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June 21, 2005
This is Fake Too
Sarah and I went out several times. Enough for me to call her my girlfriend not feel too uncomfortable when she told me she loved me. After a while I started to think things were going really well and that we were going to get serious. But she dumped me. She dumped me because I wasn't taking her "any place but mexican dives." She didn't mention that we went dutch half the time, but I could tell by her voice that she meant it.
That hit me pretty hard. Not because I was madly in love with her or anything like that. She did have an amazing body and let me use it however I wanted, whenever I wanted, but she was 18. In some ways she was extremely mature, a very complex girl that could speak in depth on intellectual subjects without sounding like a half-whit. For that I could overlook the awkward stilted sex and the way she all-to-often gagged herself while giving head. But nothing could make me overlook the clinginess. The way I was everything for her. The misplaced idealism that I was hers and we would have seven swans at our beautiful wedding.
I don't know what the swans were supposed to be doing there, but I never asked. I didn't really care. I didn't want it. I wanted the here and now. A beautiful girl with boundless energy at my side. A girl that didn't look down on me because I drove my mom's old car. Because I didn't have a retirement fund. Because I when I splurged I went for a burrito at Alfonzo's. So when she made it all too apparent to me that I had been decieving myself I gladly let things pass.
But that's exactly why it me so hard. Sort of. I mean I was 25 and she was 18. How could she have broken up with me? I'd become the older man they say women are always clamoring for and she'd refused me. Nto just refused me but basically told her I wasn't adult enough for her. For her. A kid. I wasn't at her level, I was below it.
It's not like it was all my fault though. Things were tight because of the student loans. I started getting bills and I had to pay back; I didn't know how to delay them, or defer them or whatever. I guess I could have found out, but I just threw tall that mail to the side and kept putting all of it off. Everything about the whole process intimidated me. It was worse than taxes. They were asking for a big chunk of my money for what seemed like the rest of my life. How is a guy supposed to think clearly under that kind of pressure? I guess I should have. Things started to get pretty bad when the man forced my hand into paying back the school loans back.
For some reason I had decided it was a good idea to go 30-some thousand dollars into debt to get a degreee in philosopy. I guess I got a little bit smarter through college because I realized how stupid it was to spend so much money on a degree that would never earn me a cent. I used to overhear my relatives at family gatherings making cracks about "philosopher for hire" signs and scoff at their ignorance. But forced to pay out monthly for something that was most probably a hinderence to any further money-making I started to think that maybe my Budweiser swilling uncles knew something I didn't.
I'm sure a couple of them knew about dating much younger girlsm but I didn't ask their advice about Sara. Their experience dating the younger girls was usually knocking them up behind their wives' backs. Still the break-up was hard. Actually the break up its self wasn't that bad; I realized I was probably too old for her anyway. But that got me thinking that I was probably too old to be a line cook at a chain bistro and I got a little uppity with the managers. That got me into a bit a trouble.
The first week they only cut my hours. The second week, when I realized that with the hours I was working I wouldn't be able to cover my rent and told them just how bad and menial I thought the job was, they fired me. On the spot. Something I wasn;'t exactly prepaired for. I had a degree in philosophy for god's sake. I don't know if a single other person, besides the part-time bartender had a high school degree. A couple of the other guys in the kitchen might have, but I don't know exactly how the conversion from Mexican works.
I learned that day, though, that they don't have sensitivity training in Mexican high schools. When the other guys in back saw how shocked and hurt I was by getting fired they jeered me and teased me - "Cool-lege Boy. You too good, eh, pendaho?" - so badly that I almost broke into tears. Instead I took a swing at the little Peruvian dishwasher that always grabbed my ass and flapped his tongue at me and ran to my car.
Posted by calculatoronfire at June 21, 2005 07:44 PM
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Comments
either you're using the "this is fake" thing as a cover, or you truly are a fabulous writer.
well i guess you're a fabulous writer either way.
Posted by: sweetney at June 21, 2005 08:58 PM
You are such a fake, Plagerism is uncool. I don't know how you got a hold of my story, but if you continue to publish this as your work I will find you and deep fry your testicles!
Posted by: nick at June 21, 2005 11:28 PM
Sweetney - I used to work in a restaurant. I think the dish washer was Peruvian. Let's leave it at that.
That and what was the mem thing you wrote about? Tv with rabbit ears? We all know that's how you draw a tv even though none of them have rabbit ears anymore.
Nick - You're damn right plagerism is uncool, but if you remember (which apparently you don't) I won this story fair and square through an arm wrestling match. And judging by the way I beat your ass you will be the one with deep-fried testicles.
Posted by: brian at June 23, 2005 07:48 AM
The arm wrestling match was a little unfair. When you have a midget dancing a jig on the table next to us I am apt to be distracted. I would like a rematch but my minimum wage job won't allow me the time off even to arm wrestle for my dignity.
Posted by: nick at June 23, 2005 10:35 PM
Dude. You're the one that kept stuffing money down her pants. I had nothing to do with that.
If you want a rematch you're on.
I'll kick your ass with or without the midget stripper.
And if you really need me to I'll even go down to McD's and we can wrestle over the stainless steel counter.
None of this "I want to but I can't crap." I'm not going to take it anymore.
Posted by: brian at June 24, 2005 12:32 PM