Townie

I dream of my past. I'm unsure why that is, perhaps it's what you do when you can stack decades like book volumes. This morning I had a weird one that replayed an old short-lived romance I had with a girl entirely out of my league. The dream started of all places, in Dublin. The dream had us in restaurant and for some reason, I knew the IRA had placed a bomb there. I suggested we go across the street to the other restaurant and we dined al fresco, waiting for the bomb to go off. It did, blowing curtains, plates and diners out the windows. But we just sat there, munching our food and watching the first responders come to clean up the mess. We both acted like nothing was out of the ordinary. The dream woke me up because it was vivid and I had pretty much forgotten about her over the years.

I sat up on my elbows and thought. “What the fuck was that about?”

The Real Story:

The girl I'll call the girl Bella Thorpe because she resembled her. She was the daughter of RISD's one time curator of painting and sculpture in the mid 90's. The girl lived in about every major European metropolitan center since childhood. I, however, was from Puh-TUH-kit. We had met at the Living Room watching a cover band of the Rolling Stones. She was very easy to approach because of the “come hither” grenade she tossed at my feet. She might have shot a Coast Guard illumination flare over my head as well too. That and those bangs she had that spilled across her forehead. I'm a sucker for the “right” hair...still am! She wasn't the usual S.P. (Sickening Pig) I usually dated. “Sickening Pigs” were local girls we hung with, local yokels. They weren't ugly in any way but for some reason, that's what we called them, SP's. To the girls, we local guys were “scum/dirt bags.” All terms of endearment, you know.

“Hey, you taking that Sickening Pig to the see Petty at Great Woods?”

“Yeah, she bought the tickets months ago, she really wants to go.”

Anyways...

I knew I was out of my league because she was drop dead pretty, cultured, monied and was working toward her Masters. I was working at a social service job trying to translate for the deaf. Some of those duties included translating to a teen at a Warren Dunkin' Donuts that my guy wanted four sugars in his coffee. Between Bella and I, there was a tiny bit of disparity in our socio-economic levels there.

The neighborhood surrounding Blackstone Blvd is ridiculously well to do. The part down by the Seekonk River is pretty much out of the way and you will not know it exists...I didn't really till I picked her up one night. She had come bounding out of her house when I pulled up. Again, that long hair swaying, big eyes and nice summer dress were making me fall in love. Shit! Wrong thing to do. You're getting lost in her! But your heart loves to do amazing mental gymnastics with your brain and I was hoping...perhaps...this could last?

When I had pulled up in front of her house the very first time, the first thought I had was this: “I Swear Upon My Mother's Soul..she will NEVER see the house I live in.” The home she was in looked a bit of a Frank Lloyd Wright/Brady Bunch rambling ranch with this huge crawling garden that was well tended, along with a large Shinto post and beam thingy covered in ivy. I lived in a Cape Cod Box surrounded by half crab grass and a few yew bushes...on a wide and spreading .12 acre plot.

We palled around for about a month and a half when I heard something she said that seemed kind of insulting but I didn't quite get the phrase. That phrase, had I understood it, would've told me all the truth I needed to know.

We were at WaterPlace park, down by that small amphitheater where they have the free summer concert series, when one of her RISD friends came by. They were about twenty feet off, talking when the girl asks who I was. Bella says, “That's Ronnie, he's my Townie boyfriend.”

“Townie?” I thought. “What's a 'townie?'”

I didn't ask or pursue her for a definition. Thought I did come to understand it in another month.

Of course, I was getting deeper and deeper into her, rationalizing the fact that we had very different backgrounds and very different futures. Love, is in love with itself. That lesson you learn after you whomp your head on it time and time again till you “get it.” But until that time, you can hope for FantasyLand, Puppies and Unicorns and Skittles. Plus, she was sooo damn pretty, engaging, smart and the whole package seemed perfect. She was a rare find.

That day came when reality thudded. She had told me she had won internship at NYC's Metropolitan Museum and couldn't pass that up. At first, I agreed, “Yes, this is in your best interests.” But of course, the other side was screaming “NO NO NO I DON”T WANT TO LOSE MY CANDY!” I didn't make a scene but felt like she had ripped my heart out through my rib cage, using a warm spoon. Shit...

Well, I told myself later on that night, the kid (she 23, I 32 at the time) did bounce from city to city in her life and apparently loved doing so. Her life took her from Warsaw to Seattle. The rest of reality sunk in weeks later.

“Townie...hmm...I have been a Townie fling. I can put that on my resume.” I thought. I knew what that word meant then.

You pile on life's experiences and it can be shocking when you look back on all the things you did or all the roles you filled for a time. I have been a young punk, semi-orphan, a stand off-ish investor in various underground economies in Slater Park in the early 80's, college kid and a social worker type. I had nailed myself to the Cross for other family members when they needed the help. A “Dad” to too many lost and confused waifs, beach bum, a balls to the wall day trader yelling at a computer screen and mortgage originator. I also have sneezed a lot, threw up through my nose once and laughed till I teared.

I also was a Townie...

Hell of a resume huh?

For those of you who don't know...

And "Bella," a similar look she had and bangs, bangs bangs!