Onsra
'You are what you love, not what loves you.'
Donald Kaufman
Valentine's Day. As the other Kaufman brother would say; "It's a holiday made by greeting card companies to make people feel like crap". Since there is no one currently in the life of Fat (due possibly to the fact that I'm hopeless at giving women a phone call. Unless they've just won the lottery) I'm going to rant about my first love. Why? Because everyone has fallen in love at least once. Had the feeling of stealing fire from the gods, declaring their love in wet cement, carved initials in defenceless trees and dedicated songs to their loved ones on local radio stations. That and I figured that talking about love was more topical than discussing my favourite bits of Kicked In The Nuts.com.
The first time I heard my heart go 'thump' was fairly late in life. High school was filled with girls uninterested in me. University (one year of) fared a little better since, if nothing else, girls actually understood what the Hell you were on about. It was a whole new world of rejections. I did learn that just because girls;
a) watched art house films and,
b) carried around bestickered and battered notebooks that they scribbled stanzas of poetry any time inspiration ruptured from their persons
...did not necessarily mean that they were "my type". That and people who take Psychology were deeply disturbed individuals.
After I flunked Uni I ended up dating girls who didn't chuck a hissy fit after every argument and throw red wine at you before storming back to their lecturer boyfriends in tears. There were girls like Natalya (technically my first girlfriend since she wasn't inflatable or made of fleshlight) and Mars (a Uruguayan lass who dumped me after one too many "Urugay...not that there's anything wrong with that!"-comments) who were more like friends that you could touch the rude bits of than girlfriends.
The girl that I think back to as My First Love (this may be because it's less romantic to think of the woman who read the Hungarian news that you used to beat off to as a teenager as your First Love) would be Kylie, simply because she's the most exciting girl that I've ever met. She used to work in the cafe next door to the bar that I worked at at the time. The day I saw her naked was the day I knew I had to ask her number.
Short, young and blonde. Depressingly beautiful. Follow the trail of broken hearts to find her. Make sure you have the suicide hot line on speed dial for when she ignores you. That kind of chick. Chaotic ball of energy. But funny and friendly, not one of those manic, mood-swings-to-the-phases-of-the-moon types. I'd known her for about a month and had conversations most people have with gorgeous cafe staff (ie fun talk but lasting only as long as it takes to make a coffee). So- snippets of conversation that only lasts the lifetime of certain moths essentially. How I came to see her nude was:
She'd been working a few shifts at the bar I worked at (owned by the brother of the cafe owner. White South Africans Jews) which gave me the chance to get into smelling proximity and chat to her. I'd used up every hilarious story I could think of and was scraping at the bottom of the barrel when the Owner informed us that they were running a 'Full Monty' competition. Customers were encouraged to remove all items of clothing and would be rewarded with a thousand dollar drink card. A raised hand. 'Can staff participate in this?'
'Kylie? You're getting up on the bar and taking your clothes off?' asked the Owner.
'For a THOUSAND DOLLARS! What's the catch?'
As she got up on the bar and slowly removed her clothing in front of hundreds of cheering people I knew that I could not draw another breath without asking her for her number. To this day I don't think I've ever felt that way about anyone.
Thus I'd opened a floodgate to random calls at 4 am over trivial reasons, just continuations of conversations from earlier that day. I'd slowly learn that Kylie (now dubbed Monty for her striptease act) was one of these people bereft of thought bubbles: she just opened her mouth anytime, any place (ie during films, which would drive me quietly up the wall). She owned a car we Christened "the Deathmobile" because it would burst into flames if you braked too hard. She also liked pressing buttons with 'DO NOT PRESS' on them just to see what would happen (Our answering machine at the time:
(click)
Kylie: Oops. I think something just happened.
Me: (in background) Stop touching things.
Kylie: Eep! It's recording! It's recording! Make it stop!
Me: .....)
The thing is we were never boyfriend and girlfriend (Is that an old school term? Sounds like an Archie comic reference in this day and age). We spent a lot of time together but I never did see her naked again. Months after she left the cafe (and eventually into the arms of another guy) I went in there to grab a coffee. The other staff asked me if we were still together to which I replied we were never actually going out. 'Really? She always referred to you as her boyfriend.'
I'm going to Kicked In The Nuts.com.
to cheer me up.
Meet me in Montauk,
Fatman
Donald Kaufman
Valentine's Day. As the other Kaufman brother would say; "It's a holiday made by greeting card companies to make people feel like crap". Since there is no one currently in the life of Fat (due possibly to the fact that I'm hopeless at giving women a phone call. Unless they've just won the lottery) I'm going to rant about my first love. Why? Because everyone has fallen in love at least once. Had the feeling of stealing fire from the gods, declaring their love in wet cement, carved initials in defenceless trees and dedicated songs to their loved ones on local radio stations. That and I figured that talking about love was more topical than discussing my favourite bits of Kicked In The Nuts.com.
The first time I heard my heart go 'thump' was fairly late in life. High school was filled with girls uninterested in me. University (one year of) fared a little better since, if nothing else, girls actually understood what the Hell you were on about. It was a whole new world of rejections. I did learn that just because girls;
a) watched art house films and,
b) carried around bestickered and battered notebooks that they scribbled stanzas of poetry any time inspiration ruptured from their persons
...did not necessarily mean that they were "my type". That and people who take Psychology were deeply disturbed individuals.
After I flunked Uni I ended up dating girls who didn't chuck a hissy fit after every argument and throw red wine at you before storming back to their lecturer boyfriends in tears. There were girls like Natalya (technically my first girlfriend since she wasn't inflatable or made of fleshlight) and Mars (a Uruguayan lass who dumped me after one too many "Urugay...not that there's anything wrong with that!"-comments) who were more like friends that you could touch the rude bits of than girlfriends.
The girl that I think back to as My First Love (this may be because it's less romantic to think of the woman who read the Hungarian news that you used to beat off to as a teenager as your First Love) would be Kylie, simply because she's the most exciting girl that I've ever met. She used to work in the cafe next door to the bar that I worked at at the time. The day I saw her naked was the day I knew I had to ask her number.
Short, young and blonde. Depressingly beautiful. Follow the trail of broken hearts to find her. Make sure you have the suicide hot line on speed dial for when she ignores you. That kind of chick. Chaotic ball of energy. But funny and friendly, not one of those manic, mood-swings-to-the-phases-of-the-moon types. I'd known her for about a month and had conversations most people have with gorgeous cafe staff (ie fun talk but lasting only as long as it takes to make a coffee). So- snippets of conversation that only lasts the lifetime of certain moths essentially. How I came to see her nude was:
She'd been working a few shifts at the bar I worked at (owned by the brother of the cafe owner. White South Africans Jews) which gave me the chance to get into smelling proximity and chat to her. I'd used up every hilarious story I could think of and was scraping at the bottom of the barrel when the Owner informed us that they were running a 'Full Monty' competition. Customers were encouraged to remove all items of clothing and would be rewarded with a thousand dollar drink card. A raised hand. 'Can staff participate in this?'
'Kylie? You're getting up on the bar and taking your clothes off?' asked the Owner.
'For a THOUSAND DOLLARS! What's the catch?'
As she got up on the bar and slowly removed her clothing in front of hundreds of cheering people I knew that I could not draw another breath without asking her for her number. To this day I don't think I've ever felt that way about anyone.
Thus I'd opened a floodgate to random calls at 4 am over trivial reasons, just continuations of conversations from earlier that day. I'd slowly learn that Kylie (now dubbed Monty for her striptease act) was one of these people bereft of thought bubbles: she just opened her mouth anytime, any place (ie during films, which would drive me quietly up the wall). She owned a car we Christened "the Deathmobile" because it would burst into flames if you braked too hard. She also liked pressing buttons with 'DO NOT PRESS' on them just to see what would happen (Our answering machine at the time:
(click)
Kylie: Oops. I think something just happened.
Me: (in background) Stop touching things.
Kylie: Eep! It's recording! It's recording! Make it stop!
Me: .....)
The thing is we were never boyfriend and girlfriend (Is that an old school term? Sounds like an Archie comic reference in this day and age). We spent a lot of time together but I never did see her naked again. Months after she left the cafe (and eventually into the arms of another guy) I went in there to grab a coffee. The other staff asked me if we were still together to which I replied we were never actually going out. 'Really? She always referred to you as her boyfriend.'
I'm going to Kicked In The Nuts.com.
to cheer me up.
Meet me in Montauk,
Fatman
posted by Fatman | 11:04 am
4 Comments:
Wow. That's actually quite depressing.
Hamish- I LOVE kickedinthenuts.com. One of the funniest things I've seen. An orange-wigged guy kicking absolute strangers in the balls. Genius!
Ash- Is it actually that depressing? I've had a few sympathetic phone calls and visits from friend today who were convinced that I'd hurl myself in front of moving traffic. Meh. I like talking about unfulfilled love. They make for better stories.
You've zeroed in on it. "Feeling like shit" is the #1 condition driving the world economy. Without "feeling like shit" there would be no consumption. And without consumption, well, I don't think any of us want to imagine a world without consumption.
It's a good kind of hurt because it's personal. Everyone loves that 'rusty hook to the heart' feelin' in heinzsight (when you see the world from the point-of-view of a can of beans). I should just inform people that my life isn't really as Elanor Rigby as I sometimes make it out to be. We were talking at our sister bar, Bond, after work one night and the subject of 'How good it feels to wake up with your arms draped around another person' came up. To which I glibly said, 'Most girls I go out with charge by the hour.' Everyone chuckled at that except for Paul who gave me a Knowing Wink. Huh? I don't want a Knowing Wink. But Paul is just one of those guys who takes everything literally. Thank Christ I didn't make a joke about how the only girls I get to sleep with are chicks I dig up from fresh graves.
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