Making the rounds

I got my car back from the shop and everything is fine on that front. My insurance is only gonna go up twenty dollars a month as a result, but I've been told that will go down after a settlement is reached with the State.

This week has been nuts at work. Several new clients have come on board, and it'll take us some time to adjust to the workload and/or hire some new people. Good thing I get paid overtime.

I hadn't heard from Sid in a while, so I called him up this afternoon. He's met this girl, and he's been stuck in the new relationship disappearing act. He had a different sound to his voice...far less sardonic and dark as I'm used to hearing from him. He's only known this girl a week, but they have not spent more than twelve hours apart since their first date. Absolutely amazing.

After getting off the phone with him, I made a few more phone calls. I called my mom to see how she's doing. She and I haven't talked very often over the past couple years, mostly on account of my relationship with my ex. The two of them didn't get along, and it kinda boiled down to a it's her or me situation. Now, I'm left with a burned bridge to rebuild. We had a good little talk; airing out a lot of the issues that have kept us apart over the past few years. With everything going on with Papa, I've had a renewed energy towards connecting with my family.

Since my father's death, I've been kind of the black sheep. At the time, I didn't fully understand what was happening to me, so I internalized my fears and withdrew from those close to me. When I was a senior in high school, I was showing signs of turning around. That was, until my friends and I had our falling out. Then, I crawled back into my shell. It was so hard for me to connect with anyone because I was either afraid of losing them or being hurt by them. But now, there are things changing around me, seeming without reason, and I'm doing my best to go with the flow.

After mom, I gave Nana a call. It had been a rough day for Papa. He was sleeping when I called, but he was in a lot of pain earlier today...almost enough to warrant a trip to the emergency room. He's fine now, though. That news didn't do much to ease my sense of panic.

I called Grace, but she didn't answer, so I left a message. I kept the mood of my message short, sweet, and charming...and I got it all in one take. I didn't have to review my message or anything. I may be getting the hang of this after all.

Good karma...sort of

Saturday morning I slept in too late, and almost missed out on lunch with Grace. As soon as I realized what late it was getting (11:30), I called her and thankfully, she was running late, too. We made plans to meet up for a quick bite to eat before she had to go to work.

We were unsure how to greet each other. I played it safe by offering a handshake, but she was going in for a hug. I switched to hug mode and she switched to handshake. We wound up doing both. We ordered our food and didn't talk too much after that. We had these weird silences. Not uncomfortable sliences, but those moments where you trail off, looking someone in the eyes, and just giggle and smile.

Is it wrong for me to want to ruin the mood by continuing to apologize for the Jeff incident? She seems like she's over it all, and that she understands that I'm not a violent person. It also seems like she sees the real me...the one who fell in love with her back in junior high...the one that would do anything to have her feel the same way all through high school. But the question remains, does she see the me that has regretted every day since I left, or the me that has compared every girlfriend from then to now to her?

There's so much I want to say to her, but I can't. We got through lunch, and I had a great time. We hugged for what seemed like forever, during which, I kissed her on the temple. That's about as far as it got. I told her I'd try to make it back next weekend, or maybe the weekend after that...I'm sure I sounded like a total schmuck.

I went back to Nana & Papa's house to see how they were doing; to check if they needed anything before I went back to Tulsa. Nana had a few things she needed some things from the supermarket. She offered to come along with me, but just then, Papa had himself a little accident...not entirely uncommon with prostate cancer. So, Nana presented me with a choice: Shopping or clean-up.

So, off the the supermarket I went. While in the checkout lane, I spotted some candies left behind on the shelf. They were these maple candies I remember Nana always had with her when I was a kid. Nana isn't supposed to have too many sweets, doctor's orders. However, these candies were sugar free.

Nana was surprised by the candies, even more so when I gave her all her money back, too. She protested and tried to give me the money back, but I refused. I felt like such the good grandson for buying them everything they needed for the week...until about half-way home when I realized that Nana had slipped the money into my coat pocket before I left.

Now I know where I get my need to have the final word. Thanks, Nana.

The good grandson

I'm sure I'm violating the agreement I signed for the rental car, but I decided to drive to Fort Smith to have dinner and play poker at Nana and Papa's. I stopped off for a sixer of my favorite beer in lieu of the weaker-than-Evian light beer my uncle always drinks. I offered to help out with dinner, and instead of mixing the salad dressing like I was expecting, I got something way cooler. A rite of passage, as it were. I...got to grill!

Papa was sitting in his little swivel chair in the garage, and he tossed me his apron. "Here, flip the steaks, boy." he told me. This apron has been around as long as I remember, and I don't think it's ever been washed. But I didn't care. It was just so cool to get to man the grill, even if it was under Papa's stern, watchful eye.

The steaks met everyone's approval. I just sat there, savoring my food with a smug look on my face. I looked over at Papa, eating his steak very slowly, in very small bites, and he looked over at me and gave me a proud little nod. I was on top of the world...at least until the poker game started.

The problem wasn't that I kept getting bad hands, it was that I kept getting great hands and someone always had a better hand. I even got beat with a full house, aces over kings...ACES OVER KINGS! My uncle looked over at me with his straight flush, took a swig of his light beer and laughed.

I went and sat in the living room afterwards and chatted with Papa for a while until he got weak and had to go to bed. All in all, it was a good night.

While the rest of the family finished up the poker game, I cleaned up the kitchen. Nana was shocked, as if she never had seen me clean up after myself before. I stepped outside for a smoke and to give Grace a call. She had a long day, and I caught her just before she went to bed. I cut the conversation short to let her get some sleep. We're gonna meet for lunch tomorrow. Yipee!

In the meantime, my battery's dying and I forgot my charger. Until tomorrow...

I'm not supposed to know these things

I had it in with the boss today, because I wasn't able to get any work done due to the fact that I had personal phone calls all day. I had people from the Board of Transportation trying to keep me from suing the state over the damage to my car. I had lawyers from my insurance company telling me not to talk to anyone from the State about this. They're on top of it, they tell me. I tried everything I could to multi-task, but there was nothing I could do to keep them from calling me. If I ignored them on my cell, they called my office. By about three o'clock, I had to tell the insurance lawyers to just take care of it, and when something gets done, preferably in the form of a big fat check, just let me know where I need to sign.

To try to smooth things over with the boss, I offered to take him out for a few drinks after work to blow off some steam. He's been under a lot of pressure lately and it did him some good to get out of the office for a change. Since I was buying, my boss took full advantage of the situation. I swear, that man has a liver of pure titanium. After about an hour, he got into his "let mees tellz yhoo shome tinn" drunken advise stage. Through all the slurred speech, I thought he said something about wanting to give me a raise, but I'm not sure. I've always been one to think that a drunk man's words are a sober man's thoughts, but I'm not gonna hold my breath on this one.

I started to get tired, and thankfully my boss called his wife to come pick him up. I stuck around long enough to see him off. On my way out to the rental car, I got a call from Nicky. He told me that he talked to Grace this morning, and said that she was absolutely giddy. Over me? I got a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach. What the hell did I do, other than atone for everything I fucked up? Jesus, did Jeff really screw up so badly that simple accountablity is enough to sweep her off her feet?

Nicky explained that she has had a really rough time since the divorce, and she's been thinking a lot about the past, and how different things would've been if she had chosen door number two. That got me to thinking about everything that has happened. There was never an option available for me that wouldn't have just made things worse. If I hadn't ran away, maybe I could've prevented Grace from ending up with Jeff, but only by virtue of the fact that she would've seen that neither of us was worthy of her time.

I'm freaking out over this just a little. Once I got home, I talked to Sid about it all. His response? "Hey, how's the mouth looking on that gift horse?"

Maybe he's right. This is, more or less what I wanted all along. I just need to keep from screwing all this up by being my usual self. In addition, whatever I'm doing right, I need to keep doing.

Reaching out

Been out of commission for the past couple days due to the fact that I've had NO car. After talking with the police, then my insurance company, I got several calls from various agents of the Oklahoma Board of Transportation who were desperate to talk to me before I wound up on the news talking about how our state's bridges are falling apart. I told them to talk to my insurance company regarding the matter.

Given the nature of my claim, it took a little while to get a rental car from my insurance agent. Thanks to the internet, I worked from home on Friday. My plans for a surprise visit to to Nana and Papa's got thrown right out the window. I did give them a call to say hi.

I had pizza delivered Friday night and hung out at home with the cat. I gave Grace a call to talk some more. She had just dropped off Ben over at Jeff's house for the weekend. He had apparently gotten in her face over not doing this and not doing that. I did my best to try to console her, even resorting to apologizing on behalf of the entire male gender. This gave us a chance to talk about what had happened the night that I fought him outside the restaurant...and back in high school.

Back in high school, it was easy for Jeff to play the sympathy card to get Grace to side with him. It wasn't until this second fight that Grace saw that Jeff was the aggressor, not me. I still feel like shit over it nonetheless. The last thing I want anyone to think is that I am a violent guy. I took no pleasure out of beating the living crap out of the guy...twice. I told her this, not in so few words mind you. It was a bit of a bucket of ice water on the mood I was intending to set with this phone call, but it was something we needed to talk about sooner or later.

One thing that she and I have always had in common is an incredibly sarcastic sense of humor. While explaining how sorry I was for what I did to Jeff last month, she just stopped me and said she couldn't hold too much of a grudge over someone kicking her ex-husband's ass. We had a great laugh over that.

This led to a change of subject, namely my falling concrete incident. She kinda freaked out over it, pointing out how close I came to death. I hadn't thought of it all that way, but I'm lucky I was, at the very least, injured. Once I realized this, we both had a collective sigh of relief.

I told her that I'd let her know how the whole thing turns out with the car, and more importantly when I'll be able to make it back to Fort Smith to see Papa. It took us both a long time to say goodbye. A good sign in my book.

The sky is falling

I've always had a bad relationship with gravity. One time, on my way to a job interview, I couldn't find a parking space remotely close to the office I needed to go to and I had to hoof it across a huge parking lot. It was in the middle of this parking lot that I had a bird crap on my shoulder. Wrong place, wrong time.

After a concert one night in Kansas City, I was walking back to my car, and took a detour into the woods to take a leak. It was really dark, so I didn't see the fifteen foot embankment until I had walked right off the edge of it. I broke my wrist and sprained my ankle.

I narrowly avoided death a couple years ago when an tree branch weighted down by an ice storm broke off and landed right in front of me. It didn't miss me entirely. The ends of the branch scratched the hell out of my right cheek and forehead.

Today, I was driving along the expressway...thinking happy thoughts...good music on the radio...then, all of a sudden, while going under an overpass, a big ass chunk of concrete fell from the bridge and came right through my windshield on the passenger side. I panicked, swerved, jumped the curb and scraped my car against light post.

And here, I was feeling kinda good with my situation in life.

Maybe, just maybe...

I came home from work tonight ready to call Grace again, going against the grain of normal "guy logic". Well, that is to say, my brain was ready to call her. Every other cell in my body was scared shitless. I decided to go out to dinner, you know, to buy myself some time. Don't wanna call too early, but don't want to call too late.

Dinner didn't afford me much opportunity to distract myself from "DEAR GOD WHAT AM I GONNA SAY???". As much as I was trying to focus on my enchilada platter, when a waiter dropped a large tray of dishes, breaking them all over the floor, and some patron yelled out, "Way to go there, grace!" All I could do was roll my eyes, look to the ceiling and mutter to myself, "Thank you, God, thank you so bloody much!"

I was asking for my check when my phone rang. Being a little too quick on the draw, I forgot to check the Caller ID. It was Grace, and she answered with a quiet "Uh...hi."

In hindsight, it was a wise choice that I opened my end of the conversation with a jovial "Well, Hi there!" Her mood lightened. We talked a bit about what we've been up to since, uh-hem, the incident. I was truthful, without playing up the depression angle, and without putting up too much of a strong front. I got a little more truthful once I got inside my apartment, away from the prying ears of the patrons of the restaurant and the neighbors out on their patio.

Grace said that Nicky's been talking about me a lot lately. He told her what I've said about her. That's what convinced her to call me, she said. By no means were my conversations with Nicky in the strictest confidence, but hey, a plug is a plug. I give him credit for giving fate a little nudge and convincing her to call me.

After a while, we were hitting a groove in the conversation...until it came to the heart of the matter. The Jeff Incident. Not one of my proudest moments, I said to her. In fact, it's tied for first with the first Jeff Incident ten years ago. What I ended up telling her was that what she saw was, sad to say, not me at my worst. Me at my worst was dealing with the thought that I had completely blown it with her, all because I let that asshole get under my skin.

I felt myself tearing up as I told her how truly sorry I was that I had hurt her. All I've ever wanted since we were kids was for her to see only the best of me. Unfortunately, I've always stumbled whenever I tried to put my best foot forward. I went on for at least fifteen minutes saying all these things that could've been summed up in "I'm so sorry."

When I finished there was a long silence before she asked, "Is that why you disappeared?"

I told her I was acting on my gut instinct. Running away, at least back in high school, seemed like the only choice that didn't dig me further into the hole I was in. I was embarassed, shamed, and alone in my pain. I asked her, "Even if I had stayed, would things have been different? Would I have had a chance in Hell? Would you have ended up with Jeff?"

No simple answers to any of those questions. In the time that I was away, Grace and I had a chance to learn lessons we wouldn't have learned otherwise. We both graduated from the school of hard knocks, majoring in different fields and even taking on some post-graduate work. We could go over the hypothetical situations all night, but it wasn't gonna get us anywhere. What's more important is where we go from here.

In the end, it was left at "You've got my number and I've got yours." I told her that I may make it back to Fort Smith to visit my grandfather. Maybe we could have lunch.

"Maybe." She said. "Just Maybe."

Rough drafts

It took hours for me to get up the nerve to call Grace. It was about seven when I finally hit DIAL on my cell phone. One ring...two...three...then a half dial. Oh, crap. Voice mail.

I've noticed a small trend with women with bad luck with men. They tend to give their number instead of their name on their outgoing message. I'm sure this message was recorded months ago, but i have a feeling I was kind of a reason for the level of mistrust it takes to not even make your personal message, well, personal. I had but a few precious seconds to think about what I want to say.

I can't remember exactly what I said at first. All I know is it was about ninety percent um's and er's. I ran out the time, feeling like a total idiot. Only then, an answer to my prayers. A technical sounding woman's voice said, "If you'd like to review your message, press one. If you'd like to change your message, press two..."

TTTTTTTTWWWWWWWWOOOOOOOO!!!!!

"When finished with your message press pound. BEEP!"

I left a slightly better, more coherant message. I was doing fine until I felt myself trailing off. I wasn't making any sense. POUND!

"If you'd like to-"

TWO!

I took a deep breath, but I exhaled too deeply after the beep... oh, great. Now I'm a heavy breather.

POUND, TWO, BEEP.

"Um..."

SHIT!!! POUND, TWO, BEEP.

"Hi, Grace...it's Deck. I got your message. Sorry, I was out of town and didn't get your message until this morning..." I hesitated to hit pound. "Anyway, give me a call...I'm free pretty much anytime. Bye." Pound.

I immediately second-guessed (or fifth-guessed at this point). But then, I figured I could be a chicken shit about this all night, and she won't get this message until at least the morning. I bit the bullet and hung up. What I said is what I said.

The ball's in her court. We'll see...

Messages

In all the hustle and bustle to get home yeasterday, I neglected to check my messages until sometime this afternoon. The reception on my cell phone wasn't great in Atlanta, and I never got any of these calls while I was there, even though I managed to make a few outgoing calls. They didn't even show up on my caller ID under missed calls until today. I got a couple calls from my mom, a couple from Sid, and one from a number I didn't recognize. It was a 479 area code, and the first thing I thought of was - bad news about Papa.

I immediately checked my voice mail, sadly skipping through the calls from Mom and Sid, trying to get to the mystery caller. It went something like this, in a woman's voice:

"Um...hey...So, I just wanted to call and say hello, and to see how you were doing. Anyway, just give me a call sometime and we can...look, I'm sorry. I know I overreacted, and I'm sorry for that. I just apologized twice, didn't I. Just give me a call. I suck at leaving messages like this. I guess you already know that."

Then It sounded like she was hanging up then changed her mind and spoke again:

"This is Grace, by the way. Please call me. My number is 479-BEEEEEEEEP!"

That wasn't censorship, it really beeped. I don't know if it ran out of time or what. Weird, huh?

So what do I do?!? I think I need to sit still and let my heart still racing. I'm not writing this in hopes of getting a response from anyone on the matter. I just needed to get this off my chest. Of course, I'll call her back. But first, some courage may be in order, and by that I mean alcohol.

Seminars

I walked into work on Tuesday to the news that I had to attend a seminar in Atlanta, and that my flight left in two hours. I was in a mood, and because I had to make this trip, I made sure I got something in return. I got an extra week of vacation. I kinda wondered if I should've steered my boss towards a raise instead.

I rushed home to pack, completely forgetting my laptop. Not that I'd have much time to get online.

The seminar schedule was long as hell, boring as hell, quite frankly it was hell. Here's the new software, here's how much it costs, here's how to use it once you got it. By the time I got out every night, all I wanted to do was eat dinner and go to sleep. Which is what I did. A shame, really. I hear Atlanta has a pretty cool night life.

I couldn't wait to get home. Even today as I was flying back, I did as much as possible to avoid human interaction. If they weren't remotely involved in the process of me getting back to my apartment, they were ignored completely.

I had a co-worker look after my cat for the time I was gone. That cat is becoming fat and very happy. It was so good to see him. The first familiar face I've seen in days, and he's now cleaning himself with his own tongue.

I lead a charmed life, don't I?

Clarity

I got up early today, fed the cat (even though the whiny little shit kept me up all night), and went for a run down by the river. It was a strange thing, because no one was out this morning. Not a single jogger in the park, not a sinlge bum asleep on the benches. Nothing. It was a ghost town. And while that gave me a chance to clear my head, all I could think about was how incredibly creepy and silent it was.

After about a half hour I got home and showered. I peeked through the blinds as I was getting ready and it was still all too quiet outside. I briefly thought that it might have been a daylight savings time switchover that I wasn't aware of, but that was disproved by the local TV morning show. A quick call to the time & teperature line confirmed my fear that the morning show had the time wrong as well.

I got dressed, got in my car, and that's when I caught my first glimpse of civilization. Then, everything went right back to how it always has been in the morning. I stopped a QuikTip for my morning coffee and chicken biscuit, and I got bugged for change by one guy as I was going in and two guys on my way out. Yep, everything was back to normal.

Why was I so weirded out by the fact that for a brief time this morning, I was completely left alone? I should've relished in it. There was no polite nodding to strangers as I passed them on the running trail. I didn't have to worry about what I was doing, like, if my run suddenly looked a little effeminate when I sensed a slight cramp in my thigh. I didn't have to concern myself with keeping my thoughts to myself when I could've just said them out loud.

I gotta remind myself to take stock in those moments. This kind of thing rarely happens at all, especially in the city. I guess that's my advice to you all: Don't question it when a moment of clarity comes your way.

No particular place to go

I had to run a few errands this morning. I mailed out some bills, picked up some dry cleaning, the like. I got back on the expressway, heading home. For reasons that escape me, I skipped my exit and just kept on driving. I had no idea where I was going...I just went on instinct. If an exit looked like someplace interesting, I took it.

All I knew about my route was that it I was heading west, deep into rural Oklahoma. I passed farm after farm, small town after small town. I stopped at a diner in a town I can't remember. I had never had better roast beef and mashed potatoes. The sweet tea had enough sugar in it to keep me going on the next leg of my journey.

I pulled into a cemetery out in the middle of nowhere. I needed to stretch my legs and it was the only place to turn off the road for as far as the eye could see. I walked around the tombstones. The most recent grave was from 1957, the oldest read 1897. I sat down next to a tree to take in the absloute quiet. This was on the top of a hill, and I could see for miles. There was nothing around. Miles of grazing land, but no cows or horses. Then, I got to thinking about the graves. Were all these people the last of some ghost town around here? Has no one else died since 1957? Or, did they just start burying people at another cemetery? Did anyone else ever visit loved ones at this cemetery? After about a half-hour of pondering, I hit the road again.

I wasted a tank and a half of gas in total before I decided to turn around. I bought a map at a gas station along with a Yoohoo and a KitKat (another sugar rush), and tried to figure out where I was. I couldn't. The country bumpkin behind the counter was no help at all. So, I just headed back the way I came, looking for town names that looked familiar. Eventually, I found a sign that said Oklahoma City was 63 miles away, so that's where I was headed. I could find my way back home from there.

When I got home it was dark, and I could hear Cody meowing from down the staircase. I had done absolutely nothing all day, and had spent almost $100 in gas, food and tolls doing it. I may have to eat bologna all next week to make up for it, but it was worth it. I gained some perspective on my life and the world, even though I probably only traveld about one-eighth across the country. I figure if I ever have the time and the cash, I may go even further next time.

I made myself some George Foremaned chicken for my dinner, and shared some of it with Cody to make up for being gone all day. Then, I cleaned up the apartment, took out the trash and listened to a couple of old Ray Charles records before settling in to bed with the laptop. I googled my friend's names for a while. I found Sid's name on a draft list for the NHL. Nicky's name is the same as a lounge singer in Amsterdam. Clara recently celebrated her 101st birthday. Grace starred in several obscure b-movies in the 50's. My ex's name is registered as a sex offender in Montana. Nana is a student of the month at Bell Elementary in Minneapolis. Papa died of a political hunger strike in an Irish prison back in 1973. And apparently, I have the same name as a guy who now calls himself Elvis Costello. Rock on!

And now, I must get some sleep. It's been a along day.