Whadda Jerk! Or, maybe not.

 

By Joseph Walther

 

“You get twice as much at Pat’s and you only pay about a dollar twenty five more,” she told him in a chiding sort of tone. Without looking up from his plate of spaghetti, he growled, “F*!K you.” Shrugging, she picked up her slice of pizza and took a small bite. “Honestly, Rudolph, I was just kidding,” she replied, flashing a gorgeous smile his way. Again, without so much as a glance in her direction, he said, “Bite me, Marie.” At that, she glanced away and went back to eating her slice of pizza.

 

            I’m not a word snob. I don’t think that there is any such thing as a “bad” word in the absolute sense. However, I believe that certain words are appropriate-sensitive AND, I will not use certain words because I don’t like them. Rudolph’s choice of words struck me as situationally inappropriate. Unfortunately, at least in my mind, they seem to have become typical for public gatherings of the youth-filled age group: mid-teens to mid-twenties. So, why did Rudolph’s language shock me?

 

            Before revealing this, I want you to know that the contrast between these two people was striking. He was inconsiderately loud. He was sloppily dressed and his mannerisms were gruff. He didn’t seem to care that other people could hear his language or that it might embarrass Marie, seated across from him. Marie, on the other hand was soft-spoken, conscientiously thoughtful, impeccably dressed, and linguistically refined. The fact that they were together blew me right out of my socks!

 

            The genuine shocker was the fact that Rudolph was not a young person. He looked to be a charter member of the late 50s to early 60s set. He wore rumpled and dirty clothes. I wouldn’t consider him fat, but “pudgy” certainly fit. He was unshaven, too. You know how some guys have that “Screw it, I’ll shave tomorrow” look? Well, Rudolph looked as though he’d been saying it for several days. He was around five-feet, six-inches tall AND bald, with the exception of about a ten-strand comb over that he managed to gather from a sparse distribution of scraggily gray hair on the sides of his head. Stupid seems so inadequate to describe how it looked, especially the way he parted his hair, about an eighth of an inch above his ear top.

 

            Marie seemed younger, but not by much. She was esthetically pretty. She had a fantastic atmosphere of emotional maturity about her. It lent an air of sophistication to her mannerisms that made her very attractive. She wore beige slacks and a black, ribbed turtleneck sweater, neither of which fit too tightly. Her hair was about mid-neck in length and not a strand out of place. She wore little, if any, make-up. She didn’t need any. She had a beautiful smile. Most men, me included, would consider it an honor just to sit next to her.

 

            I don’t know why, but she seemed to care deeply about Rudolph. No matter how gruff he was toward her, she smiled, sometimes laughing, as she’d reach across and touch his shoulder. I don’t think he said more fifty words to her. When he did speak to her, he used a lot of profanity. Even more troubling to me was his seemingly limited stash of profane words. However, what he lacked in term multiplicity, he made up for in term repetition. In all, this coupling embodied the classic assertion that opposites attract.

 

            I’ve found that women, in general, seem unjustifiably critical of themselves, particularly with respect to certain physical attributes, um… shall we say, both north and south of their personal equators. Something is always either too big or too small. They spend hours picking out the “right” outfit. They spend even longer periods making sure that their make-up and hair are perfect. And still, they’ll be critical about what they see in themselves. As Dave Barry wrote a few years ago, “When a woman looks into a mirror, she sees Chewbacca staring back at her, no matter how attractive she actually is.”

 

            Not so with more than a few males. Such men have an amazing ability to fantasize themselves right into GQ magazine, no matter what they look like. They can be complete slobs: short, pot bellied, bald, and inarticulate, with wardrobes limited to stained, hole-infested tee shirts and filthy, polyester slacks. Most of the time the only missing accessories are a shopping cart filled with assorted empty aluminum cans and an empty gin bottle.

 

            I know guys just like this! And, in no way am I referring to Ted Fincher who works for Ralph’s Auto Parts in Millsboro. Such men, while gazing into a mirror, will comb their three remaining lusterless strands of hair across their greasy bald spots, smile reassuringly, and mumble to themselves, “Yeah, you da man!” No matter how hopelessly out of shape, they figure they’re never more than a couple of push-ups away from a naked hot tub rendezvous with Lulu Luscious!

 

            Anyway, back to Rudolph and Marie. As I was about to stand up and leave, another couple approached their table. They were around the same age. Marie greeted them by their names: Jack and Gladys. Jack asked Rudolph, “How’s the research going, your honor?” Rudolph replied, “It’s going great, but not so loud, Jack. You could ruin the whole day’s data collection.”

 

            Have you ever experienced a divine revelation? Duh! Try as I did, I could not stifle my laugh. Marie looked over at me and laughed back. Rudolph began to laugh, too. I had to admit to both of them what I’d been thinking the past 30-minutes or so. It seemed that, in the midst of my own research for column material, I had become research fodder for someone else’s project. Touché!

 

            We introduced ourselves. I told them about this column. “Are you going to use us?” Rudolph asked. “Are you going to use me?” I asked in return. “Maybe,” he said. I then asked them if they’d mind me using them in view of what I just found out about his research project. They said OK, but made me promise not to use full names or locales. I agreed and gave them a business card with my web location.

 

            We talked for another hour before they had to leave. Rudolph is a legitimate superior court judge. He’s located in another state, which will remain anonymous. For the past year, he’s been researching material for an upcoming book. I promised that I would not give any details. He also made me promise that I would not shorten his name to Rudy. He explained that while he’s never forgiven his parents for “laying” that moniker on him, it’s gotten him a lot of valuable mileage.

 

            Perhaps opposites do attract each other. However, not all of them do. These two prove it. And, for Marie’s sake, I’m tickled pink. She’s way too nice for the person I initially thought Rudolph was. Had my first impression of him been accurate, doubtless she would have eventually seen him as the hangnail of her life and bitten him off.

 

            I’ll be back next week. I’ve been doing quite a bit of research myself. Stay tuned, same time, same channel.

 

Joseph Walther is a freelance writer and publisher of The True Facts. Copyright laws apply to all material on this site. Send your comments. Just click here.