it seems that every time i'm home i find myself at one (or more) of the three local establishments dedicated to alcohol consumption. and usually, something significant happens, about which I want to report. Things like crying over CT. sophomore homecoming dates becoming plumbers. jody singing while doing a shot. spartacus. my girlfriend from nap town. getting invited to house parties by 9th graders. the list goes on.....
but three things of significance happened last night at C2. first, i saw the necessary. it was not the first time i'd seen him at the circle. in fact, the very first time i went there on a thursday night with the butter cow crew he was there. the night it all began...but last night, the conversation was a bit more intense. he was one of the first people i saw after walking in with lou and mamaH. he said not much is new, except... & held up his left hand to display a wedding band. and then he very directly looked at my left hand. it was strange. i know plenty of married or engaged people. i know r___ & r____'s elaborate code system for communicating the presence or absence of a ring. but i've never felt so scoped out before. not to say that his scoping was due to romantic interest, but i guess i've never felt subject to such curiosity, presumably because i've always felt so far from the marriage stage. so i lifted my empty hand and said "nope" to which he responded with a slicing off the head motion, and said "don't do it." maybe i'm making too much of this, and by no means do i think this really means he is unhappy, but its very strange to be told by the man you went on your very first date ever with that marriage is a bad idea.
now, however much i'm blowing necessary's comments out of proportion, this is the type of thing i expect to happen when i make my rounds at the heyworth bars. i have bizarre conversations about children, marriage, jobs, school, and mostly the past with people i marginally knew in high school. but the second noteworthy event was entirely unexpected. i was standing by the flocked christmas tree with mamaH, and lou had gone to the bathroom (in which, taped to the mirror, is an utterly ignored sign that says "no smoking comrade" just below a newspaper article explaining the unconstitutionality of the illinois smoking ban). mid-conversation, i felt a swift and strong slap to the ass. i expected lou to be returning from the bathroom. but i looked around and she wasn't there. i searched behind me for b.s. or some other character i've known for 20 years that might feel such entitlement, but mostly just saw a bunch of kids about 6 years younger than me playing pool.
Then I saw markH. I didn’t know him well. His sister was on my high school basketball team. I believe we went to the same church as children. I once bought a pair of jeans were likely his from his family’s garage sale. But I wouldn’t say any of these connections might give one reason for thinking they have any business slapping my ass. Well, upon realizing through his drunkenness what he had just done, his face turned a bright rosy shade. He apologized. And I, being in a jovial mood didn’t yell, but laughed and eventually excused him. This of course, was the wrong move. I’m not sure any logic was functioning in his brain at the time, so perhaps my excusing was unrelated, but at this point, he started putting his hand on my waist and asking my age. When he discovered I was a mere 5 years younger than him (as opposed to one of his former girlfriends, who was 8 years younger), he pressed on. He paused to say “that’s kind of young” at which point I thought to myself- Oh, honey, if only you knew…but I kept quiet. The conversation finally ended with him attempting to get me to kiss him with the convincing line “come on, why not?” He walked away and rejoined his friends.
Later, Dana, who I had seen earlier with the elder Fox at H3, came over to say hello. We had lovely conversations about her sisters’ children, connie, and the Arkansas connection. The conversation was nothing extraordinary. But an hour after leaving the bar, I got a text from BS saying he ran into Dana at a gas station and she told him I was in town. The night before, I ran into little Mr. Burns at the AL and he texted his sister to tell her I was around. Last summer, BS’s brother saw me at the GLT summer concert and without my knowledge BS was informed. It sort of feels like being stalked. Perhaps it shouldn’t surprise me, and in a way its comforting, but you just can’t go anywhere in this town and get away with it. Word travels fast. My face is too familiar. This is not the place to hide out if I ever need to be anonymous. But on the other hand, it sort of feels like walking into the Cheers bar.
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