The Beautiful Lie (Or How To Get A White Guy To Shut Up)

Posted on October 15, 2012

Ever wonder how we’d live our lives if we knew from very early on everything we know now? Admit it. We’ve all thought about it. “I’d have gone to see this…I’ve have gone to do that…I’d have spent more time with this person…I’d have slept with all these people before they got old and ugly…I’d have played more and harder when I was physically able to…” and, of course, “I’d have taken greater advantage of my youth.” So much of what we’re lead to believe when we’re young doesn’t quite turn out the way we thought it would later; study, graduate, go to college, get married, work hard, raise a family and retire in luxury to enjoy our golden years. It’s a lie. It’s a beautiful lie, but a lie nonetheless. At least for the overwhelming majority of us.

It occurred to me last week that one of the great fibs, if you will, is the idea of attaining some amount of “me” time that you’ll enjoy one day. I can’t say I’m really seeing it in my future other than as a very ironic end area of a circle we follow in life. Helping your parents because you’re under the age of 18 and still living in their house is a convenience for them. It may even by why they had you. Helping them after the age of 18 becomes much less about convenience and more about necessity. We age and they age. Things they had you do before to torture you for their amusement are things you now do for them because they’re incapable of it. Or you pay someone to do it for you for them because you’re still bitter about being made to do it when you were younger.

We do what we can to get out of the house and stand on our own feet. We think then that the life we forge will always be one of freedom away from the parental shackles of youth. Not so. We learn to stand on our own feet so we’ll be in a much more mature position to go back and help them when they need it. And they will need it. And it’s not as much fun reminding them how they tortured you all those years back making you mow the lawn and pull weeds when it’s discovered you weren’t fibbing and actually legitimately suffered from hay fever. It’s also about the time you learn your parents are people just like everybody else. We’re all flawed, we all make mistakes and we hopefully all learn to look past many of them. They did with us, so we do it with them. It’s reciprocal.

The golden retirement exists for some, but not for all and certainly not for many. For those who can experience it, good for you. Don’t take it for granted. For those who don’t, I understand more than you know. If cancer doesn’t get us, Alzheimer’s will. Fortunately, I don’t sit here and wonder which one (or if it’ll be both) will get me. Who has that kind of time to waste? We go from being kids to students to worker bees to spouses (some to parents)to caregivers. That is so not in the instruction manual, but don’t get me wrong. I’m not complaining about where life has gone. I’m just annoyed that we weren’t warned and properly prepared for it. We were instead lead to believe something else entirely.

My husband has his own unique approach to the future. I’m just not entirely sure what it is. Some things? Sure. He’s very big on putting money away. As for his thoughts on aging? No idea. And when we’ve come to any hurdle? He’ll stare at it, consider it, stare at it, continue staring at it, and then stare at it some more. That’s usually when I get in my tank and push forward over it until enough progress has been made to solve it. I don’t like problems. I see a problem, I do what I can to solve it as quickly as humanly possible. Basically, I confound him at times.

I know there are days Ralph looks at me and wonders “What’s going on in there? And thank God you can’t hear me ask because I’m pretty sure you’d tell me and I don’t know that I really want to know except out of morbid curiosity.” He and I have many of these mental conversations and he doesn’t even have to be in the same room or in the state for us to have them. Then, of course, there are the conversations he mentally walks in on when he’s home and laying down next to me.

Moi: Do you ever think about the future?
Ralph: Oh, God. I knew I should have slept on the plane.
Moi: I’m serious.
Ralph: So am I.
Moi: Who’s going to take care of us when we get to be our parents’ age? Are we even going to be able to afford it and is anyone even going to care?
Ralph: Fine. Grab the lube.
Moi: And what about all the things we’ve accumulated over the years that have stories and memories behind them, not to mention sentimental value? Who are we going to pass those onto or is everything just going to be sold off or given to charity to people who have no idea of what it means or meant to us?
Ralph: I’ll get the lube myself. Where is it?
Moi: Next to the bouncing glowball we picked up in Hong Kong during my second trip the night we went to the festival of flowers with your Hong Kong Grandmother. You saw someone bouncing them, they lit up and you had to have two of them, which you then refused to take out of the box so the batteries would last longer. They were selling them right next to the place with the picture scrolls where I found the Ultra-Man that’s hanging up in the dining room.
Ralph: How do you remember all this crap?
Moi: Because I remember the details. They’re important and a part of who we are together. Remember the time you…
Ralph: Kiss me, please.
Moi: Why?
Ralph: It may be the only way I can get you to shut up.

It’s certainly not the worst way to get me to quiet down, but the future’s still out there…staring at us…daring us and not giving us many signs of what’s in store. I’ll keep my tank gassed up and armed just in case.

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Kristoffer Gair (who formerly wrote under the pseudonym Kage Alan) is the Detroit-based author of Honor Unbound, A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To My Sexual Orientation, Andy Stevenson Vs. The Lord Of The Loins, Gaylias: Operation Thunderspell, several short stories featured in anthologies (to be combined in a forthcoming book), the recently re-published novella Falling Awake, its sequel, Falling Awake II: Revenant and Falling Awake III: Requiem.

5 Responses to “The Beautiful Lie (Or How To Get A White Guy To Shut Up)”

Dorien says:
October 15, 2012 at 9:34 am
I do not recommend this blog for anyone who is given to self-reflection.

Dorien

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Kimber Kahn says:
October 15, 2012 at 10:12 am
Dorien, it’s really all about the lube! Kris, I just lurve you. Thank you!

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Jeff says:
October 15, 2012 at 11:00 am
A golden retirement is the last lie we allow ourselves. It is the adult Santa and I refuse to let you take that away. I think you are lying. It does exist. Lol

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Katherine T. says:
October 15, 2012 at 8:59 pm
I stiil believe in Santa, but I , like you Kris, have that tank and it’s always gassed and ready to go. You never know what life has in store, but if you can roll through it with your trusty tank, you can get to the other side in one piece, at least. Sometimes it might be a rough ride, but just keep rolling along and one day you reach the light at the end of the tunnel. I don’t like to sit and ponder a problem too long. I just want to do what needs to be done and with as little fuss as possible.
I think if we knew what life had in store for us as we got older, we wouldn’t have been as carefree with our youth as we were. We’d be too busy preparing for the inevitable “future” and letting our youth pass us by. There is a sort of elegance to the blissful ignorance of youth. We just don’t know it while we’re in it.
Very thoughtful post today. I like it.

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Jaime Samms says:
October 18, 2012 at 7:32 pm
You want to know what I think? The future is going to come.whether the tank is.fired.up.or not. Hubby wants the lube NOW. The future can Damn well waot. Not like its going anywhere.