top of page

Essay 1                                                                                                                           September 23, 2024

IMG_0078.jpeg

Not The Man I Was - I Am The Fall Guy

I'm a paragraph. Click here to add your own text and edit me. It's easy.

IMG_3337.jpeg
IMG_2693.jpeg

I was at the Co-op after work looking at chicken theighs. I was wearing a dark blue suit and a yellow tie. A man, younger than me by a few years looked at me, not overtly flirty, but if I were to describe the way he looked at me, I would say he cruised me. I flushed a bit and grabbed a pack of the chicken theighs and moved on. It was a few days later that my phone rang; it was my ex Dennis. “Hi Josh,” he said into the phone. “What’s up?” I asked. I always felt bad about Dennis. He is such a nice man and I broke up with him because he was such a nice man. He never brought out of me the passion that I wanted a boyfriend to elicit from me. But on all other levels, from looks to humor I loved the guy. “Hey were you in the Co-op on Tuesday buying chicken?” he asked. “I was. Why?” I asked. “Were you wearing a blue suit?” he asked. “Yeah, I think so, why?” I asked again. “My friend Mark saw you there,” he said. “He’s a little shorter than you, nice looking guy with dark hair. He said you two looked at each other.” Looked at each other I thought. That’s funny, a single look can communicate so much. “Yeah, I think I know who you are talking about,” I said. Of course I knew who he was talking about. “He wants your number, is that okay?” He asked. There was nothing awkward about it. “Sure,” I said as I put the top down on my black Porsche and said that I had to go, the wind noise made talking hard but Dennis said that I would do anything to get off the phone with him, and this felt awkward. I hung up. Over the weekend I had finished with the horses and drove into Albany to run a few errands: my dry cleaning and all the other things I don’t get to during the week. I was wearing a tee-shirt that I am sure was not clean. I had on my John Deere cap which had faded white rings of old sweat and a deeper, wet ring of new. I was wearing cut-off chinos and muck boots when I walked out of the dry cleaner’s with an arm full of shirts to my pick-up truck that was doubled parked outside Plaza Cleaners. After I got the shirts in the passenger side I closed the door and started to walk around to driver’s side when I almost walked into Mark, the man with the dark hair with whom I had shared a look and who had asked for my number. “Hi,” I said with a smile and my hand extended. “Hi there,” he said caught off guard and uncomfortable. “I’m Josh, Dennis’ friend,” I said. “Oh right. Right,” he said pretending to have been confused but he was not. It was clear to me that the Josh in the suit was the man he liked and this one before him was not at all the man he made overtures towards. I was the prince who was kissed and turned into the frog. With this understood, without any words having to be said I got into my truck and headed home. Rejected. *** Dennis and I sit in the window seat at Bountiful Bread and he tells me not to feel bad, that Mark is kind of shallow and really is just into suit and tie types. My weekend persona was a “turn off” Dennis tells me. “We should hang out more.” I said, wondering why we don’t. I do like Dennis. *** It is dark and quiet in Lisbon tonight. It’s 4:30AM local time; my dream of Dennis was so vivid. But know this, there was never a man who looked at me at the Co-op and then called Dennis for my number. Dennis and I don’t talk anymore because he died of cancer in 2015. But the dream was haunting and not all together meaningless or unwelcome. Sometimes, often times, the dead only come back to me under the cover of night and the vail of a dream.

IMG_2701.jpeg
Follow Me
  • X
  • Instagram
  • Facebook
  • LinkedIn
  • TikTok
Sharing Is Caring

Writer Travel 

bottom of page