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May 18, 2009
here pussy pussy pussy
1996
Uncharacteristically, I'm sitting in my office working when Katrina steps inside. She's spent her day at one of those morale events Microsoft holds periodically, in this case, bowling. She's wide-eyed. "Oh. My. God. I just met your perfect woman."
"Huh?"
She gives me directions to my Perfect Woman's office, which of course I follow with all due haste. Therein sat a beautiful girl, Kristin. I could see what Katrina was talking about. Kristin was resplendent in a faded sweatshirt and blue jeans, no makeup, her natural blond hair pulled back in an informal ponytail. The woman exuded "tomboy." Pretty tomboy. Very pretty tomboy. We had no real reason to talk, but I gagged out some awkward pleasantries anyway. She beamed and sparkled and offered her handshake.
And I pussied out.
1999
I left that team shortly thereafter, and three years later, Kristin and I are invited to the same birthday dinner. When I arrive, the only empty seat is next to her. Utterly heartbreaking development, that. And so we chat for hours over drinks, and she only becomes better. She sparkles and beams. She listens and jokes. We love and hate the same music and movies. She knows the answer to my Perfect Woman test question. We'd loved the same cartoons as kids and quote them verbatim. She not only loves football, she plays football in a league. We talk about our lifes and loves, our successes and disappointments, and she heaps unusual amounts of empathy on me and everyone else.
Katrina sure knows what she's talking about, I think for the first and last time in my life.
When dinner ends, I walk Kristin to her car. And then I completely pussy out. She was just too...too. My knees wobble.
2009
After ten years of my kicking myself, this weekend Kristin and I are invited to the same party again. No longer a cute 22 year old, she's now a drop-dead beautiful 35 year old. She shows up alone, sans ring. Chance for redemption, coming up!
"I cannot work up the nerve to even talk to her," I text Katrina.
"Do it! You'll hate yourself if you don't!" she replies.
An hour later, I'm talking to Katrina on the phone. She's trying to help me to muster some courage that, with this one woman and only this one woman, has inexplicably deserted me for a sizable chunk of my life. Ten minutes into the call, Kristin spots me. She smiles and waves across the room.
"I gotta go," I said and hung up.
And so I chat with the Perfect Woman again, 13 years later. My buddies were there, and I zing then, and she laughs and sparkles and lightly slaps my forearm. All systems are go! What can possibly go wrong?
"It's official. I pussied out again," I text Katrina two hours later.
"Is it too late?"
"Yes. I'm in the ferry line."
"Sigh."
Exactly: sigh. If you think it's exasperating being around me, you should try being me.
posted by john at 8:06 AM • permalink