I sent a note to an old friend today, whom I haven't seen or spoken to in probably 20 years. We had worked together and rammed around together in the early 80s. I had spent my high school years living on an air force base, and she had grown up with something like a half a dozen brothers - the result being that we both knew our way around a pool table.
One evening, she and I headed down Route 9w, hitting every bar between Kingston and Newburgh that had a pool table (and in the early '80s, there were a lot of them). We'd watch for a bit, then ask to play some guys for drinks, then proceed to embarrass them terribly, stomp them into the ground. Then we'd down our drinks and skip out before anyone got over their shock. She wracked up her car on the Mid-Hudson Bridge access road on her way home that night, and walked several miles home in the dark (no cell phones then). I felt very guilty. I was a good 13 years older than her, and I should have known better than to let her drive.
Thinking about her got me to thinking about a mutual friend of ours, a very pretty Ivy-league yuppyish young man clearly marked by the Company for fast-tracking. She decided she had a crush on him. I kinda figured he was gay but didn't know it. Again, this was the early '80s, and it was a lot easier to stay in the closet, even to oneself.
I offended him twice within a year in the mid-'80s, and he hasn't spoken to me since.
The first occasion involved a new manager. She was one of those very large very feminine very proper women that at first strike one as maybe a transvestite who's trying too hard. She was a good manager, very good at both technical and people skills. Many of the younger people in my department laughed at her, they picked up on her need to be accepted, and, well, perfect, and her obvious pride in her daughter. There didn't seem to be a husband, so we assumed she was divorced.
I happened to mention to a Mensa friend that she was our new manager, and it turned out that he had known her for many years. He said that she'd had a very rough life, and that he was happy for her that she was now doing so well.
He told me that she had gotten pregnant as a young woman in the mid'70s. In those days, one simply did not get pregnant, even if one's hippy friends were espousing "free love"! And if one did, one either got married immediately, or "went away" for a while, and gave the baby up for adoption. One simply did not KEEP the baby. This woman fought to keep the child, and refused to name the father. Her parents threw her out on the street in her 7th month and virtually disowned her. She worked her way through college alone while supporting herself and her infant daughter. Along the way there was a physically abusive relationship or two.
So, the aforementioned young yuppie was one of those who made fun of her. One day in his office, I said that she was to be admired, not made fun of, and I told him her story, in confidence, I thought. I guess I'd hoped that he could influence others to cool it and give her a chance.
The next day, I was walking past his office, and he called me in. There were several other recent college graduates there, looking all big-eyed and hopping up and down with excitement. He said "Come on, back me up here. Ummm, what's Hilda'(not-her-real-name)'s father's last name?" I gave him a blank look, and said "I don't know." He said "Oh, come on. It's the same as hers, right?" I wasn't going to give him the satisfaction. I have to admit I was a little pissed at him. "I really don't know what her father's name is. You should ask her." And I walked out.
He was annoyed that I wouldn't back him up on the unwed mother story, but that blew over after a while. I think he knew that I was disappointed in him.
A few months later, several people asked me, rolling their eyes, if I'd seen the shrine in the yuppie's office. One of the guys he'd been hired with, and had been roommates with, had transferred to a field office. They were keeping in contact through the Company net, and Yuppie had visited the friend over a holiday a few weeks before. Later, as I walked past his office, he called me in "to see something wonderful". The something was the latest note from his friend. It was just an old joke, but Yuppie acted like it was it was the absolute height of wit. On the bulletin board over his desk, he had a photo of his friend, surrounded by leaf-napkin-ticketstub souvenirs of their visit, plus cut outs, tastefully bordered, from notes the friend had sent. I thought "Oh, my God! Not in the office!"
I closed his door and said "You've got to stop doing this!" "Doing what?" I told him this looked to others like a shrine to the friend. That it looked like a schoolgirl crush. That people were wondering when he'd start writing the friend's name all over his notebooks. And then he looked down, and I followed his eyes, and ... yep ... all over his desk blotter. I wanted to ask him if the friend knew how he felt, but I don't think HE knew what he felt. But there wasn't going to be a chance, because when he looked up and met my eyes, the shutters were down.
He never spoke another word to me from that moment on. If we passed in the hall, he looked straight through me.
Ten years later, he was a manager in one of the products that I oversaw in a legal capacity, and he always absented himself from any meeting I called. He'd send a rep. I dealt with his lead designers/programmers, not him. I'm non-confrontational. As long as it worked, that was fine with me.
He's probably in his mid-40s now. I still wonder if he ever figured himself out. I still miss him. When he wasn't being immature, he was awfully sweet and bright. And so very nice to look at!
(Oh! PS to the old friend of the billiard balls - last time I saw Yuppie he was very heavy! Chipmunk cheeks! What a surprise! If it wasn't for the perfect hair and cold stare, I wouldn't have recognized him.)
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