To The Southern Man

The Southern Man is mining. More or less. I told him to look up posts on Sparky but then I realized I'd taken the cloud away and there was no way to find those posts without starting from the beginning and reading forward. No way in hell you're going to work that shit out any time soon and best I can tell, posts on Sparky are sparse.

Now why is that, do you suppose?

Because I didn't even tell my husband about Sparky, not really.

It's not that Nomans didn't know about Sparky. Sparky came well before Nomans. Sparky came before Husband Number 2. I remember standing outside building two of The Castle having a smoke with Sparky, back when we all lived in The Castle, unhappy about something, and Sparky asking me what the hell my boyfriend had done this time.

I don't know if I was crying or not. That time. Not that it really mattered.

Sparky and me and Florkow and The Other Guy. Florkow, I don't even know what the hell to call The Other Guy. That sad piece of shit who married that bitch we love to hate? That's hard and cruel and probably not the entire truth so I'll let it be, but the truth is, that's how it all shook out in the end.

Southern Guy, Sparky walked me through two marriages. He actually gave me away to the third and I cried all the way down or across the slate path in the rain in my Manolos and he may very well have cried too. He said, 'nothing good ever came of me having anything to do with anyone's wedding; are you really sure you want me to do this?' He'd already had a part in my last wedding. But if you're going to be traditional about something, and I am an old fashioned girl when it comes right down to it (and well past 'belonging' to anyone, really), you're going to have somebody at least walk you to the threshold. Well, you're going to do that if you're me. Maybe you have to be me to get that. My dad was inside. I expect he got that.

I was that vulnerable, that last time.

So back to Sparky. He was my almost lover. He was my best friend. He was the brother I didn't have when my brother was AWOL. The brother you can't have because your brother has brother stuff about you. He's where I ran when the shit hit the fan. He's who came to me when his life went to pieces. He was the thorn in my husband's side in the beginning. He was the man who asked permission to remain a part of my life, as if he really needed to do that, but he did it anyway, to smooth the passage. I broke his heart, I smashed him flat, I picked him up, I rolled him over, I dusted him off, he saw me at my worst, he yelled at me, comforted me, made everything OK and I never once felt like anything less than a human being. He was the safest place I've ever known. I was his safe place too.  

He died 7 weeks before I went into lockup. I read his eulogy exactly one year to the day before my last husband walked out the door. I don't know which day I needed him more. Either way, I got through it but the point is, he was that person in my life.

Every year Nomans would say, Sparky is gone another year, how horribly sad, and every year I would want to throw water in his face and say, what do you know about Sparky? Really? What do you know? You don't. I'll light my candles privately, thank you anyway. They were both drinking from the same well but for different reasons.

Or they didn't know each other. Or something. Or maybe Sparky knew Nomans and Nomans didn't know Sparky. I was never really sure.

I guess my point is that Sparky knew me and he was a constant.

Southern Man. You are a constant. Clearly. You are mining my blog. Mine away. I trust you.

Northern Man. I get it. Small sips. Skip no steps. It's an entirely different relationship. I trust you too.

You two know each other. clearly. Forgive my public introduction.

That is all.

The peanut gallery may remain silent on this one. With the exception of Florkow if she has anything to add.

Comments

[florkow]

I miss him too.

[florkow]

And you.

[SM]

Startled to have found this treasure trove - and honored to be allowed to poke around the skeletons in your closet.

I humbly accept "Southern Man" as my first nickname in 30 years - with bemusement - since I grew up in the upper midwest, have been infrequently in the south, live in the north now (albeit within a very few miles of the civil war south). But I (mostly) live south of you and certainly live south of NM.