Another Message From Tom Robbins

“How can one person be more real than any other? Well some people do hide, and others seek. Maybe those who are in hiding - escaping encounters, avoiding surprises, protecting their property, ignoring their fantasies, restricting their feelings, sitting out the Pan Pipe hootchy-kootch of experience - maybe those people, people who won’t talk to rednecks, or if they are rednecks won’t talk to intellectuals, people who’re afraid to get their shoes muddy or their noses wet, afraid to eat what they crave, afraid to drink Mexican water, afraid to bet a long shot to win, afraid to hitchhike, jaywalk, honky tonk, cogitate, osculate, levitate, rock it, bop it, sock it, or bark at the moon, maybe such people are simply inauthentic, and maybe the jackleg humanist who says differently is due to have his tongue fried on the hot slabs of Liar’s Hell. Some folks hide, and some folks seek, and seeking when it’s mindless, neurotic, desperate, or pusillanimous can be a form of hiding. But there are folks who want to know and aren’t afraid to look, and won’t turn tail should they find it-and if they never do, they’ll have a good time anyway because nothing, neither the terrible truth nor the absence of it, is going to cheat them out of one honest breath of earths sweet gas.”

Tom Robbins - Still Life With Woodpecker

When I read that last night, it resonated in my soul. I had to share it with you, because I truly believe it. I believe that some people are seekers, and some people are hiders. Some people need to think for themselves, and some want others to do their thinking for them.

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Intense people scare me.

It’s just this strange thing I’ve had ever since I was a child. Extreme views in either direction, arguing, insisting on being right, anything that devalues another person. The strange thing is that person doesn’t even have to be attacking me to make me uncomfortable.

When I was fresh out of my four year tour of High School, I worked at a popular fast food restaurant famous for their golden arches. The girl working next to me that day was a round faced blond girl with big blue eyes.

She had always been pleasant to work with, and had never had a problem with a customer before. This customer obviously had a problem with her. Right in them middle of taking an order, I heard her say something we all said dozens of times a day. “Would you like cheese with that?”

This great huge red faced man came almost nose to nose with the girl. “Did I say I wanted cheese with that?” He didn’t even stop to take a breath. “If I would have wanted cheese, I would have asked for cheese!” He yelled at her for some time, something about her being what was wrong with the world today. Kids don’t listen...

I will never forget the look on her face. Her wide blue eyes got even wider, and she leaned back away from him, but did nothing else. Not a single thing. She just let him yell at her. When he was done, she blinked a few times, smiled and said. “Okay, without cheese then, will that be all?”

If it had been me I would have melted into a gelatinous puddle of goo on the floor, a lot of people would have yelled right back. He deserved it, he was rude for no reason but she didn’t. She was a true professional, golden arches logo or not. She just went right back to doing her job.

I have gotten better about handling crisis situations in the seventeen years since that day, I don’t melt into puddles anymore. I’ve been confronted by some real jerks in my lifetime, and I have yet to manage to handle it anywhere near what you would call gracefully, unless you consider bursting into tears graceful.

What really amazed me was how the man handled it. He didn’t apologize, he didn’t even pull back. He was obviously being a jerk, but as he grabbed his tray I saw the superior look on his face, he had obviously won this round, he was proud of making some fast food girl cringe even a little.

I also saw the look of mortified horror on his wife's face. She looked like she wanted to melt into a puddle of goo with me. I still wonder if he was just having a bad day, or if he really was like that all the time. From the look on his wife's face I’d say it wasn’t the first time he had done it, and it probably wont be the last.

I’d still like to come to a point where I can handle it as smoothly as the girl next to me handled it that day. It didn’t ruin her day, it didn’t even ruin her minute. She just faced it and moved on. She took the next order like nothing had happened.

The old man probably spent the rest of his life pissed off at the world for daring to ask if he wanted cheese with that. What a terrific waste of time and energy. I don’t know where that girl is today, I don’t even remember her name now, but wherever she is, I have a feeling she has excelled in whatever career she chose.

Life is too short to spend it pissed off at the world, if I know nothing else I know this.

Intense people still scare me though.

Science has taught us that we are all carbon based life forms, science also speculates about the possibility of silicon based life. (Besides Pamela Anderson) but that’s all I’ve ever heard about, yet I know for a fact that other possibilities exist.

You see, I married a testosterone based life form, to make this even more interesting I know nothing at all about men. I am the type of person who studies what I don't understand. It hasn't helped with him.

I come from the isle of estrogen, a family of strong, independent, stubborn women. For a good portion of my life males were mostly the things legends were made of. I am the fourth generation of women raised without a father in the home. Females outnumber males in my family five to one.

Those few males who survived this dynamic have adapted, they are still all male, most of them work in construction or other manly type fields. They fix things around the house, they have manly hobbies. Yet they also do dishes, clean the house, and help with the children. Many of the men in our family are better cooks than the women.

Then I met my husband.

He isn’t just a manly man, he is the poster child for all that is male. His favorite hobbies all seem to involve adrenaline in one form or another. From motocross to snow boarding, the more danger to life and limb the better. Extreme is just a way of life for him. He even drinks Mountain Dew, albeit the Code Red variety.

The closest I’ve ever been to extreme sports is watching X-Games on television. I am not your average girl, but underneath it all I am still a girl. To me, a truck is a truck is a truck. To him a truck is not a truck unless it is tall enough that I need a boost just to reach the seat.

I’m perfectly comfortable with tools. I can use a drill, read a tape measure, and run a phone line. Yet the look he gets on his face when I grab a butter knife because I can’t find a screwdriver is priceless. Why a mallet can’t be used as a hammer in a pinch is beyond me.

A saw is a saw as far as I’m concerned as long as it cuts, which always leads to a serious discussion about which saws are to be used where. I keep explaining that I am a girl, if a tool works, then it is the right tool for the job, and he vehemently disagrees.

Then, there are the movies. I prefer movies that stimulate me visually, intellectually, or emotionally. He prefers movies that involve body function humor, and lots of explosions and somehow always leave me with a feeling that my IQ is slowly draining out through my nostrils.

I am also a crier, he not only knows this, he thrives on it. He waits for the sad parts in movies and then stops watching the movie and starts watching me. As the tears start rolling his grin starts spreading. He doesn’t say anything, just watches me and smiles.

Our marriage has been an education for both of us.

He was a confirmed bachelor at the age of 26, though he had a daughter from a previous relationship he really didn’t understand girls any better than I understood boys. I came with three kids, two girls and a boy. Not a day goes by that he doesn’t witness at least one female crying.

My poor husband could advertise anything from car parts to Marlboro, he is THAT manly and must share his life with four women. To add insult to injury, two of our three pets are female. Add to that my grandmother, my mother, dozens of aunts, and female cousins and he doesn’t stand a chance. We have him surrounded.

Women are a lot like the Borg, we kind of insist you assimilate eventually.

He has held out remarkably well. In a few weeks we will be celebrating seven years together, and he has managed to hold on to most of his man sanity. True he does dishes now, goes to girl doctor appointments with me, and has learned not to ask if we are PMS’ing or just being bitchy.

I’ve learned to love X-Games, to crawl into trucks that are taller than I am, and to not ask why he felt the need to park the dirt bike in the living room. I’ve since read Mars - Venus, and I’m beginning to understand that we really do come from different planets.

He does at least get bonus points for finally adapting to all things geeky. He's almost as bad about computers as I am now. He isn't exactly a geek, he's far to manly for that, but my friend and I decided he does deserve honorary geek status for the effort.

I have also learned to appreciate those differences. I don’t know if a non-testosterone based life form could have survived the estrogen island without running screaming. He not only puts up with me, he loves me, and that makes spending an hour in the tool section just watching him drool totally worth it.

But... Resistance is futile. You will be assimilated.