Still haven’t found it …

I wish that I knew how to share stuff on here. I mean, I have access to a digital camera, and I check out cool stuff on the web. I haven’t figured that out yet. I was checking out one journal, and there seemed to be a image taken from a Don Heartfelt (sp) film short. I remember catching some of his stuff at an animations film festival once, and another by e-mail. That one was hilarious. I can’t remember the name of the short, only that the protagonist was named ‘Caffiene’.

How Are Things On The West Coast?

The trials of Caffiene were those which most men can easily identify with … WOMEN! No matter how he would approach them, they would rip him to shreds! It wasn’t until he said, ‘I have money,’ that he was able to hear those ‘three little words’! It was a hoot!

Today was the anniversary of my marriage. There was no method to its date, although there seems to be a confluence of sorts for me personally around these dates. We may have dated 6 mos., give or take a week. Right out of the service, ready or not, I wanted to be married! I guess she did to, as she took the ring when she saw it!

One of the things that I underestimated from my short-lived life in matrimony, is the scarring that it left. Being young, I figured I would just bounce back. Not so. I would go from ‘jumping the gun’ to becoming gun shy when it came to pulling the trigger. I figured that out when I lost my Last Best Girlfriend (LBGF). She was the second ‘can’t miss’ prospect to slip out of my life! The first one was a mulligan, but LBGF was all on me. I had to wonder what was wrong with me?

SEE, MEAN PEOPLE SUCK

I had seen ‘signs’ that my first wife was not who I had hoped she was. My Mother did too, when we told her we were going to get married. She took me aside and said flat out, ‘Boy, all your are is P-- Whipped, you ain’t in love!’ (and yes Ingrid, she DID TOO use that expletive deleted!) Maybe I was, what was for sure was that I was dumb, dumb, dumb!

What I knew of her background was that she was a single Mother who was no longer entangled with her daughter’s father (man, little girls are EVERYWHERE in my life ..!). She has a twin brother, and her parents were divorced. Oh and another little thing that I really didn’t account for, was that her Ma and Pa used to fight like Ali and Frazier, the went at it like it was the last chicken wing in the bucket!

I thought the way that things fell in their family, she missed and doted on the Father, where everyone else in her family, being raised by her Mom, did not care for the Dad, including her brother.

Looking back, I could see all the problems we would have were foreshadowed. But that idiotic ‘youthful exuberance’ ..! I severely underestimated how much of an impact the exposure of domestic violence had on her. She saw violence as a way of expressing herself. Me, I just saw it as just being rattlesnake mean, and I couldn’t handle it. Over the summer, as me and my peeps mended bridges, they finally told our Unwanted Older Sister that they were wrong for siding with her after our divorce, and that my Mom said so as well.

Yeah, I passed licks too, but they were ONLY in defence. I never tried to ‘jump on her’ or even beat her up. Again, my sisters explained that to her, especially since the only acts of aggression they witness between us, she initiated. Better late than never, I guess.

The experience never really soured me on marriage, but I would find myself pulling up short on the runway, just when I had done everything to be ready for takeoff. Though I don’t care for those who’s anger can boil over, I didn’t have the experience to tell the difference from someone who was just ‘spontaneously emotional reacting’ from some one who was mean.

FAIR PLAY #1

I have shared this with my first wife already, which prolly makes her think the way she does about us. But she was married at the time (what, y’all didn’t know she beat me back to the altar ..? Three guess as to the name of her #2 ..?). I had tried to hate her, but it was MY albatross, and when I let it go, I felt freer. But I wasn’t completely free just yet.

FAIR PLAY #2

Yeah, she was a puncher. But I could have donebetter in my role as well. Would have help if I wasn’t out there in the world, and devoted those energies to trying to put our marriage together. Immaturity isn’t an excuse when you sign up for that kind of thing. That I didn’t have an idea of what I was asking of myself is not good enough of an excuse.

Doomed to fail, it may have been. But some of MY actions were adding an accelerant to a burning fire. I feel guilty for that. I left some stuff in the tank, and that haunts me.

Yeah, I guess I will get in that line too … hey, isn’t there a circle in Dante’s poem for folks like that ..?