Of Frogs, Nitwits, and The Crying Game
A Shell Game* essay
*Shell Game Essay. Also known as a Hermit Crab Essay, a SGE is a bit like an actual hermit crab in that it's an essay that takes on the existing form (as if a shell) of another type of writing. For instance, the essay may look like a set of instructions, a social media post, a letter, a recipe, postcard, obituary, a script, footnotes, prompts, or a test (source: Writers’ Digest, 12/30/21)
1989 It was an interview for a job I didn’t especially want so when the interrogator asked what I was great at I said hooking up with losers. The woman:
fell out of her chair laughing.
looked at me like Mrs. Allen in Health Class did when I asked if you could get
pregnant from reading dirty novels.kicked my ass out the door.
cracked a barely discernable smile, scribbled on her note pad and validated my
parking slip
Backtracking to me at age twenty, I recall that’s when I discovered I have a tendency to overshare. I also never know when to shut the F up. [Reminder to self: tattoo on my arm: “It’s better to keep your mouth closed and let people think you’re a fool than to open it and remove all doubt,” Robert Frost.]
On to the saga of pathetic hookups wherein I became adept at kissing frogs who transformed into ogres. One suitor didn’t look like a frog so much as he resembled Keith Richards after the Stones musician had decomposed. The dude—let’s call him Michael, because that was his name—smoked weed so on occasion his skin took on a greenish tinge. Nitwit me missed that warning sign. Inevitably, by date three Frog-Michael transformed into an ogre. I mean ogre in the worst possible way. I should have walked then and there, but Michael was a musician AND wrote a beautiful song about me. I can’t reveal the title because it was my given name, a name I hated which Michael knew and which he always called me, and somehow his song, “XXX,” made me hate my name less, and him more. Anyway, my only option was to:
give him my long-gone virginity.
become one of his pathetic groupies.
sleep with the drummer in his band because he was hot and, well,
he was a drummer for God’s sake!
follow him around salivating like the sap I was.
Eventually I came to my senses and walked. And gravitated to more frogs. I’d describe the losers, but let’s mosey on and get to the part in which my life as professional frog-kisser came to an end. That was when I:
leaped off the roller coaster of pathetic love and nearly died in the process.
came to my senses and took a vow of celibacy that lasted thirteen months, a week, four days and some hours.
joined a nunnery for nearly a day.
discovered my self-worth, self-respect, clicked on my brain and eventually met a man who bore no resemblance to a frog, to Keith Richards or, most importantly, to my high school boyfriend who taught me how to kiss, how to bullshit, and how to hold a blade of grass between my thumbs and whistle.
1991. Approximately nine months and a day before I took a vow of celibacy, I met Bill. He was no Adonis, but neither was he Keith Richards. Bill didn’t compose sappy love songs, though he did play the sax. AND he sent me sappy greeting cards on every occasion, including a few he invented like “Happy one month anniversary of the first time you let me kiss you.”
You’ve probably guessed, but Bill was sentimental. And he was sweet. And kind and gentle, patient and calm. How could I, professional frog-kisser and lover of villains, possibly be attracted to him? He and I quickly became friends and hung out regularly in a platonic way. Well, platonic for me. Bill wanted in the BF-GF zone, but I was determined to stick to single-dom. I was fearful, and deathly sick of life in the crazy lane, and worried I’d regress into my old pattern of kissing those damn frogs. Those {shudder} mean and nasty frogs which I’m guessing have found:
their rotting lily pad pads
their nitwit frog princesses
their ugly, rotting, decomposing hearts
the road to hell where they’re burning a thousand years for every naive or brain-dead nitwit they blindsided, strung along, tormented.
Within a year, Bill wore me down. I subdued the fear that he was a frog in disguise and, instead, convinced myself he was my reward for having suffered those other amphibians. Thus, in April 1992, we glided out of friend-zone. The next couple of years we were devoted to one another. There was one scary occurrence: on our first cruise: Bill got sea-sick and turned a worrisome shade of green. I flashed back to the frogs and panic’d. My addled brain considered nudging him overboard—honestly, just to see if he’d float—then I came to my senses and remembered that staying afloat on water was proof for witches or deity. As I tried to recall the test for frogs, Bill got better and we departed the cruise a happy couple and returned to our life of bliss.
Then came a nightmare day in March 1994 in which we had a huge confrontation. It was the first and only time he and I actually shouted at one another. The result:
brought us closer together.
caused my neighbors to call the cops.
led to heartbreak and us permanently breaking up for the first and only time.
made me consider lacing his coffee with rat poison and skipping town, but by the time I worked out a plan, I was in pj’s watching Love Actually for the millionth time, I had no rodenticide, it was late AND winter in Vermont so approximately a thousand degrees below zero. I wasn’t about to freeze my ass off to go shopping for poison which I had no idea where to find (that was a terrible sentence but you get what I’m saying).
Photo by DESIGNECOLOGIST on Unsplash
Talk about hell! [And, btw, did you know that Dante’s deepest level of Hell isn’t fire but a frozen wasteland? It’s why a lot of people confuse Vermont with Hell. You would get this if, as I did, you grew up in New England.]
Bill’s and my breakup was absolute Hell. HELL! I suspected the universe halted our bliss because we’d become complacent. I even wondered if the demons who’d long ago haunted my mother found me and resumed their nefarious games. By day four—or maybe it was five—of the breakup, I was Ophelia. Despondent, melodramatic and engaging in suicide ideation. My response was:
to call into work sick because I could feel my heart breaking. LITERALLY (I mean that)
to stay in bed watching mind-numbingly stupid reality TV shows (yes, I do understand that’s redundant)
to cry and cry and cry and cry and
cry some more
I tried to accept I wasn’t going to die. For days I struggled to believe I could live without the only man I’d never considered cheating on. I’m embarrassed to admit that as it probably says volumes about my morals. My point is, however, it’s a testament to Bill and to the love and respect I had for the man he was.
Day five (or maybe it was six) my sister phoned. She lectured for what felt like days then ordered me to crawl out of the couch cocoon, open the windows to let in fresh air, and haul my lazy ass out of my stagnant apartment! To shut her up, I swore I would. Not one to swear lightly (okay, that’s a lie), I let my arm fall to the floor, rummaged around, and grabbed the Burlington Free Press. I opened it to see what was happening in the world of the living, and found the one place I knew I was safe from running into the man I pined for. The safe haven was:
a Montreal strip joint because that’s what started the fight.
the beach because of Bill’s easily burned skin and because it was the middle of winter so literally (I mean that) NO ONE goes to the beach in one thousand degrees below zero weather. Even nitwitted Vermonters.
my sister’s because it would remind him of me, and he’d have to listen to her bitch about her lazy ass husband, and lecture about what an idiot Bill was for doing what he did which only three of us knew about and now it’s just two.
a dark, depressing, and violent movie that neither of us would ever in a million trillion years go to see AND a matinee to boot which we both hated.
I threw my worn mustard yellow parka over my stained monk-fish grey thermal tee shirt, pulled my stretched out baby-shit green toque down past my eyebrows, and moped out to the cinema.
Considered a sleeper in 1992 and promoted with ads that screamed: “DO NOT REVEAL THE ENDING!” The Crying Game was as depressing and hateful a film as any I’d seen. I was focussed 100%. (Btw, don’t you hate when people say one hundred ten percent or a thousand percent? Don’t you want to yell “it’s not possible!” and if they say it again you will slap them?)
The dreadful film engaged me for two hours, during which time I mostly forgot:
to cry despite that I felt hopeless and miserable.
I was dying from a broken heart. Literally (I mean that).
I suffered from indigestion due to having eaten a concession taco left over from the previous century.
I was on the verge of returning to my miserable old life wherein I’d resume the odious tendency I had to kiss frogs.
all of the above.
I sat through the film’s end credits then trudged my way out of the dark theater. I slogged into the glaring lobby, surrounded by windows that magnified the sun’s rays and blinded me. Squinting, I heard my name. By some cruel trick of fate, Bill had come to The Crying Game. Bill who, unlike me, looked as though he’d showered recently and probably smelled good. Bill who, unlike me, was not dressed like a filthy hobo (is that redundant?). Bill who, like me, hated depressing and violent movies. Bill who, like me, hated matinees because of kids throwing popcorn and old folk chattering and coughing their brains out. (Btw, don’t you hate it when you meet some old fogey and discover they’re the same age as you?) So, the dead last person I expected to run into was Bill, the man who preached that when you live in a state that had sunshine maybe six times a year, it was asinine to waste even one in a dark theater.
Face to face, Bill and I stood in the lobby where we:
immediately resumed our fight.
shook hands and parted friends.
screamed at one another and had to be broken apart by the movie cops.
went back to his house to engage in make-up sex.
1998. Shortly after our second wedding anniversary friends threw a “Newlywed Game” party. The first question: “Do you ever worry your spouse will cheat?” Without hesitation, Bill wrote, "NEVER!” on his card. I’d written “rarely” and was struck by his response. I’m ashamed to admit, I was annoyed that Bill announced to all that he was 100% certain I was faithful (thankfully, he didn’t say 110% which would have been cause for me to file divorce papers). In my vast stupidity, I’d assumed (remember the adage about ass-u-ming?), I figured Bill dismissed the possibility that I’d cheat because he didn't think I was attractive enough for anyone to want to cheat with me. Nice, huh?
I never had the guts to ask Bill why he didn’t think I’d cheat. But I’m a smart chick so did figure it out. Eventually. It took approximately:
a week
a month
a year
15 years
In 2014, the universe decided Bill and I no longer merited a happily ever after life. Maybe it was bored and wanted to shake things up. Maybe we’d become such a sickeningly sweet couple the universe couldn’t bear it. Whatever the reason, the powers that be up and killed off my husband. I got the message. I'd had my allotment of near-bliss and was relegated back to the Hell of kissing frogs. I immediately told the universe "thanks but fuck you no. I don't kiss frogs anymore.” True story. Okay, recently there was a slip up, but it doesn’t count. And today, like the smart chick I finally am, I don’t kiss anyone. Because, well, those ogres.
Weeks after Bill died I re-read all the cards we’d exchanged during the twenty plus years we’d been together. Mushy and sentimental cards from him; silly joke cards from me. I remembered that Newlywed Game, and brainiac me finally understood Bill’s response to the cheating question. He knew me better than anyone ever did and ever would. He knew I was loyal—100%. Given that and how very much we loved and valued each other, he knew that under no circumstances would I ever do anything to hurt him. Bill’s answer to the Newlywed question was a compliment and I was a nitwit. If Bill was here, I’d tell him I’m sorry it took years for me to realize that.
Btw, you know that stupid movie with the stupid tag line: “Love means never having to say you’re sorry”? What love actually means, is knowing when you simply must say “I’m sorry.”
My heart feels warm and cozy after reading your love story.
Such a great story, CJ. Repeating the list-making technique was funny and so effective at setting a mood. You have a fine, clever wit. Even when bemoaning your own idiocy, you make it seem light. We know better - we know what heartbreak feels like and how disappointed we are in ourselves sometimes. It is so bad at times, all we can do is laugh. At least in hindsight. Nice stuff here!