Silly Little Fool

I had lunch with Tim yesterday - Valentine's Day. I had invited two other folk to join us, but it turned out to be we two. I promised him it would not be a birthday lunch and it wasn't. It was two friends, who know they can literally say ANYTHING to the other, having a good meal and an even better (and overdue) talk. We discussed our jobs, our coworkers, our personal lives, our pasts, our futures and everything in-between. I wonder sometimes if there is another human on the planet that knows as much about me as Tim does …

… which brings me, quite naturally, to today.

Today my mom and I visited drove North and spent a few hours with my sister and her family. I was rather dreading the drive, with just the two of us in the car, because of the inevitable talk that I was sure would somehow be about how badly I've screwed up.

Instead, as we drove past Sloat Boulevard on 19th Avenue, she pointed left and said "That's where your father and I first lived when we got married. The apartment was below ground level – and when people would walk by our window, we would see their shoes … kind of like the set from 'Laverne and Shirley'". I had heard this before, but didn't know that I was literally driving by the place twice a week on my commute.

"Your grandparents – your Dad's folks – didn't like me, you know. I wasn't educated enough, I was older, and I was from the 'wrong side of the tracks'. Plus I was already living on my own so I was clearly going to be a bad influence on their only son. Oh, and I had not just a job, but an actual career. All of these things were just so dead opposite from what they wanted in a potential daughter-in-law." She stopped to look over at me, to make sure I was listening.

"When your dad proposed and I accepted, he told his folks and they disowned him immediately. I was terrified because I had torn apart this family just by existing – just by loving their son and wanting to be with him. I felt like I was asking your dad to make all these impossible concessions to just be with me, even 'tho he told me over and over that he'd do whatever it took for us to be together. It wasn't easy and it hurt like hell to know what he was freely giving up and that I was the cause of it all. Your grandparents didn't even talk to us until your sister was three years old."

We were now across the bridge and traffic was light. She turned to me. "Do you honestly think there was anything that anyone could have said or done to keep your Dad and I apart? Do you honestly believe that neither of us had doubts? That we didn't want the other to be completely happy and wonder ALL THE TIME if we were just being selfish for wanting to be with the other person?"

I had all kinds of witty responses at the ready, but before I could respond, she finished me off.

"You know, Julie Lynne, I have heard you say that if you're gonna be a fool, you may as well be a fool for love. Thus far, I'd say you're just being the fool. So – what are you gonna do about it?"