I am standing in line at the Legion hall and the smell of burned hash browns surrounds me. We are buying tickets for yet another veterans' breakfast and up ahead I see my cousin and the man she had an affair with during her rocky marriage. This woman has a college degree and yet she allows herself to be seen in public with a guy who sports a mullet. That particular side of my family is full of shady types and they all married stalkers and pervs. Thank god my mother's side boasted honest farmers and gas station owners or I would never have achieved any kind of social acceptability.
I have nothing to do but stand and stare as they have run out of sausages and nobody's budging until they get some. This is Iowa and we take our pig meat seriously. There's an open bar and $3.00 bloody marys, garsh I wish I liked tomato juice but I get myself a can of diet Coke, the next best thing to booze. There is an enormous man on the bar stool and there's something about him that spells familiar. And then I see them. Zebra-colored snakeskin boots peeking out from his jeans. Can it be Terry?, the guy I lived with before I met the present husband.
Terry was from North Dakota just yards from the Canadian border where it is so cold the men never turn off the ignition in their trucks. Was he a cowboy, yes he was and no citizen in my county would ever be caught in those ugly striped boots.
He lived with me for several years and then I kicked him out, what a jerk but we still dated because I was 43 and convinced no other man would look at me. And then there's that popular theory that desperate women hold onto that starts out, "He'll change, I'll just give it more time." When he stopped showing up for major holidays I thought this calls for some investigation and sure enough, I saw him pushing a shopping cart at our local Sam's and nudging up against a younger woman.
And here they are sloshing down alcohol at nine in the morning and part of me, a very large part wants to go up to him and say, "Terry? Terry, is that you? I didn't recognize you. You got so fat! Oh, and is this your wife? Is she the one you were cheating with when you were dating me?" And I have actually played this conversation in my head many times over the years and I might just make it a reality some day. Why not, the schmuck has it coming. I just can't figure out how to finish the conversation, I need a real zinger to wrap it up.
Curses, this place is teeming with ill-reputed louses. I was never one of those people who remained friends with my exes. I cross the street when I see them coming. After all, they know too many of my secrets.
I have nothing to do but stand and stare as they have run out of sausages and nobody's budging until they get some. This is Iowa and we take our pig meat seriously. There's an open bar and $3.00 bloody marys, garsh I wish I liked tomato juice but I get myself a can of diet Coke, the next best thing to booze. There is an enormous man on the bar stool and there's something about him that spells familiar. And then I see them. Zebra-colored snakeskin boots peeking out from his jeans. Can it be Terry?, the guy I lived with before I met the present husband.
Terry was from North Dakota just yards from the Canadian border where it is so cold the men never turn off the ignition in their trucks. Was he a cowboy, yes he was and no citizen in my county would ever be caught in those ugly striped boots.
He lived with me for several years and then I kicked him out, what a jerk but we still dated because I was 43 and convinced no other man would look at me. And then there's that popular theory that desperate women hold onto that starts out, "He'll change, I'll just give it more time." When he stopped showing up for major holidays I thought this calls for some investigation and sure enough, I saw him pushing a shopping cart at our local Sam's and nudging up against a younger woman.
And here they are sloshing down alcohol at nine in the morning and part of me, a very large part wants to go up to him and say, "Terry? Terry, is that you? I didn't recognize you. You got so fat! Oh, and is this your wife? Is she the one you were cheating with when you were dating me?" And I have actually played this conversation in my head many times over the years and I might just make it a reality some day. Why not, the schmuck has it coming. I just can't figure out how to finish the conversation, I need a real zinger to wrap it up.
Curses, this place is teeming with ill-reputed louses. I was never one of those people who remained friends with my exes. I cross the street when I see them coming. After all, they know too many of my secrets.
1 comment:
Terry sounds like Karma caught up with him.....
I went out with a cowboy once. He was very good at riding bulls at the local rodeos but unfortunately not much good at anything else. I ran a mile when he asked me if I'd be his 'Chief Cook and Bottlewasher'. Seriously.
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