Thank you very much for the Neil Simon comparison. I’ve always been a very big win and Brighton Beach Memoirs is like a depression era version of my family, so you can imagine how much that impacted me.
Non-fiction / The Ivory Letter
I just now realized that I was married.
I know that I should have known this earlier, especially since our second anniversary just pased. It may come as a surprise to you, but being married is not something that is consciously accepted. Being married is something that one may actually be completely oblivious to, as I am find myself to be living proof.
How is it possible to be so oblivious?
Much as I remained unconscious to my state of being, it is still unfair to consider this a state of oblivion. A man undergoing a metamorphosis such as marriage may in fact just be a caterpillar unaware that it is about to become a butterfly. One might argue that the caterpiller knows what is to come, but I ask you to prove that to me. Do you speak caterpiller? No, then let’s move on.
This comparison deserves further discussion if only because the new butterfly and the new husband both
arrive similarly, awakening to something different and behaving quite flighty.
You are probably confused still. If so, allow me to further explain that the newly married man suffers from much confusion. Some attribute this to a post-wedding hangover, but I subscribe to a different school of thought, mostly because a hangover that lasts a lifetime that is achieved without tequila seems a bit too unbelievable.
With a tequila named Montezuma, perhaps, but otherwise, it just seems wrong, like Hybrid SUV’s or soyburgers.
Now, I assume there were signs on this road that I ignored, but please know it was not intentional, more like drifting off while on a long stretch of road and realizing you missed your exit.
I realize now that it began when I started to suffer from prolonged pronoun lapses. Moving from “I” to “We” is an obvious one. But this is especially true in cases where “We” is actually “Her” or “What She says We should be.” I find myself fortunate in that for “Me,”“We” is most often “We,” or at least an impression of “We.” For my wife and I, “We” is sort of like Eddie Murphy’s Bill Cosby impression in that it’s a “We” close enough to pass for the real “We” if you listen, but don’t look carefully.
Then there’s the ring, which really should have been a dead giveaway. Understand though that a husband cannot immediately come to grips with the idea of this the shiny, often heavy, metallic band that become surgically attached to his finger during what women refer to as “marriage” and I refer to as the “Marital Procedure.”
This is especially true if said individual rarely wears jewelry. In these cases, the ring is often passed off as a toy or plaything, as it affords more of an opportunity to fidgit with something in meetings, or clank against metal tables and such.
I suppose if I am to give creedance to my theory that I must explain that this “Procedure” is not too different from any other procedure that one might go under, as it usually takes less than an hour, but it differs in that the recovery period is decidedly longer, and in some extreme cases, is never-ending.
As with most patients that experience partial limb damage, I spent approximately one year in therapy, adjusting to the weight of said ring, as well as the sometimes troubling emotional aspects of realizing that a part of you has been taken, rather quickly, away from you.
This leads to the last type of confusion that I have come to relate to, which is a kind of a “Phantom Limb” pain, similar to that which occurs in amputees. The sense is that there is a missing part of me, now lost forever, that I sometimes still feel the sensation of. It is in cases like my own, where the sensation of not wearing a ring is felt, despite the fact that one is now joined to my body and soul that are most often discussed. This traumatic adjustment needs to be met head on in order to re-achieve functionality in society as a “Husband” or “Married Person.”
Having undergone all of these types of confusion, today’s discovery left me a bit flabbergasted. I had determined that I had dealt with every kind of confusion that was there to experience, yet today I realized that a new form of confusion lie ahead.
Today I took off my ring, as I normally do when I swim, and discovered that the ring remained. No, not the shiny platinum band, but a white, tan-less ring of skin that had remained behind, acknowledging my state of living, even in the ring’s absence.
Many thoughts occurred to me. Here I was, with an Ivory Letter encompassing my finger, a white letter O that branded me for all to see. Wherever I was to go, regardless of choice, I was now a marked man. I could not simply take off my ring, should I decide upon indiscretion, for now, as Reverend Dimmesdale before me, I had branded myself beneath the surface. No, I realized, this was not society using a ring to brand me, as they did with Hester Prynne’s scarlet insignia. I now knew that I had affixed my own stigma, my own brand, and my own new identity simply through adapting to my new lifestyle.
Today’s epiphany has left me aware for the first time, not just of the woman who will forever share my life and bed, but that I have retained a surprising amount of information from Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “The Scarlet Letter,” a book that I really tested poorly on in High School.
So now it occurs to me that my confusion, finally to the surface, has arisen solely to disappear. I have reached a point of no escape. A truth has been revealed, not only to me, but to the public as well. I am married, I accept that.
Except that, well…
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Nani reviewed Version 1 -
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This 129 word review has not been unlocked.
brookelynne reviewed Version 1 -
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I REALLY ENJOYED THIS PIECE, AND THERE ARE SO MANY WITTY COMMENTS AND CLEVERLY CRAFTED SENTENCES, AND JOKES THAT WRAP AROUND ON EACH OTHER I’D HAVE TO COPY/PASTE THE WHOLE THING TO SHOW YOU THEM ALL. ONE THING--WE DON’T ‘GO UNDER’ PROCEDURES--WE ‘UNDERGO’ THEM. ALSO, I WASN’T SURE IF I SHOULD LAUGH --AND I DID A FEW TIMES, QUITE GENUINELY-- OR BE TERRIBLY SAD FOR YOU--OR FOR YOUR WIFE. I HATE IT WHEN PEOPLE CRITIQUE ME ON MY STATE OF MIND RATHER THAN MY SKILL, SO I’LL CLARIFY THAT LAST COMMENT-- I WASN’T SURE IF YOU INTENDED ME TO LAUGH OR CRY, OR MAYBE YOU THOUGHT ‘TO EACH THEIR OWN’, ANYHOW, I’M SUDDENLY DREADING MY OWN UPCOMING WEDDING. GOOD WRITING, WISH TO SEE A PART II .
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dellessa reviewed Version 1 -
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INteresting opening. It caught my attention and held it.
Dragon_Master reviewed Version 1 -
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I liked it. It is true, and it sounds like Neil Simon. Very good. I am truly impressed by your grasp of the subject matter.
hisredhead reviewed Version 1 -
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Although this piece was a bit of a rambling monolouge, I found myself completely connected to it. I too have recently reached that shocking two year mark. Sometimes it’s like the wedding never really took place and you’ve suddenly woken up to this person in your life. I really enjoyed your humor on the topic, particularly the “prolonged pronoun lapses.” Very creative! I didn’t quite understand the cliff hanger ending though. It left me a bit confused on the overall point of the piece.
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