Wonder Of Wonders. Gem Among Rocks

Wonder of Wonders, Gem among Rocks 

He got a letter from a vicious vixen the other might. He didn't know what prompted her to reach out for him after she had walked out in a huff and wandered into the wilderness of self-righteousness and the wilds of the frozen tundra of Alaska in the middle of winter. She begged him to reply to her. He obliged her:

"You would never really understand how I felt about you and thought of you. You viewed me from the lenses of practicality whereas I looked at you and life from "impossible dreams". You thought I was a greedy married man who wanted everything while in fact I was and am a lonely man trapped in a snare of my own weakness and sentimentality. My "farewell" letter was a test and your reactions showed deep down you cared more about your own self, your hurts, and your desire to hurt me back, than an investigation of what drove me to write such a letter. 

I have regained my peace. As I said, I would rather dwell on the beautiful, the kind, and the gentle sides of life while trying to block out from my mind your hurtful, harsh language. I am the type of person if once I address a woman in endearing terms, I cannot switch to terms of contempt even when I am angry. I would rather scream and yell to express my anger than to use contemptuous words because those words are ugly and have no place between a man and a woman, even if they are never romantically involved. Words have a way to tell the world who we really are. 

Believe it or not, deep inside me, I am a very gentle and soft person. The hard, clumsy exterior is just only my poorly adapted defense.

I hope you finally got some peace of your own. While it's highly unlikely our paths ever cross again (the magic was gone for good; your vicious side glistened and glimmered and shimmered in the sun), I always wish you the best of luck in the remainder of your solitary travel along the road called life. "

Of course, she wrote back to me and this time she signed her name instead of tersely putting down "me". I already deleted her annoying and self-righteous and stupid reply so I cannot reproduce here. I vaguely remember it left a sour taste in my mouth and an unexpected surprise at how ordinary and common her values were. She talked about her pride of being practical, her low opinion of my tendency to have dreams, and the justification of her display of contempt for me. After reading her reply, I asked myself how I, a person of learning and sensitivity, would and could ever be mixed up with a coarse midget of crass and crabby values. My only answer was that my loneliness blinded me of her crassness and crabbiness. On the other hand, I was glad that I didn't get in that deep a relationship with her. She taught me one thing: I didn't know shit about bitches!

So when my longtime, almost asphyxiated, fixated aficionado called me and inquired about my latest cardiac tests, I told him about her. He exploded, "How many times I told you to get rid of the fucking bitch, the stupid, impoverished, poverty-stricken dumb ass, good-for-nothing midget? Stop taking her calls. Don't text-message her back. Completely ignore her. She is scum. She is shit. She is just plainly no good. You hear me?" I meekly and softly sighed, "Yes, Victoria. I meant Victor." He slammed the phone on me. The asshole still uses an almost antique dialed land phone that he inherited from his mother. In this age of Internet and smart phones and tablets, he owns no computer and relies on a typewriter for formal written communications. I call him Dinosaur Victor.

Where am I ? How did I get here. Where's the "He" that started this meandering narrative, this thread of self-confrontation, this wild and crazy exploration and examination of the dark recesses of the human mind in looking for the forces of attraction and destruction.

I am 62 years old. A Spanish song is saying love kills. Please, I am saying to myself, tell me something I don't already know. Yes, love is a fucking funny thing, especially to a guy like me. And so is sex. 

I met a whiskey-soaked, starry-eyed girl in a bar in Tennessee
She later took me to a motel room for a ride
When it was over, I was black and blue and could hardly see
Ever since, I haven't been able to drink her off my mind

I once lay next to a  divorcée on the beach
I had to put up a fight for my life
When it was through, my sanity seemed to be out of reach
She not only blew me all over, but also blew away my mind

As I am lying in bed, alone, and depressed
I think of all the girls and women that have come and gone
I would have to tell you this: "Okay, I confess
I slept with them all, but no one made me moan and groan
Like the way I do with you, sweetie.
Don't you believe me? Go ahead, make me swear
Don't you see that I love you till eternity?
You're the only one that I really do care."


I once took a lad under my wings and counseled him the "Art of Love". I said, " Son, the Art of Love ain't no different from the Art of War. You must do unto others as you wish they do unto you, and that is, with passion and imagination. You have to weave a parachute out of words, sweet and tender words. You talk to them in a slow, soft, baritone voice, telling them not you want to say, but what they want to hear, while looking straight into their eyes, and acting all sincere and gentle. Remember the difference between a truth and a lie is as light as a feather. Don't rush things. Love is like sex and wine. The longer you get there, the more satisfying it gets." Guess what the lad said to me? "But, master, if you're so good with women, why you are always by yourself in the weekend, and I never see you with any woman?" I blushed, "Son, haven't you heard 'those who don't know love to teach'? Never mind." 

My voice trailed off and I stared into empty space which so resembles the void within me. I said goodbye to the young man and staggered home under the weight of loneliness. I opened the apartment's door and the emptiness of the room sucked me into its vortex. I plopped down on the sofa and instinctively reached for the remote on the coffee table. My cell phone rang. I looked at the number. A name went with it on the screen. It was the Midget. I said, "Hello." She asked, "Do you still love me?"

After a long silence, I sucked in the air and sighed, "Not really, not anymore." Then I clicked off the phone. I felt like shit, but I knew I had done the right thing. To ease off the pain of "conscience" that was tugging at my heart, I swallowed two Ambiens. I was drifting in a fog of forced sleep and unlocalized pain when the phone rang. "Did you tell the bitch Midget to get lost yet?". "Yes, I did, honey, just like I told you I would."

-You did the right thing. She was no good for you. Besides, she didn't know her place. She was stupid, vain, and thought so much of herself and not enough of you.
-Listen, Harriett, do we have to go through this again? I did that for you. I really didn't want to cause any pain and suffering to her or to anybody, no matter they desereve that or not. A loss is a loss. I knew what it felt like to be dumped. I was dumped once, maybe twice. I don't know. It was a long time ago. I finally got over the horrible memories, the terror of pain and uncommunicative shame. I know she asked for it, that I deserve better, that I deserve you. But I would rather close this chapter of my life for good. I don't want to talk about her anymore. I made a mistake. I was lonely. I thought she was a decent, caring, unselfish woman; I didn't know she was selfish, rude, and vengeful. Anyway, pain should not happen to anyone, but maybe we all learn from it. Love is not an easy thing to have. We must work hard for it. I think in the end only wise, kind, loving people really know what love is. Other people only experience the ersatz kind. That's probably why we have all kinds of separations and divorces. Love is like money. To get it, a lot of it, one must work hard, very hard, at it.
-Roberto, I love you.
-I love you, too. Now, I have to go back to sleep. I have a lot of things to do tomorrow.
-Such as?
-Honey, please, I need to go back to sleep. I'll call you tomorrow.



(to be continued)