Five days after I met Semi-Homeless, we were engaged. In a self-proclaimed, no-ring-in-sight, no-date-set, don't-know-his-last-name, ghetto sort of way. I didn't tell anyone, not even the best friend who had recently steered me through my casting-couch crisis.
I was too embarrassed. Even I knew I wasn't making any sense.
Semi-Homeless was either a genius or a retard, I'm not sure which. There were moments of deep conversation where he seemed extraordinarily bright. He claimed to have scored a 1360 on the SAT and to have once held a six-figure job.
But the Semi-Homeless I knew was a common, dirty, smelly day laborer with no car and no place of his own. He made his living painting signs and doing odd jobs.
The day he proposed, I met him for brunch at a little diner where he was painting. He said he'd be through in an hour, and we'd go to the movies. I came back two hours later, and he was still painting. An hour later, I drove him to the vacuum shop that seemed to be his second no-home away from no-home, so he could change his clothes.
We barely made it to the movies before it started, and he spent his days' wages on tickets, popcorn and candy. In the middle of the movie, he decided to get nachos, which meant standing up and blocking my view of the screen. Not to mention, talking during the movie and trying to hold my hand. At some point, he even spilled his drink on me.
By the time the movie ended, I was pissed. But in the car, as I drove him to his second no-home away from no-home (some middle-aged woman's residence), he suddenly turned intelligent again, and I softened.
He sprang for a seedy motel at King and Western, where he paid cash for one night's stay. Instead of going home to the dreary circus that was my 88-year-old Great Aunt, I stayed the night.
We didn't have sex, because I had an as-yet-untreated STD. I'd been oozing discharge for two months, and penetration was just too uncomfortable. So we did everything but, and in the soft haze of orgasm and 10-dozen professions of undying love, he asked me to marry him. And I said yes. Not once. Not twice. But five times.
4 comments:
You mentioned in an earlier post that you were desperate to be married.
This desperation seems to be a common thing in USA culture in a way it isn't in Australia - at least that's what I pick up from US TV shows / books / movies. I'm wondering if this is actually the case or if that's just mass media stereotyping.
Cheers,
Laetitia :-)
Laetitia - that's an interesting observation. Can't really comment on whether it's true or not, as like many Americans, I've never travelled outside the States, so I don't have much experience with women from other cultures.
I would say that American women think we're SUPPOSED to have that soul mate, that love everlasting that we see in the movies, and we think something's wrong with us if we don't have iit.
Thanks - you answered my (slightly badly phrased) question. I was asking if most US women have this idea that they are "supposed" to be married.
"as I drove him to his second no-home away from no-home" too damn funny...
so, I'm hoping you can fill in the blanks about the infection you had and why you had it so long...was it because of lack of information re: STD's or infections? I've been there before too....not fun...hopefully it didn't do any long lasting damage...
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