Dinner for Two

“Thank you for treating.”

“It’s no problem,” responded Jon with a warm smile, “I think you needed a break from it all. Besides when was the last time we got to sit down for dinner together?”

“Hey, I told you before that I’m perfectly fine. Sure, it hurts but in reality I have been expecting it for some time,” answered Josh.

“I still can’t believe she did that to you.”

“Well, she did,” countered Josh shrugging his shoulder with a smile which expressed a bit of embarrassment.

Feeling as though he was intruding a bit Jon asked a bit timidly, “If you don’t mind. I, I have to ask, what happened?”

Josh smiled and looked down at his silverware placed with care on the red, cloth napkin.

“Look, I’m sorry,” Jon responded while looking down at the table before him before Josh could utter a word, “It’s none of my business. You need time to process everything and heal. I just, just don’t get it. You seemed happy together. I, I, look, just forget I asked anything.”

With the same calm smile Josh leaned forward and met Jon’s eyes. Jon’s eyes followed Josh’s as Josh sat up straight.

“It’s okay. It is totally fine. In fact talking about it helps me to put things into perspective and actually helps me to feel better.”

“I didn’t mean to pry…,” attempted Jon.

“No, I mean it,” offered Josh nodding and smiling a little, “It is perfectly fine. I am good and I am getting better.

“When I was in the military I was asked if I ever did marijuana to which I answered I did. I still was inducted and I still received the clearances I needed to do the job I wanted. It turned out I would have been more of a liability to the service if I had lied because if the wrong person had found out my little secret they could use it to get me to hand over secrets. But since it was out in the open there was no possible way of blackmailing me. I found if you have no secrets no one has any power over you.”

“I would have never thought of that,” answered Jon in a lighter tone then changing back to the subject and his reason of needing to know, “But it just happened.”

“To you maybe but it was something in the making for some time. I can sum it up easily for you by saying it was my fault entirely. Pam has no blame in this.”

“Now who is being ridiculous?” demanded Jon, “I’ve been close to you and Pam for most of your relationship and I never saw you mistreat or demean her. In fact you were very encouraging and supportive. Oh, sure, I know you had some fights, some misunderstandings, but you were there for that girl the whole time.”

“But see, you missed the problem because you were blinded by all of that.”

“What!?” demanded Jon sitting back in his chair with a confused look not sure if he needed to take offense.

“It was my fault. Of course she does share her blame but I should have never removed her from her element and have tried to change her.”

“What are you talking about? Now you’re just not making any sense at all. Are you sure you are okay and everything is fine?”

“To be honest, no, I’m not one hundred percent but I am getting there. I’m at about seventy right now. There is a lot of pain I am dealing with but I am dealing with it and I am moving forward,” said Josh looking right into Jon’s eyes, “That is the best thing for me to do is to keep moving forward.

“Think of it this way,” said Josh changing his tone entirely, “What choice do I have but to move forward. I could sit here and wallow in self pity or I can pick myself up and dust off and move forward. Perhaps we were never really meant to be. Perhaps we were but this was just the wrong time.”

“Wrong time?” mused Jon almost absent mindedly.

“Sure, maybe we were meant to be together but just not at this time. Perhaps we need to age, to mature, to grow. If that is the case then I need to move forward.”

“And if it never happens?” asked Jon with caution in his voice.

“Then I’ll be ready for what happens next.”

“Okay, I get that, but what do you mean you took her out of her element?”

Josh looked about the rustic looking restaurant and breathed in deeply the essence of meals prepared, “It is really hard to explain over dinner but perhaps if I told you of two things which had happened, it would help me clarify what I mean.”

“Sure, give it a shot,” answered Jon sitting up, “I just feel the more I understand the better I can be there for you.”

“And satisfy your carny sense as well.”

“Yes, there is that too. Might as well be totally honest,” replied Jon with a smile.

“Okay, we have some time before our meals arrive so here is the first.”

“Yeah, these guys take time preparing your meal but it is great.”

“I know,” agreed Josh, “There was this one time when I was doing my internship for Reserve Officers Training Corps at the local National Guard Armory.”

“I remember that. It was with that medical unit in the Stahr Armory.”

“Yes, it is the building on the 400 block of N. Queen Street with the WWI Doughboy bronze in front.”

“Can’t miss it,” said Jon with a smile.

“Pam would prove that wrong.”

“What?” asked Jon with a bit of a smile.

“For the most part I did a great job of letting our bosses know about my drill times and other military related functions. Most of the drills were only Saturday and Sunday. There was an occasional extra drill on Fridays. See a drill is a period of about four hours and with Saturday and Sunday combined you had satisfied four of these units and occasionally you would have a fifth the Friday night before to fulfill your annual commitment. It was also a little extra money.”

“Which doesn’t hurt when you’re going to school,” added Jon.

“No it does not,” agreed Josh with a smile, “Anyway, I don’t know what happened either something was copied wrong or I just made a mistake because during one of these Friday night drills Pam was scheduled to work and at the time we only had the one car. So there was a problem. If I dropped off Pam and took the car she would end up waiting outside at Park City for the better part of an hour by herself.”

“Well that’s not good at all.”

“No sir, it wasn’t a viable option as far as I was concerned.”

“Wasn’t there anyone else who could have picked her up after work?”

“No, everyone was home during winter break and the few who were around were all busy.”

“So what did you do?” asked Jon with concern in his voice.

“She worked at Park City and I thought she could drop me off and then pick me up after she was done with work. She would have to wait less than a half hour but she would be on a well lit street and in our car and the front of the armory had a lot of parking spaces even during drills. In preparation for this I chose the easiest route I could think of and made detailed instructions listing major landmarks such as Long’s Park or the Post Office, I drew a little map, and we made several practice runs to build her confidence. Lancaster traffic can be a little confusing at times. She was more use to country driving.”

“How did you have her go?” asked Jon.

“She worked at Sears so I had her exit the Sears/JC Penney parking lot at the light by what was then the Bank of Lancaster County. She would make a left at that light and head to the Harrisburg Pike. At that light she would then make another left and travel for about a mile and a half until she hit North Queen and then she would make another left and be there.”

Jon sat back and thought about those directions and leaned forward, “It has been some time since I was there but it sounds right.”

“A simple nine minute drive,” said Josh in a low tone while shaking his head slowly.

“What happened?” asked Jon with a concerned tone.

“My drill ended. I went outside hoping the car would be there, nearby.”

“But it wasn’t.”

“No,” answered Josh, “For two hours I stood there in front of the Armory pacing to keep warm. I had my winter jacket but it was cold and windy that night. But that was the least of my worries. I was concerned about Pam. This was before cell phones. I had no way to get in touch with her. I didn’t know what happened. I was cold and I was extremely concerned.”

Jon just looked at him shaking his head slightly. Josh had gone silent as he watched the waiter place their respective dishes before them.

When all was set Josh continued, “She finally appeared to my great relief. I quickly got into the driver’s seat. She had gotten out immediately after stopping and quickly moved to the passenger side without a word or even looking at me. I saw she was in tears. I asked her if she was okay and she blew up at me.”

“Blew up at you? What did you do?”

“Let’s get to work on this wonderful meal before it gets cold and I’ll finish.”

As the plates were removed and coffee poured Josh sat back, “Man that was good.”

“Sure you don’t want a dessert? I’m still treating.”

“I am full.”

“Okay, so why did she blow up at you?”

“She immediately screamed at me that my directions were all wrong. I asked her what she was talking about and she told me that she asked some other people about the directions and they gave her better directions. Of course there is possibly a shorter route time wise by going out the back way of Park City using the Manheim Pike to North Prince Street and a couple of turns and you are there at the armory but it was some extra turns plus you had to keep track of how many blocks you went and being in the right lane. I had chosen the route I did because it was the simplest and in actuality was the fastest and shortest way. But someone had convinced her that this other way was better and she tried it and ended up lost. Somehow she found her way back to Park City and took my directions and found the armory.”

“I’m sorry but why would she do that?”

“I know, right, but in many ways that was Pamela. I mean she did the exact opposite of my directions and it led her right to Sears but we couldn’t try it for the return trip.”

“What did you do?”

“What I shouldn’t have done but I was getting tired of this. This right here was an ongoing theme in our relationship and I just went off. I told her as I drove out to Park City and Back to show me where the error was. Of course, she immediately shut down which was her main defense as I did this drive.”

“Her main defense?” asked Jon reaching for his cup.

“It was difficult to get her to deal with anything and she did not like to be told that she was wrong. There was this one time when we had moved back to Lancaster from New York and we were living in this small second floor apartment. I was at my desk working on some things and she came in and told me that she wanted to try to make me stir fried rice for me to thank me for helping her with some problems. She went to the kitchen and I went back to what I was working.”

“What was that?”

“I think it was planning out the budget for the next few months based on recent expenses. I was only working for a few minutes when she came back to ask me for help. I went out to the kitchen with her. She was busy getting the ingredients ready and she started to ask me about them. I had noticed that she had a frying pan sitting on the stove with oil in it and the flame was on. I turned it off saying that we should have this off until we are ready to go. She just walked out of the kitchen. I knew it was over. I didn’t say it in a mean way at all but I knew she had shut down and it was all over. I left everything where it was and went looking for her. I tried talking to her but she had shut down so I went back to work.”

“Did she ever make it?”

“No, I ended up cleaning it all up and making something else for us to eat. But that was Pamela.”

Shaking his head slightly, almost in disbelief Jon just replied, “I never knew this about her.”

“That was Pamela in a nutshell. Any form of criticism and it didn’t have to be criticism, just that she understood it as criticism, and she would take it personally and shut down. Personally I look at criticism as a wake up call, as valuable feedback to use to grow and improve. But how can you learn from your mistakes if you refuse to recognize if you ever made a mistake or deal with it?”

“Of course it depends on the source.”

“Of course,” agreed Josh, “But even still let’s say a five year old is calling you a meanie for not allowing the child to do something. This is still valuable feedback to learn to communicate and to especially communicate your intentions better. Problem is you can’t communicate with someone who completely shuts down.”

“Well, it seems to be just nuts that is what she shut down over.”

“Does seem insignificant but that is what she would do and I should say this didn’t occur all the time but a good majority of the time. If you said something you had about an eighty percent chance she would shut down.”

“So, some times you were able to get through?”

“Oh sure and we would actually progress. But if she could find an excuse she would cling to it. There was this one time when we were living for a short time at my parents’ house, when we had moved back from New York and were looking for a place and jobs. We went for a walk back to this old church. It was an old small road through the woods. It was a beautiful late summer day and we had talked the whole way, just an amazing time. Suddenly this hornet thing came out of the woods. They are aggressive and they do bite hard. I have no idea what they are called but I do know they are highly territorial and all we had to do was to move fast out of its territory and it would leave us alone. I told Pamela this and told her to move. I took five quick strides and noticed she wasn’t with me. I stopped and looked back. There she was in the same place with her arms across her chest, crying, and occasionally dodging and swatting at the insect. I ran back to her and placed my arm around her waist and moved her forward until the insect disappeared back into the tree line.”

“I think I know what you are talking about and I don’t know what their name is either.”

“But that was what I felt our relationship was like. I was growing and trying to move forward and she was standing still allowing others to hold her back. Biggest one was her mom who constantly was telling Pamela what she wanted to hear instead of what she needed to hear. Pamela would cling to anything anyone told her that she wanted to hear especially if it cleared her of any culpability for anything. Whereas I was dealing with things, learning, growing, and evolving, Pamela was still on that road swatting at that insect. I was constantly going back and trying my best to help her move forward. Eventually all those holding her back or trying to control her just had a stronger grip.”

“I am really sorry,” offered Jon, “I know you really loved her. It shows in how you stood up constantly to all those demons.”

“It was really hard to watch her just leave as she did but I have to come to terms with it. I had made the mistake of putting all of my hopes and dreams, of trying to take on the world and stand up to all of its challenges, to try to reach for lofty brass rings with someone by my side who couldn’t handle a simple direction of one left turn, another left, straight for just over a mile, and then another left. No, she is back in her element and is surrounded by people who tell her what she wants to hear, especially her mom. But I will say I have become a far better person from the experience.”

“You definitely convinced me you have what it takes to survive this and move on to a brighter future. Are you sure you don’t want a dessert?”

“You’ve already done enough and I am full.”