Twenty Year Kiss

I kissed this girl, you see.

She wanted me to, there in her room in the basement. I was not an expert on making out by any stretch of the imagination but I had been spending a lot of time with this girl.

She was a little nervous and when I had moved closer and leaned in because of the motion—not because I was making my Official Move, she had looked down at the last second to scratch her nose on her hands.

It was the giggly sort of nervous. I was sitting on the floor and she was lying on her bed, our faces close enough it would the smallest adjustment to my posture and our lips would meet.
She paused mid-sentence to think of a word. She was distracted enough I moved in and brought our faces together.

We kissed and I must have blinked or something because now it’s twenty years later. She stayed awake and made sure to tell me it was officially twenty years. I always remember the date but somehow I forget she likes to start at midnight. I joke that it was much later in the evening by the time we kissed.

I know twenty years is nothing to sneeze at but also celebrating things extra because it’s a round number seems arbitrary to me. Don’t get me wrong—I love the number ten and sure it’s neat when it can cleanly be divided into a number (and don’t even get me started about the number five!) but I’m not sure it’s the kind of thing that propels one into a partying frenzy.

When people ask what we’re doing to celebrate I say, “Stay married. Probably.” But we like to sit around and make plans for the future that will some someday, somehow involve just us. Her and me trying to get a jump on the future version of “us” that does not inherently include our daughter and son. We are planning on being the youngest old people ever.

Secretly we have started putting our change and spare dollars into a jar to someday buy an RV. She’ll drive. I’ll write. Maybe find a nice campground to tend for a summer...

When people ask what the secret is I tell them there isn’t one secret, really. Maybe it’s because she is co-dependent and too forgiving and I am an irritable bastard who feels less irritable around her.

It’s certainly rare to find someone who doesn’t make me itch like people do; even people I proudly admit to loving can say or do something and bottom line is it makes me feel like the only way to get a good scratch in is with some distance from them. That I found such a person with boobs and a fetish for bastards is not a card you can expect to be dealt twice.

No one is perfect and I’m positive enough to hope my cynical nature helped preserve my marriage when times where tough. I could tell myself that it folly to think there was such a thing as a perfect fit. I’ve met what seemed like a perfect couple and seen them not only get divorced but they end their marriage in such a way that jaws drop. And while my wife is certainly capable of driving me crazy I’ve never thought there is a female out there who would drive me less crazy. I mean, I’m a bastard but people like me—I hear their stories. If you say “adult” to me I silently add the word “dysfunctional” before it.

And I also know I’m not mounted high up on a horse named Functional. I’m what I’d like to call mostly functional. I know funds are low and rent is always due. But I also got the night off to go do something. Even if I’m not sure what we will be doing blowing off work seems like the thing to do, and is there for responsible.

Board Game Bastards

A buddy of mine owns a game store in town. He heard I quit my job at the boarding school and called me to see if I could work for him at all in August. My plans in August were basically work less. But, I like the guy and don't mind the store and it's always nice to be considered valuable before an exchange.

I work four hour shifts. The nerds wander in to get their Yu-Gi-Oh, Pokemon and oh-god-yes, Magic the Gathering fix. Most of them are adults (at least in the sense they are over 18 and will be prosecuted as such) 

Today a nerd came in to look at our Yu-Gi-Oh cards, which of the many cards available is least popular and mostly fueled by grown adults. He was definitely an adult. He looked and found some cards he wanted to add to his collection and while I was ringing him up there was a bit of that awkward brand of silence.

I usually have a beard in various stages of beardiness. It is getting fluffy but no where near what one would call "epic." The customer also had a beard.

"I like your beard," he said. 

I checked our little credit card terminal. It was receiving. If his account had the funds he and his approval would be on their way. 

"What this old thing?," I said but I had no opinion on his facial hair. 

"I wish my mom would let me grow mine out like that."

I glanced up. I had made a bit of a funny and I thought maybe he was too. His face, though, was very serious.

"Yeah, my mom's cooler than yours I guess," was all I could come up with since I imagined laughing outright in a customer's face would be frowned upon and kicking them out of the store and back to mom's basement for being a walking, talking stereotype was not an option.

Married Bastard

At 37 I've been married for 19 years.

That's over half my life. People assume I'm good at relationships because I have longevity. I guess it would be insulting if people heard how long I have been married and the typical reply was, "Whoa! Which one of you is codependent?"

They say the three biggest points of contention that tend to put married folk on the road to divorce are sex, money, religion/politics. You can put them in what ever order you please (and of course they are not the only potentially poisonous subject.

Mrs. Bastard and I tend to share opinions and attitudes.

I think one of aspects for marriage is accepting life as sometimes dull and routine. Sometimes sex (o' silly hyped up, over focused, sex!) can't always be amazing and hot. I think there is something beautiful when I am interrupted mid-sentence with, "Could we have some sex, maybe?"

Questions like that tend to bleed the interruption of its offensiveness.

And then I say, "No! I want to finish my stupid work story!"because stories need finishing.

And then she crosses her arm and pouts. Until the end of the story, that is.

And then later when she's says, "Don't move."

And I ask, "Did I find a good spot?"

And she replies, "No. I found a back zit. I'm going to gittit."

You don't question it. You wince from the pinch and inconsequential lost of body fluid the zit that just got gitted with the confidence that this is happy road of marriage; littered though it may be with offhand comments and interruptions one must be careful labeling--with terms like "silly," for example.

Boom.

Marriage.

One word, incomplete sentences (not this one).

Employed Bastards

What's the worst part about working with teens?

Adults is the funny answer.

But really though, it's the adults. 

I decided to end my stint working with teens. It was not easy. I get along fantastically with teenagers for whatever reason but it was time I pushed past that emotional connection with the kids and moved on.

 

Two jobs at both ends of the day's spectrum was making it hard for me to sleep. My body goes by that invisible clock and I tend to wake up at the same day every day. Four months of waking up at 7a.m. and going to bed around 2:30a.m. wore a bastard out and when I sat down at the end of the day the boarding school job fell short for too many reasons. I will probably get to some specifics but I don't want to go on and on about how quickly a good thing can turn bad.

Working at a bar has shown me if nothing else it does not pay much less to be in charge of much, much less. I'm already sleeping in later which for me is usually a long process. 

Working one job will be nice for a minute. I have my eye on a part time day job--the easy sort you get minimum wage for but also will be a good experience that lasts about a month but will get you a discount on comic books.

Southern Utah Bastard--No, Really

I was out with my wife in celebration of our 19th wedding anniversary. I was thinking--I'm 37 and I've been married over half of my life. But also my wife and I were both craving taco salads. Lots of lettuce, grilled chicken on a freshly deep fried tortilla and mixed together with sour cream a guacamole. Damn yes.

My wife had a glass of wine with her meal. We were too full for dessert. We sat hoping to digest enough to get dessert but we had other places to get to before we returned to the homestead and our little half bastards (born within wedlock to a full blooded bastard = half bastard). During our optimistic sitting two moms and a whole bunch of children walked in. They were not the empowered lesbian minivan family. This was two separate moms with mean creases in their faces. They sat down and spoke openly of their very, very limited budget. One of the smaller babies threw a handful of chips onto the ground. I saw our server wince.

"They are not going to tip her shit." My wife said quietly for just me. Utahns are not known as generous tippers in the first place but she has been in the business for awhile. She has the eye of the server. She had worked in Nevada where servers would fight over who had to wait on the people about to come into the restaurant from the car with the Utah license plates.

We got our check and she nudged me. "You should give her something extra." She was telling me because I had the cash in my pocket. The card I paid with was the account both of our checks went into.

I put two five dollar bills with my card and we paid. We were full, in good spirits and in the mood to spread the wealth. Our server ran my card and looked at the cash in confusion.

"Did you need change?" She asked.

"Nope. All for you." I smiled.

"It's our anniversary," my wife said.

"Are you from around here?" Our server asked.

I laughed. I had been in born and raised in southern Utah. My wife and I met in high school.

"We are. We've both worked for tips, though."

I looked over my shoulder where one of the mothers was jabbing at the menu one of her small children was holding--he was getting one enchilada, not two. "It can be rough." I tapped my heart with my fist.

My wife wished her luck and on the way to the car we joked about what a compliment it can be to have people thing you must not be from around here.

Dollar for the Bastard

I could not hear the dude over the DJ's bass happy tune. He was Australian and had been here for hours and he was having a great Friday night. I had not seen him before but he had been laughing and joking all night.

He wanted to tell me something, though. He was grinning and motioning me to lean in over the bar. What choice does one have?

"I'm John! Wha's ya name, mate? Eric? Good t'meetcha! Do you know what we call your job in Australia?"

What did they call the dude fetching new bottles of liquor, stocking the beer freezers, cooking food when the fancy struck a patron? I had no idea.

"Piss pig!"

I laughed. He laughed. He handed me a dollar and told me I was alright.

When I got home and was musing over the busy Friday night I got curious and did some light internet searching. A piss pig around here is also a fan of pee. To what extent, I'm not sure, I clicked none of the provided links. If you're more curious than I, though, you know what to google.

Busy as a Bastard

"What have you been doing all this time, Bastard?" asks no one, ever.

For employment I've been working at a boarding school for almost six years. Sometime in early June it'll be six years even. I joke about tracking down my exact hire date and then quitting the day after word. I'd call the ensuing book Six Years and a Day: My Life with Their Kids.

Catchy, no?

I've also recently gotten a second job at a bar. I am a bar-back. I have the pleasure of cooking food (using the term loosely), fetching new liquor bottles, slicing limes on the fly and of course--I wash the dishes. "Bar-back" is often "synonymous with "bar-bitch."

I stroll in around 7p. If it's busy enough--and it usually is, I walk out with the bartender and the closing bouncer. This means every Thursday night I go home knowing I have to be to work at 7a. Well, 7ish--I run the shift and my staff know what I signed up for and though it was quite willingly they cut me slack and don't say anything if they don't see me until fifteen after the hour. I've never let the shift suffer because I'm tired.

It's more than safe to say I've been collecting stories I hope to share and I have to say bouncing from one social institution to the next is quite the contrast. I don't mind going from "Don't ever say fuck!" to "Could you say 'fuck' more? You're making us fucking uncomfortable."