Retarded Love

I have a habit of loving too much. The way that I love my mother’s restless behavior and how she can’t sit down for ten minutes without finding something for her to clean up or reorganize. The way that I love my father’s restful behavior where you can’t get him to do any of the household chores after he’s come back from work and that’s just two out of the thousand things I love about the world that surrounds me. You see, I’m a true believer in love and what love can do to a person. Love makes things work, it makes an ugly place such as this world, into something magical and marvelous. It’s what keeps people of different cultures together and it’s what makes films so special. It’s what binds my wife and I together in our twelve-year marriage and I would tell you the lovely story of how our love came to be but that’s not the story I want to tell at this moment. The story I want to share is a story of love beyond any ordinary measures and standards. It’s a special type of love between two very special people on a very particular moment in their lives and had it been any other moment, it might as well have been very ordinary, this I’m sure of.
You see, love is not just an emotion between two lovers. It’s more than that. I can’t exactly describe what love is but maybe I can explain its effects. For example:

A man had to part from his lover because he was being sent off to fight in the war against Germany and its Nazis. Because he loved his wife so much, he didn’t think twice before leaving her in the arms of his best friend so that harm wouldn’t reach her way. He loved her so much that not a week went by when she didn’t receive a letter written with the most elegant prose and metaphor confessing his love for her. Not a day went by when he didn’t masturbate thinking of her and only her. Not another single breast entered his thoughts during this time of self-gratification. So maybe you’ll understand this fellow when he finally came home after years of separation and emotional hardship to want to jump into bed with his wife. Although he did jump into bed, he found his best friend there as well, and found his wife six months pregnant. Because he loved his wife so much, because of the love between his best friend and his wife, because of all this love that surrounded him, he was forced to dig a hole in his wife’s belly with a kitchen knife and cut off his best friend’s penis. All this was out of love for the two lying now dead in bed.



So now, you must believe what strange effects love can have on a person and when I say love will make a person do crazy things. Love is special like that and it was out of this love when I promised my parents that I would come down to their wicker furniture store at least once a month even after I graduated and found a job to help out, because that’s what you do when you love someone. You do everything in your power to help them in any way, shape or form. So yes, I drove from New York City to the middle of Pennsylvania every second weekend of the month to help them move wicker furniture around. Wicker furniture is not all that heavy and very easy to lift and move around but I figured my parents needed at least a weekend of a little R and R.
The drive down would take approximately three hours but in my broken down Saab, the three hours seemed like six. On the drive down, I was constantly reminded of this guy. This guy named Stanley. Stanley lived across the street from my parent’s store and would drop by on occasion to help out for a little bit. Stanley was in his late thirties with no wife and kids and no job that we were aware of. He would just sit outside, on his porch, a beer in one hand and his other hand was always scratching his back. How he maintained this way of life always boggled me but there was a rumor going around in the old neighborhood that he’s an only child of a brilliant scientist and is just living off his trust fund. Not to say his house is any better than the piece of run down building a few blocks down but rumors also say he’s a child prodigy gone wacky. They say he won every math competition up until the eighth grade and now he just mopes around and never uses his brain. He sits on his porch with a beer in one hand, scratching his back with the other. Not to say he’s a bad fellow, in fact he’s awfully kind and he was always very fond of my father. He always asked him advice on plumbing and whether he should start buying free-range chicken eggs. One time he came over to the store on a slow day with a bottle of Jim Beam and finished it amongst the two of them. Stanley had gotten drunk and threw a wicker footstool in the middle of the street where it had been run over. The next day he begged my father to let him work it off and so he did. Everyday for a week, he came to the store 10 AM sharp and left not a minute before 6.
Stanley is a kind hearted man who’s troubled by his ingenious childhood, left alone to live off his remaining days destroying his liver. In a perfect world, a man like Stanley would have a home with a white picketed fence and two or three kids running around playing kick ball or 1-2-3 red light. Instead he lives across a wicker furniture store waiting for a slow day so he can run across with a bottle of liquor to have a drink with my father. One thanksgiving we invited him over since he had no family of his own and he must have had a little too much eggnog. He rambled on and on about the government and how they brain wash people and how elections were rigged and how a black man will never become president for another 100 years. Stuff that you normally wouldn’t discuss over turkey and mash potatoes. He was right for most of his arguments. He had his points and they all seemed to make sense and that’s when I realized that Stanley was borderline genius and retarded. It all made sense, all of it. This poor boy was so smart, had grown up in an intellectual family and have never experienced a normal childhood. All the time spent in a room studying was one less hour spent playing wall ball with a friend. The competitions they entered him in were a replacement for a girlfriend who still to this day hasn’t had the privilege of having. That was what made Stanley retarded. Not that he had any physical or mental damage but that he’s never experienced a proper childhood.
I was down at the old neighborhood one weekend when I asked of Stanley. Hadn’t seen him around so I asked my mother and that’s when she had told me he hadn’t been around for a good two months. Turns out that Stanley had visited his mother in Florida who was dying of lung cancer and hadn’t come back since. Time passed with or without Stanley and so did my life. I since then had gotten married and out of love for my wife, told my parents I wouldn’t be able to go down to the old wicker furniture shop every month but I let them know I’d try whenever time allowed. Well, time didn’t allow and I would end up going down just on major holidays. It wasn’t that I loved my wife more than my parents, but the love between my wife and I was a different kind of love. A love that needed special attention. The love between my parents and I had developed over my whole life. It was unconditional and would never go away. The love between newlyweds must be well kept and requires a lot of maintenance at first. And so that’s what I did, maintain our love.



The second winter of our marriage I decided it was time for a career change. I quit my job and told my wife I needed some time to think some ideas through. She agreed and so to clear my mind of any other irrelevancies, I decided it was a good idea to spend some time down at the old wicker furniture shop. I had packed some of my clothes and towards the end of winter, took my Saab and headed down the turnpike to my parent’s place. The whole ride down I couldn’t help think about good ole Stanley and the life he could have had only if he had a normal childhood. Not to say he’s having a shitty life now, he’s probably sitting outside his mom’s porch in Florida with a beer in one hand and that’s not bad of a life. Not bad at all. But just imagine the potential of his mind and how nice it would have been for the rest of the world if he had put it to good use. Maybe we would have had the cure for AIDS by now. Maybe an entire new system of social order could have been built to eliminate discrimination and injustice. All these maybes but now I should take my mind off these frivolous things.
This had been a hard winter for my parents. The economy was changing and wicker furniture wasn’t of much interest to the new home-owners in our surrounding neighborhoods. I told my parents it would be wise to change the store around, maybe add some furniture that wasn’t entirely made out of wicker. Being the man that my father is, the idea was thrown out along with the hopes of sustaining the shop much longer. I knew this would be the last year we ran the store.
It was the first day of spring when a car with a Jersey license plate number drove into our parking lot. This lady, probably in her mid thirties, was passing through on her way to Ohio and decided to check out the store. Why she was going to Ohio was beyond me but it had turned out, she was on her way to a dog show. I guess she really loved dogs. So much that she would drive a days worth just to see some Jack Russell Terriers run down a field and jump through a couple of hoops. But who am I to judge what someone does on their free time?
This lady looked around for a while and then finally introduced herself to my parents. She went by the name of Rebecca. She asked if they knew a place she could stay the night. She had driven all day and was in serious need of some rest. My parents offered her their shed which was converted into a guest house to accommodate passer bys who were looking for a cheap place to stay for a night or two. I showed her to our place and offered her a drink. She didn’t respond but instead kept saying “cooold…cooooold.” Now it was the first day of spring and an incredible day at that and there was no breeze or winds blowing, not to my knowledge. In fact, this whole winter, it had probably dropped below forty degrees once or twice. Most of the time, the temperature was around fifty degrees or so. But never mind what I thought, the farmer’s almanac had said this would be the warmest spring in the last seventy five years and this lady was saying it was cold. I took her over to the guest house and handed her the keys. “We haven’t had a guest here for a while so the place might not be in the perfect condition” I told her. She told me not to worry, she said she was probably going to leave early the next morning.
The next morning, thinking she had left, went into the guest house to clean up whatever mess she might have made. Instead I heard the cries of a little girl. On the bed she just sobbed and continued to sob and probably didn’t even realize that I was in the room watching her. I didn’t bother say anything, instead I kept backing up until I was outside of the door. I went to the store and never thought twice about the incident.
A week had gone by and this lady was still living in our guest house. My mother told me she had paid us a weeks worth, and on top of that, given us two weeks in advance. Now for someone who was suppose to make it to a dog show, she’s sure taking her time. I didn’t really mind it though, for the week straight, she was always hanging out at the store doing the little things like taking out the trash, sweeping the floors and making coffee. Not the best coffee, not something that you’d actually buy, but I didn’t expect too much from her. On the first day of the second week she asked me if I was cold? I looked outside and saw kids riding their bicycles and other kids with ice cream in their hands. It must have been at least a warm sixty five degrees and no sight of rain or showers. I just looked at her oddly and continued to move the furniture around.
The next morning the whole neighborhood woke up to seven inches of snow. No one expected it, nor did the forecast tell us of any such predictions. It was just there the next morning. My father started cursing the mess and told me to grab a shovel and head over to the store. The parking lot at the store needed to be cleared so I started digging away at the snow. Ten minutes go by and I see a figure in the distance carrying a shovel our way. It was good ole Stanley. “Long time no see Stanley” my dad mumbled. Stanley kept digging away at the snow and between the two of us, had the parking lot cleared in less than two hours. The lady, Ms. Rebecca brought out some coffee and that was the moment of sparks and all sorts of fireworks. Stanley couldn’t take his eyes off of Ms. Rebecca and Ms. Rebecca seemed to enjoy being drooled over by Stanley. Now, for anyone just reading this, this moment was far more special than how I just described it. It doesn’t fit any cliché description but at the same time, fits all of it. Eyes connected, souls met, hands locked and in this moment, we had our retarded love. I call it retarded love because to me, the two of them were farthest from any normality I’ve come to realize. The fact that they can experience any kind of human connection just belittles me. Stanley is this suppressed child killing off his days. Ms. Rebecca must be the loneliest lady in the whole eastern side of this country yet all she ever does is talk gibberish. The two couldn’t be any better for each other.
That night, my father invited Stanley over for dinner and sure enough, Ms. Rebecca was there helping out with the cooking. About ten minutes go into our dinner when Ms. Rebecca asks Stanley if she wants to go with her to the dog show in Ohio. Now, I’m not much of a dog show person but I could have sworn this dog show was two weeks ago. How many possible dog shows could there be in the same month? But either way, she asked him to the dog show. Stanley stared at his food for a little bit looked at my father who gave Stanley a fatherly nod and started eating his food again. Not another word about this dog show was mentioned nor did Stanley verbally agree to go with Ms. Rebecca.
The next morning, I noticed Ms. Rebecca’s car missing. She must have left for Ohio and a cool calm flew down my back. It was just awkward to have her around. She seemed like a really sweet person, but just strange to have around for the amount of time she stayed. A week went by and no sign of Stanley either. Come to think of it, I hadn’t seen Stanley since the night we all had dinner, my parents, Stanley and Ms. Rebecca. I had the feeling the two of them left for Ohio but I’m sure the dog show was over by now. I don’t know much about them, but I’m pretty sure a week is enough to see a couple of dogs jump through hoops and such.
Three months had gone by, and I had finally realized what direction I wanted to take my life. I knew what I wanted to do so I told my parents I was leaving in a week. They gave me their blessing like they always have and God bless them for they are the best parents any child could ever have. No complaints from my end. Up until the time I had all my things in my Saab, I was hoping to see good ole Stanley one last time. I even went over to his house and knocked on his door but no one replied.
That year, my parents had to close their store down and now lives off the money they received selling the property. As for me, every time it snows in New York, I wonder about Stanley and Ms. Rebecca. I wonder if they finally did go to that dog show. I wonder if they’ll ever be back. Then I start thinking, maybe they never made it to the dog show. Maybe they just stopped somewhere in the middle of Pennsylvania and bought a house with a white picket fence and maybe have two or three kids running around playing 1-2-3 red light. Yeah, Stanley would have liked that. He would have liked that ending…