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Thread: Rumpolephoreskin's Existential Wanderings in and Around Negril

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    Rumpolephoreskin's Existential Wanderings in and Around Negril

    "If you really want to hear about . . . all that David Copperfield kind of crap . . .”
    J. D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye, opening lines, spoken by Holden Caulfield


    Since this trip (reach if you will) is largely about my relationship with Mrs. Peel (pseudonym alert), some of Salinger’s “David Copperfield kind of crap” does seem germane, possibly even required for purposes of context. Our courtship has followed a rocky arc that bears more than passing resemblance to that of Lara and Dr. Zhivago’s.

    If you want to skip these relationship parts stop reading and wait for the later installments.

    We first met as members of a Hostage Negotiations Team (circa 1994). You don’t meet women as pretty as Mrs. Peel working in prison as a rule (or anywhere else for that matter). Later I was assigned to teach a class with her. I was not happy about it because I imagined a couple months of running interference between her and the inmates trying to hit on her. But beyond that, honestly, she was so beautiful I was afraid I’d fall for her.

    I was wrong about the inmates, she handled herself with grace and the inmates treated her with respect. The class we taught was scheduled to have its curriculum revised and we both volunteered to work on the re-write. The head of the program must have appreciated our work because we were asked to train staff in the program, so again we were thrown together.

    Training involved going on the road, frequently we were in the car for hours at a time. Mrs. Peel liked to talk about her children and family and I enjoyed listening. We never played the radio. We became good friends. I managed my fears of becoming involved by adopting the role of a big brother/confidant.

    Twice we were hired as consultants by the Feds and got to travel out of state. Flying home from Oregon she told me she was promoting to our Dept.’s central office. Initially I took this in stride. I knew I’d miss her, but friends move on in this business so it shouldn’t have been a big deal. But it was. It didn’t hit me until she was actually gone. I found, after she left, that I was in love with her and it horrified me, I was happily married.

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    We’d still get together professionally from time to time; I can remember her coming up with excuses so we could meet. “Can you drop off those text books when you come down next Wednesday?” . . . that kind of thing. And I’d see her socially sometimes too. She and her husband came over for pizza our first day back from Negril. I remember dancing with her that night as Bob Marley advised “. . . don’t worry be happy.” My wife was not too happy. She was jealous. There was no need. Despite my feelings, we were able to keep things platonic, but always with an edge of sexual tension.

    It was a frustrating way to live but due to honor, self respect or self discipline (I’m not sure which) I managed to keep a lid on my feelings. I never told Mrs. Peel how I really felt. I tried to deny it to myself. Around Christmas of 1998, I came up with some artificial reason for breaking off our friendship. We met for a lunch and then . . . nothing. I’d told her to get lost.

    If I was troubled by her transfer to central office, I was devastated by this self engineered break in our friendship. I couldn’t think straight for months. I’d be driving down a highway and I’d see a landmark that had been significant to us and I and I’d be lost in thoughts of her. I was unable focus on day to day tasks. This wasn’t once in a while, it happened everyday. My guts ached with longing for her.

    I fancied myself a latter day Ulysses, who’d tied himself to the mast to hear the siren’s come hither song. What Homer failed to tell us was that although Ulysses survived he was haunted by the song for the rest of his life. It took over a year but eventually I became able to taste the food I was eating.

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    OK Rum-p, this is reading good! Keep writing and posting!

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    This is very interesting. It's reading like a romance novel. Keep it coming Rum-polephoreskin.

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    Gonzo Journalism:
    Gonzo Journalism is a style of journalism that is written without claims of objectivity, often including the reporter as part of the story via a first-person narrative.

    Soon come . . .

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    A real life LOVE story....I'm totally intrigued...

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    Two years after we parted I was back to pretty much my old self. I still thought about her daily, still heard the siren song but it took less time for my head to clear. I got by by telling myself she never really cared about me. In 2001 I was struck down by a complication involving medicine I had been on for years, I was hospitalized for over a week and off work for over a year. One of my legs was permanently damaged but I could still walk (look for the whitest left leg on the beach – that will be me). Mrs. Peel told me later she’d heard rumors ranging from my death to my leg being cut off.

    During this time Mrs. Peel promoted from central office to a Mgt. position at a new prison. I held a union position that on occasion required me to represent her staff. That would put us in opposition. Other than that we had no contact.

    This is what I didn’t know; she’d moved away to get a fresh start. Her husband, a child welfare professional, had lost his job due to a drinking problem. He’d managed to land a job at her new prison. This prison was far upstate and her hope was they could put the embarrassment of his faux pas behind them. They had two daughters to think of.

    Her husband’s problems persisted, she got by putting on a brave face to the world, “nothing wrong here” was her mantra. She told me later that she often cried because of what she was going through and the fact that she didn’t have her best friend to talk to anymore.

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    Around this time my wife hurt her knee exercising. This led to an addiction to painkillers. My daughter tried to make me aware of this but I refused to believe it. I thought my daughter was overreacting. My wife assured me this was the case. My daughter (a college graduate by this time) wouldn’t let up on it. I scheduled family therapy. We all went, but my daughter refused to believe that my wife was following her prescription. I sided with my wife and my daughter left the session angry.

    Two months after that my wife approached me and essentially said my daughter was right. I felt terrible about doubting my daughter. I was deeply hurt that my wife knew better but had let me side against my daughter. I never thought she’d pull something like that. I had a lot to learn. I stuck in therapy for two years. Sometimes we went together. Sometimes I went alone. The only constant in that time was that my wife’s addiction became worse.

    After a shade over two years of therapy I told my wife I couldn’t go on. She’d developed a personal world of her own, she was in her own words (just spoken to me last week) not herself any longer. Pain killers had become her ring of power and like Frodo she was becoming a shadow of herself. She left in a huff (or was it Neon?), taking only the possessions she could fit in an econo-box car. I was left with two cats, two mortgages and one income.

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    Don't know when I'll finish.
    We leave tomorrow night (well Wednesday at 1:30AM) for Chicago and our flight to Negril.

    Mrs. Peel and I will be traveling down together.

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    What! Dayum....

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