White knight in dented armor February 15, 1986
I more or less got a Valentine’s Day card from Louise,
coached as “I’m sorry I haven’t written in so long,” card.
Of course, the card implied a complex of things unsaid.
It’s not that Louise is utterly obvious all the time, but
when she finally gets down to writing, she has a pack of unstated reasons that tend
to show up eventually in the text like a laundry list.
And this letter/card was no exception, containing a certain
edge I’d not expected.
Late last year, Rich, her lover/boyfriend had called me to
ask about her past, feigning innocence while dropping it in the middle of what
might otherwise have been an innocuous conversation, mean spirited when I
thought about it more – how dare he called her ex-husband to ask things like
that. It felt like a federal inquiry. He said he loved her and wanted to build
a life around her, but wanted to know what she was “really” like.
After all the chaos I recently engaged with her, including
welfare and other things, I was almost tempted to warn him off.
I did not. I stalled, and then said I would get back to him
after Christmas. By that time, I realized I had no business involving myself in
Louise’s love life.
Sometimes people like Louise need lies in order to stand
their ground against society’s social judgements made against people who make
mistakes.
This is not to say I approve of everything Louise does; I
don’t.
Her letters are filled with manipulation and petty deceits,
intended to lull me into sending her money.
Her manipulation the weekend after last Halloween brought
back flashbacks of those days when we were together.
But to challenge her, to expose her petty bullshit risked my
losing contact with my kid again.
So, on Christmas I sent Rich a card thanking him for
thinking of me but refusing his request for information.
Fortunately, it all blew back on me in a positive way, as
Louise’s card this week suggested, mixed in, of course, with the disguised
pleas for cash I could not afford to send her – though I knew I would send
something, if not what she wanted or needed.
She said her rent has gone up and she feared she and my
daughter would get thrown out if they could not find some way to raise the
additional money.
Jobs are hard to come by, she said.
Of course, the money that is taken from my paycheck every
two weeks in child support does not go to her or my kid, but to repay welfare.
Not all of this manipulation is conscious on her part.
Living on the edge as she always has, money becomes the measure of all things,
including love. It is the center of all conversations.
The letter, of course, included a note at the end from my
daughter saying how they could not afford a teddy bear she really wanted, one
of those electronic things that speak back when spoken to. At sixty-nine ninety-five
I would hope it did something more than just look at her.
There was no direct request for anything.
Underlying all of this is the idea that I am not only Ruby’s
father, but Louise’s, too, that accepted male figure that somehow rises above
the cast of ordinary men, who send cash occasionally, who sometimes rescues
them in need, and someone who keeps their secrets – as the incident with Rich
confirmed and suggested Louise got wind of his phone call, and my reply to him.
I fail in some cases because I could be sending more money,
vowing constantly to do so, and yet not quite managing it because I have my own
pet projects, I’m trying to get done such as putting out my own underground
newspaper, or simply because sometimes it is a choice between sending her spare
money or catching up with old bills.
We both are acting out some unrealistic scene, each having a
part to play, me as protector and provider, her as helpless and in need, when
neither role is precisely accurate in real life.
With these comes a whole package of expectations neither of
us is capable of living up to.
Louise manipulates as a means of survival, she sees herself
as that, even when she has to rely on someone like me, a blast from the past,
someone she once hated, but has come to depend on, and on my side of the equation,
I see myself as the white knight – slightly flawed, with dents in my armor from
those jousts I have lost, always coming to her rescue, even when I can barely
make ends meet.
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