Whom Besides You and What Cavemen?

When I was child, my sisters and I used to raise objections, based on historical precedent.

“Why do I have to brush my teeth? Cavemen didn’t brush their teeth.”

My mother had what she believed was the ultimate answer: “Yes, and they died at twenty.”

When you’re five, twenty seems a long way away. Also, how did my mother know the cavemen died at twenty? Did she see the death certificate?

Later I learned that, depending on what actual prehistoric group and era, “cavemen” did brush their teeth and still some died at twenty. Not sure what to make of any of it. Like life today.

People are always saying to me, “You’ve lost weight, haven’t you?” No, I haven’t lost weight that I know of. “Your face, it’s thinner. You’ve lost weight in your face.” I started saying, Yes, thanks for noticing. But actually I couldn’t figure out what these people were talking about. I’ve written about this more other places, not that anyone read it or noticed. Not like the fact my face is a balloon on a daily basis. Some of these persons I hadn’t seen in maybe two days, or even just twenty-four hours. Coworkers come up to my cubicle: “Whoa! You’ve lost a LOT of weight. What is it, about twenty pounds?” I just saw you yesterday and you’re telling me I look like I lost twenty pounds overnight? “In the face: your face is much thinner.”

I figured it out one day. I told my coworker, Like on TV, in my middle age, memory adds ten or twenty pounds to me. I’m fatter in memory. I’m just some big fat guy in all these people’s memories. “Remember K? Yeah, that fat guy. Yeah; no, you’re right: he’s the guy with the fat face that looks like he lost twenty pounds overnight. Funny how his face is so fat in my memory and every time I see him he looks like he lost all that fat in his face in just two days.”

I’m reading this book about relationships and compatibility. How’s that for pathos? Maybe we have a movie here. Guy with a fat face reading a book about relationships. Nah. Boring. So in this book the author is writing about how if you and your mate don’t have common interests and passions for things, it will be hard “in the long haul.” I like that he uses that expression, “long haul.” Marriage as truck driving. He gives as an example if the man loves golf, he better have as one of his considerations, his potential wife had better love golf, too. For himself, the man must know he loves golf; for his list of qualities in his soul mate, “Must love golf.”

How about, “understands differences” on both lists? Are people really this childish and simple nowadays, so selfish and spoiled, they make lists of nothing qualities and superficial characteristics such as a sport, and that is a determining factor in who they choose to spend their lives with? I hope there’s a chaperone on this planet for all these perpetual adolescents and narcissists.

"In WHOM they choose." I hear my mother correcting me. Did cavemen have grammar? Was it a factor in longevity?

Where are the values? The author of this match book is nominally educated and supposedly has some religious affiliation. But he recommends to his readers they consider things such as hobbies and incidental habits in the same way I would recommend a simpler procedure.

Make a list of qualities for your ideal partner, the man or woman of your dreams. Visualize that person and even try to imagine how you might meet someone like that. Have fun with it for a while. Really take the fantasy for a whirl. After you’ve got a fairly firm idea of what this ideal person should be like, ask yourself this question: What do you have to offer that ideal person? Seriously, why would your fantasy soul mate want to spend the rest of his or her life with you? Then go back and imagine the meeting again. Try to see it from the point of view of that person whose qualities and character you have itemized.

After that, focus on yourself and make yourself into someone anyone might want to spend time with – not necessarily marry. Honestly, how many of us are really worth any notice in this world? Who is that person who notices and knows how wonderful you are?

I have to thank my mom for making me brush my teeth when I was younger. Sure, they’re not as white as they used to be. But at least I didn’t die at twenty.