My lady friend once said: there are takers and there are givers, and you don’t really get to choose which one you turn out to be. Take me, for instance. I’d love to be a taker. I’m ready. Give me whatever is going around, please. I never thought for one minute I’d be the bank of first resort for so many people, including all these kids out back. And that’s nothing compared to my wife’s family. They’re from Naples, don’t forget, which is a town with one of the highest proportions of takers to givers anywhere on earth. The few givers that remain are being driven to penury, like a species on it’s way to extinction.
My lady friend has plenty of money, which she has no problem earning. But she doesn’t take money for granted. She just expects it, like people who expect clean air and make you put out your cigarette to get it. She’s one tough bitch, which is not to say she isn’t generous. She gives more to charity than you make. Every homeless knows her name, a true friend of Andrew Jackson, but that doesn’t mean she’s a soft touch. Just the opposite. Some people question her ability to see people as people. She seems to stare right through them, or else to look at them like specimens, more at the clothes than the face. But trust me, she sees everything there is to see, and she’s seen enough of your face.
I always call her when I’m in a crisis, but not because I’m expecting a shoulder to cry on. I call her because she has no time for that. I do not call for sympathy, but for the opposite of sympathy. I call her to prove to myself that I am a hard man. Of course, I wish I were a little harder around the middle. I’m talking more about my head, which is where most givers meet. They bang heads because they like it, and they admire that tendency in others.
I met my lady friend 40 years ago, which is quite a piece of change. We buried a lot of people since then, people we loved, and we watched everybody get old, including us, and there we are, alone on the dance floor with the music still on. Yet, I’m not sure she likes me. On the other hand, you could call it love and you wouldn’t be wrong.
She never met the spouse she liked. (Including her own. She did try, three times, but none took.) This is not to say she doesn’t like my wife. She might even like my wife more than she likes me. But between two people she is bound to choose one, as she has no interest in three-way relationships, which doesn’t mean sex. As far as I can tell, my lady friend never has sex, and never much liked it back when she was experimenting. This is one reason why my wife, despite my lady friend’s tendency to view my wife as a specimen, allows my devotion.
My first wife allowed the same. She didn’t like anybody, so it was all fine with her. I was the only one doing any liking, and in the beginning, I liked everybody. Of course I didn’t know what I’d end up giving. But my lady friend needs nothing. Being such a giver, she’s very low maintenance. When I buy her dinner it’s because she lets me, which is every single time. Sometimes I think it’s what holds us together, me buying dinner. It’s her way of saying: I love you. At least that’s what I’d like to think.
