#4
How I wish my memory for detail was better. If I were writing a work of fiction, I could make up the parts I don't recall, and be happy that I had an imagination.
Even though no one would know the difference, I can't seem to get myself to that place.
So, this is what I can remember of that evening.
One of my girlfriends set us up. It must have been during single 2, as I'd been to Israel and was therefore already divorced.
I believe he picked me up from my apartment. We went to a lovely restaurant that was named Millie's. It was charming . It was decorated with art nouveau fixtures, oak siding and tables and an oft crowded bar.
We sat at the bar as it was a first meeting, which meant drinks or coffee only.
He was a nice looking guy. What I recall was very dark brown, curly hair that was long enough to cover his hearing aides; horned rimmed glasses and a good height and build.
While we drank and talked I was surprised by how much we actually had in common. That was so unusual. He had lived in Israel too. He was educated and interested in the same things I was. Not that I can remember what they were, but it doesn't matter.
He actually seemed like a good person and I wasn't repelled.
I was even okay with his hearing problem. I'm guessing that he had been born with his hearing as his speech was good. I'm ashamed to say that I was "proud" of myself for being able to "get past it as an issue". I was insanely picky. You must have figured that out by now.
We left and he took me home. Did we kiss? I don't know. He said he'd call, and I was sure he would. He wasn't like the jerks I often met.
I waited. And waited. No word.
Normally I wouldn't ask my friend if she knew anything, but this was different. I didn't get it.
When she got back to me she said that he thought we were too much alike. He wanted someone who was different from him. HUH?
That was a first. And probably a last. I was floored. Wasn't that supposed to be a good thing? Weren't relationships with commonality the ones that worked best?
Of course, he may just not have been "into" me and this was the reason he gave. For some reason I believed it. It was nuts, but believable.
Never saw or heard from him again.
#5
While remembering this I thought about another date I had with someone who was also deaf. And, come to think of it, it was the same friend who fixed us up.
We're still close friends which is wonderful. And I am not as stupid or nuts as I was back then. That's wonderful too.
I remember more about Malcom because I saw him a few times. I believe the second time we met, I picked him up at his place. The Marina on the West Side of Manhattan. I had a car and he didn't. He lived on a little house boat around 72nd or 79th Street.
I did not go on board, but looked in from the dock. It wasn't very impressive but he liked living there a lot. Except maybe in the dead of winter.
What he did for a living, I can't say. How he got to be deaf, I can.
He had gone to Harvard. When he graduated, or possibly the year before, he joined the Marines. It was when the Viet Nam War was a whisper, but there was some speculation. He was told, and believed that if he enlisted at that time, he would be safe from the war and initially it was true. He was happily ensconced in France.
War, being war, did ultimately intrude upon his platoon. Up and away they went.
I don't know how many men were in his group, but he was the only one who survived. He was wounded and the bombing ruined his hearing and wreaked havoc with his eyesight too. The war took a lot away from him. I believe he had planned to return to school and do some graduate program, but had lost his motivation along with everything else.
The night I picked him up was in the middle of January and it was becoming a bitter cold night.
We ate something and went to the movies. We saw ...wow I'm blanking on the name. Ah, The Big Chill. Which I just looked up, making the year 1983. Assuming it was in the movies and not on TV.
In any event he asked if he could stay at my place in Queens. He was afraid he'd freeze to death on the boat since the pipes froze and he'd have no heat.
How could I say no?
I remember the two of us dancing around the kitchen singing some of the songs from the movie. " I heard it Through the Grapevine" and "Jeremiah was a Bullfrog".
He spent the week end and we had a good time. The memory ends there.
I may have seen him again, or not.
What I didn't know about myself, at least not yet, was that I had a deep fear of intimacy and lots of issues around loss.
Sleeping with someone isn't an act of intimacy. Not in the highest sense. Getting to know someone. Truly know them. Letting that someone get to know you. The real you. That's the intimacy that certain people are likely to avoid. People like me.
That's why I was attracted to men who weren't capable of a relationship. That's why I got rejected and hurt a lot. I was clueless for a long time.
THE THEORY IS IN THE STORY. YOU GET WHAT YOU NEED. THE PROBLEM IS THAT YOU HAVE NO IDEA THAT WHAT YOU ARE GETTING IS WHAT YOU NEED. YOU JUST DON'T KNOW IT. IF YOU ARE LUCKY, YOU LEARN.
