A Lifelong Question

2024 Author: Harry Day | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 15:43

A lifelong question. Names and details have been changed. Feelings and emotions are saved

He wrote to me in the evening that he wanted to come and ask just one question. I wrote a message, then in a vibeer, then in a messenger, and ten minutes later he was already calling. Excited baritone, generally pleasant

- I urgently need to meet. Tomorrow. One meeting, I don't need any more. I will describe the history and ask just one question. I wanted to ask you because this is important to me. I can come before work at seven in the morning. Can you?

Frost passed over my skin at the thought of working at seven in the morning. Agreed for one o'clock in the afternoon. Although I didn’t fully believe that he would come. Such people who want to come suddenly, often just as suddenly, lose their desire and do not come.

He came. With a confident step he entered the office, thoroughly and comfortably settled himself on the sofa. And the story poured out. He spoke in detail and in detail. He asked me not to talk about myself in order to catch up with my whole story, and that he had already read everything about me in the description.

His story was fascinating. A piece of biography from more than ten years. It turned out that in a short time you can tell so much. He spoke quickly, slowly, loudly and quietly, whispering, at times shouting, laughing. He threw his hands behind his head, folded his hands on his knees, curled up into a ball of pain on the sofa and sobbed dullly, drank water and continued the story.

When he fell silent, I asked him about the request, but he said that he hadn’t gotten to the point yet and would not be able to ask a question without details. I recalled that half of the meeting had passed.

- Yes, I understand. But the question cannot be asked without details!

Benjamin met his future wife at school. Once upon a time, in no hurry, a three-ruble mortgage, a car, a career, an only son. He lived to earn money, a mortgage for an apartment almost in the center. Mother-in-law and father-in-law in the country. Intrigue in a large office. Weekend in the country: fresh air and a hundred parts of a vegetable garden. Potatoes and other vegetables according to the season, cans of conservation, bring and take everyone to the country, help in the struggle for the harvest, eat "more vitamins" when the harvest is successful.

He always did not have enough money and time for himself. I paid off my mortgage a long time ago, repairs were made in three rubles, but the car needs to be kept in order, my wife should look smart, repairs at the dacha are in full swing with my father-in-law, who actively interferes. There was no money left for myself, old jeans and T-shirts, boots are not too leaking yet. The wife was indignant, called him a bum. He did everything to live without criticism, but for some reason he was to blame for everything. She said that only divorce would save them, but she did not file for divorce. He was silent, recalled that "a man is stronger and must endure."

Then there was a crisis, he lost his job. The reproaches became stronger, the new job was more difficult and with the boss a tyrant, less money, more reproaches at home. He was silent, recalled his mantra of patience. The pressure went off scale, he started going to doctors, taking medications for "age-related hypertension", migraines and excess weight, back pain, a doctor's "lose weight immediately, otherwise the vertebral discs will collapse." Doctors and proper nutrition have become routine. The son closed himself in his room so as not to hear the screams. From the screams he himself went into the car, there is music and loneliness.

Once he habitually endured, ate supper, not feeling the taste, But on the phrase "why does my son need such a father", something broke in him. He packed his things (jeans, shades, socks and phone charger) and left in silence.

He asked to go to a dacha, to a friend, a summer hunting lodge without heating, in March it was almost like outside. But around, the forest and silence, only birds, only the wind in the pines and a lot of sky. He changed his job to something simpler and quieter. I began to eat ready-made food from the markets and run in the morning in the forest. I began to sleep better, migraines disappeared.

Frozen at night, woke up, writhed with loneliness. I called my son, found out that his son misses him. On weekends, instead of giving a summer residence, he began to walk with his son. By the fall, he saw that his jeans were falling off him. I realized that I had lost weight, that my back no longer hurt and the pressure did not rise to two hundred more. I went to buy clothes, bought more than I planned.

Fell in love. I rented an apartment for myself, and there were more things. Learning to cook. Still running in the morning. Jealous. Scandal. It is reconciled. Divides time between love and son.

All this time I thought about what the question would be. In this litany there was a lot of pain and joy, the magic of change and many reasons to ask the therapist a question.

- You see, I used to live calmly and measuredly. Now if I see my son's tears I feel pain. And I also have tears, and when my son got twelve, I also have tears. If my ex-wife yells at me, my heart hurts and my ears ring. When I see my friend come, I feel so good at heart. And I also gave one in the ear. And this is easy for me too, although the brush sank. It is easy and joyful for me to live. And this is strange, very strange.

- And what is strange to you?

- This is my question. Why did I start to feel? Is this abnormal, is there any pathology? Why everything around me resonates in my soul, I'm not used to it, there is a lot of pain, a lot of happiness, some kind of bitterness when I went to the funeral, when my son cries, in my soul everything twists with pain, love is still like in ladies' books with ease and jealousy.

- I think that you have begun to live. Really, with feelings and events. As in that movie "At the age of forty, life is just beginning …"

His face became embarrassed and proud. "Do you think I'm forty?" But I’m fifty-one,”he said,“and that means I live! - shook my hand and left.