn't a complete list of all of my follies, and I am sure there will be more follies to come, but to each of these wonderful women I told one important story. I won't go too far into the details of the story (more of a theory) that I shared with women, because I don't share it that often. It has to do with numbers, and each of them will understand exactly what I mean by that. It is not a happy theory, but it is a theory that I believe in strongly. A theory is just that a theory, something that isn't a law but something that can be shown to happen again and again under the same set of circumstances. Thus we get a theory. Each of these women, to whom I owe both a massive debt, and a heartfelt apology, to, have helped me show that my theory, as depressing as it is, is sound.  It is another tragedy that I will have to deal with, and it makes me very sad. Sometimes being right about things hurts a lot more than being wrong.



P.S. There is no hidden agenda or meaning in the post, but there is, if you try hard enough to find it, a hidden message.