Dear Man-tana Man, March
18, 2014
We
met the same day I signed a personal contract to stop dating younger jerks for
the rest of my life. Amen. It was Halloween, and a friend and I were downtown
at a very loud bar. I could hear neither what she nor this man who approached
us dressed as a detective were saying. He called me “Ramone” and talked about
what I think was electrical engineering and Cuba. The first time he looked
away, I knocked his spyglass off the table on purpose. That way, when he had to
bend over to pick it up, I’d get to see if he had a bald spot. I’d be the real detective. But, honestly, I do shit like this with
every halfway handsome guy who has a receding hairline and flirts with me. (Not
accounting for the “jerk” part of the package, such behavior is perhaps one of
the reasons I’ve ended up dating so many younger jerks . . . I am, in certain ways immature, and they are less prone to baldness).
Well,
the “detective” had thinning hair but no bald spot. For a guy in his twenties
though, a receding hairline and thinning hair is a formula for premature
baldness; it would only be a matter of time for this poor guy. So I was suddenly
tired and had to go. (Maybe I’m the
jerk?)
Exiting
the bar, I fell into step with you. You had a cowboy hat and boots, and I said
it was a pretty neat costume, and you said it wasn’t a costume. I felt silly,
but not as silly as I’d feel three months later when I accidentally called your
military uniform a costume. I liked that you strayed from your friends and
walked beside me without knowing where we were going. I said I was a writer and
you said you were a writer too and that you were also in the National Guard,
and I said I wasn’t in the National Guard. I taught yoga. You asked for my
number so we could “get coffee” sometime (you said you couldn’t that weekend
because you’d be doing “drilling” in Helena). Until you later described
“drilling,” I pictured you literally holding a drill in your hand for God only
knows what purpose. (I’m from the east coast; I don’t know any better than to
picture such a thing or to prattle on in Montana about the evils of the Beef
Industry).
I
was wary of you because of the infamous “asshole lottery” I’d been winning
since age eighteen and that I’d made a contract to quit playing. Guys born in
the ‘90’s are usually the grand prizes in this lottery and so, as we turned the
corner, I said I couldn’t keep walking with you if you were born in the ‘90s.
You said you were born in ’88, but how could I be sure? After all, I hadn’t
known that a man I once dated was married until his wife tracked his calls and
contacted me. So, stalking you on facebook, I learned that you were truthful
about your age but also that you had a girlfriend. (Soon you’d explain that
you’d forgotten to change your status after breaking up with her awhile back).
Our first date was at a potluck. I
didn’t take seconds of the sweet potatoes because I was worried you’d judge me.
We talked for five hours, and then you drove me home in your off-road pickup ––
the back of which you said was caked in deer blood. We listened to Johnny Cash.
When we reached my house, I panicked because soon we’d part, and I knew I’d be
left to obsess over what you thought of me. I’d probably sit in bed eating
popcorn (I was still hungry because I hadn’t taken that second helping of sweet
potatoes). I’d agonize over whether I’d touched my hair an irritating number of
times and if it had been poor judgment to share how I’d drank my urine in
Ecuador upon a doctor’s recommendation. (Logical much? I’d worried about being
judged for taking a second helping of sweet potatoes but not about sharing my
urine-drinking story). So,
stalling outside your truck and shivering, I said how awkward it was the way
the word “aluminum” gets jumbled in your mouth when you say it over and over
(which we did, laughing). Well, at the very least, I hadn’t dropped something
on the floor when you weren’t looking so that, when you bent over to pick it
up, I’d get to see if you had a bald spot. But I didn’t do that at the potluck
only because you didn’t have a receding hairline. Then again, you were wearing
a cowboy hat when I met you and a baseball hat at the potluck, so how could I
have been so sure? I’d probably worry about that too once we parted.
When
we hugged goodbye, I said you smelled nice, and you said it was probably your
cologne. And your cologne is what I ended up obsessing over that night before
anything else. Because, back east,
a guy who wears cologne likes only a certain type of girl. And the only way I
know how to describe this girl is that she’d hobble to Mexico in high heels
before drinking her urine. Also, she doesn’t believe in “phantom sweet
potatoes” (sweet potatoes that disappear, reappear, and then disappear again),
miss spots when shaving, or have a bad credit score for never paying a large
hospital bill after losing her mind and riding (barefoot) in an ambulance to
the hospital. And, above all else, this girl tells her most embarrassing
stories only to her stuffed animal, which she hides in storage in the attic
when she knows a guy will be spending the night. And, of course, she wears perfume. Every single day of her
life. Even to the DMV and the gym. And me? I forget to wear deodorant. My
left armpit smells chronically even when I do because I use the organic stuff
without “aluminum.” After I shower, there’s a five-hour window during which the
armpit doesn’t smell, and this is when I hope to see you. Anyhow, even though you’d said you were
a writer, you belonged to the army and seemed reserved and a little regimented.
I was a yoga teacher and artist --- belonging to nothing, erratic, and putting
my foot in my mouth so often I should go to Hot Yoga more than once a day to
get flexible enough to hold it there.
So
how would we ever work together?
But
we met again, and this time you weren’t wearing the cologne, so I decided to
let it go and tease you (and myself) about it later. You shared with me what it
was like growing up on a ranch in Northern Montana –– living the kind of life
where you get so thirsty while driving cattle that you actually drink from a puddle.
While we talked, I was distracted by how tight my pants felt and wondered if I
should stop eating so much banana bread, get serious, and start driving cattle
and drinking from puddles. Anyhow, the next day, we went on a hike and only did 1/4 of it because it started to snow, and you were concerned about getting
caught in whiteout conditions. I would have continued because I’m impulsive. This gets me into compromising situations. For
example: once, on a whim, I took a job working on a farm in backwoods Maine. I
lived in a haunted little hut alongside a corn row –– eating mostly Oreos and
pasta provided by a farmer who drove me around in his teal–colored pickup while
drinking beer and shooting out the window at wild turkeys. The bottom line is
that I’m terrible at chess or anything else that involves strategy or logic. I
move every two years without having a job lined up, and I plunge head–first
into every relationship expecting the best. (Since meeting you, I’ve learned that
impulsivity can be a luxury. And that, growing up on a cattle ranch and serving
in the army, you haven’t always had this luxury).
Really though, I was 99% okay with
turning back on the hike because you promised to cook me cactus when we
returned to my house. I didn’t like the cactus you cooked one bit, but that was
okay too because then we sat on my couch, and I talked about the Ecuadorian
Rose Industry, my Polish Grandmother who survived the Holocaust, and something
like how preposterous it is to get charged extra for a medium-sized tea when
all you’re getting is a little extra hot water. I inserted my conspiracy theory
in there somewhere (it wouldn’t be the last time you’d hear my theory because
I’d revise it as much as I’ve revised this letter). At 9PM, because you’re a
cowboy and polite, you said you should go home. But I wanted you to stay and
suggested a walk. On the walk, I decided that, since we’d never finished our
hike, it was necessary to climb to the top of a giant dirt mound I spotted in a
field. On top , I wanted to kiss you but didn’t want to be the one
to initiate it. So, instead, we returned home and watched Little Shop of
Horrors while I vowed to myself that we’d have our first kiss somewhere as
special as on top of a dirt mound.
In the number of
hours we spent talking on the couch in the next couple of months, we could have
flown around the world (maybe not in one of the planes you fly as an aviation
student). But, while flying around the world together would have been a blast
as long as I didn’t vomit on you, I don’t even get bored watching your face
while you watch TV (which doesn’t feel as creepy doing as it does writing).
Anyhow, as someone who runs 8-11 miles daily in between forcing myself to write and do art, it isn’t easy to get me to be
still and “unproductive." Yes, I’m a yoga teacher, but I'm still the first one out
of savasana at the end of every class I take. You, however, do get me to be still. You also get me to be quiet
because you often think hard before speaking, and I’ve learned that I need to shut up to create space for thoughtful responses to my slew of complex, run-on
sentences about everything from Russian Film to Don Quixote.
Now I’m going to stop making fun of
myself and get serious for a minute here. On the surface, I’m attracted to you
because you hunt, skin, and cut up deer like I told my Boulder friends that I
wanted my theoretical Man-tana man to do. You have a motorcycle and look
especially appealing in your casual army clothes. But a more meaningful and telling attractiveness is how you
wore the cross with the serenity prayer that your mother gave you at your
deployment. To me, the cross symbolized at once your faithfulness in an higher power and your groundedness. Like Don Quixote, I myself have difficulty distinguishing between
the "real" and the "imaginary." Scared of loss and of never fulfilling my
potential, I try to change what I cannot –– contorting and distorting and
twisting myself and everything around me into knots. You have your own
fears about being mediocre, but you don’t seem to let them distract you. Instead, you
gently, calmly, and quietly untie knots and even like doing it. To me, your ability to
remain level–headed and practical is unparalleled. In itself, your ready acceptance
of having recently lost the cross represents the kind of practicality we all
need in order to roll up our sleeves and live in a world that is not always
kind or fair. (A world not only at war, but also where there are troubled girls like me dropping things on the floor so that they can inspect the
hair-statuses of prospective dates. Maybe it’s not appropriate to lighten the
tone this way, but, then again, I never won any gold medals for being
appropriate).
Anyhow. You are the only guy I’ve
met who, as a Blackhawk Crew Chief in Iraq, has risked his life to
save others. The greatest peril in which most guys I've dated (especially those playing on the state of the art jungle gym that is Boulder, Colorado) have placed themselves are on rocks while climbing to send routes for personal satisfaction. And the poems you wrote while overseas and that you quietly share
with me reveal you as a passionate and intelligent man. You display a
familiarity with the mechanics behind how this world does and doesn’t work.
With your mind, you deconstruct the world and put it back together. And, with
your hands, you do the same with helicopters and motorcycles (and hopefully soon with my car while changing its oil). In short, you take shit apart and put
it back together and make it better. I see the authentic, creative, loving and
hilarious you that lies beyond any sort
of hyper-rational, emotionally distant persona. I also see how, while working
hard to balance your military and civilian lives, throwing me into the mix can
be disconcerting. I’m an ingredient your recipe doesn’t call for. There’s no strategy with me. But, on
this particular journey, I’d prefer to keep going even at the risk of a getting caught in a blizzard.
(By the way, if we ever do get become snowbound, I promise to eat the snow
instead of drink my urine).
I love you wearing cologne or no
cologne, wearing clothes that are “preppy” or greasy with holes, doing math or
singing to country music I don’t like, with or without military ribbons
positioned two centimeters off in your photos, recycling or not recycling, and
religiously separating your string beans from your ground beef. Maybe someday
you’ll get deployed to Afghanistan. Or maybe, long before then, you’ll get
tired of me –– of playing the game where I say a word and you guess the definition. But, as we did on the night we met, I hope to keep
walking together without knowing exactly why or where we’re going. Thank you
for being the Man-tana man I hoped but never entirely expected to meet. Also,
thank you for trying to teach me “jitterbug” dancing or whatever it’s called
and not laughing when I sucked. At the time, one of my feet was probably in my mouth.
Love,
Simone
Simone
No comments:
Post a Comment