Nostalgia

Not long ago, the Lady of the Manor blogged about a staggeringly stupid episode from her youth and then asked readers to report their own missteps.

Now, the Matron has a long history with this imaginary scenario, this revealing your own stupidity and mistake. Goes like this:

Massive Ego-Driven Scenario! Unfolding!! Matron on Big Talk Show. O. O. O. You will never guess, right? The book deal and the Matron is ALL about the wisdom, the growth, the spiritual vibe and verve. And the skinny jeans and the journey to get there, sistah! After much lauding and love. O: "Matron? Girlfriend, tell us one of your most embarrassing moments, the thing you did that make you shudder and quake, still? We all have one!" Light applause, bated, eager audience breath! Is O able to humanize the delightful Matron? Matron: "Uh, the most humiliating moment of my life would be that moment when I'd be stupid enough to relive terrible shame and angst in front of millions. Humiliate myself, again on purpose. Next question?"

So anyway, that was a tiny digression into how the Matron feels about scraping the bottom of her personal barrel. But guess what, friends? You are SO in lucky because -- after the first full work day of the school year, an overnight house guest downstairs in the kitchen, and not one but TWO healthy glasses of wine -- she has decided to dish.

When the Matron was a Young Miss and in graduate school, she dated this man's son:


This would be Mickey Edwards, at the time one of the most powerful and conservative members of the U.S. Congress. Did you hear her type the words 'conservative'? Well. . . . when the son, let's call him S for son (oh! she's original!), first set his eye on the Matron, his friends warned him away.

"She is SUCH a lesbian."

"She swings in the other direction. Like, probably buys Playboy herself."

"She's a fucking socialist freak and maybe a lesbian. You are crazy!"

"Wake up, man! She wants to live on a commune and love everyone. Here, read Regan's memoir, one more time!"

"Oh my God! This woman channels Karl Marx. Did you see the tie-dye leggings she had on yesterday? Throw yourself off a bridge."

My, my! She caused quite the stir (and was actually shocked to learn all this, later). But Young Miss followed her heart and not her ideology -- as did S -- and they fell hard for one another.
S loved her with all his Jewish, Oklahoman, conservative-born heart and the hippy dippy Young Miss in tie-dye and Grateful Dead loved him with her lapsed Catholic, left-wing Buddhist leaning heart, right back. At one point, she was ready to convert and bear his children.

But.

The twentysomething fever did not last, at least first, for the Young Miss. She eventually fell decidedly out of love and that had nothing to do with politics. Indeed, as sometimes happens with young love, hers grew - sour. Ugh! And it was nobody's fault.

But.

She is kind by nature and when S, devoted still, asked her to pretend they were still happily together for the day his parents visited? Why, Young Miss held his hand and smiled through dinner! She sorta did this a couple of times, breaking up and making up and struggling through even when she knew was finished.

One night in the midst of this muck, S made a proposal. It went like this (and, Oh My God, she is not making this up):

S: "Mary? I know you don't love me, but I love you. I've been thinking about this for a long time and I'd like to ask you something."

Young Miss: "Hmmmm."

S: "Will you marry me?"

Young Miss: "What the @#$%$^^#^&#@ are you KIDDING?"

S: "No, no! Not like that! I love you. I want to always take care of you. I know how you grew up -- welfare, food stamps, crime and poverty -- all of it. You never have to love me back. You never have to sleep with me, never. You can have your own life. But I want you to marry me. I'm a rich man and will be richer. You know the trust fund kicks in when I'm 30 and I'll have millions of dollars. I'll take care of you for the rest of your life if you'll marry me. Please marry me."

Now we're talking.

Friends? The Matron hesitated for about one second and then she said:

"Sure!!"

Yup. She said yes. Yes, to the most clearly doomed idea humanity ever dredged up. Yes for all the reasons S mentioned and then one more, one she didn't even yet know - she didn't yet understand that she herself could provide all that security she craved, the security she hadn't felt as a child.

She signed on! Yes!

Yes lasted about 11 days and 6 hours. Sex was actually not quite so clearly out of the picture. Of course, being the buoyant fiancee when the deal is all about the dollar isn't all that easy to fake, either.

So it ended, forever, right after the engagement/agreement/purchase.

But the beautiful, tragic, staggering (really sweet and nostalgic in a 'how could I have been so young') truth is that when she said "yes! yes!!"?

She meant it.