My current state of rage is, by some measures, not even legitimate.

After all, the last serious thing that was said on the subject (or any other subject) was by me, and I said, quote:

“You’re off the hook”.

That was two months ago.

And in some sense, birthdays are just birthdays …

… and a card, or even just a public declaration via SMS and a few emojis, are sufficient, technically, for that occasion, these days. I have done no more or less myself, for anyone but a wife, for many long years.

Well, except for that time two months ago.

And my generous gift of gas and time upon that event was also acknowledged sufficiently.

So my fury of today is, technically, ridiculous.

At least until zooming out over a span of six decades, or even just one.

The case can be made that way, with all due credible sincerity.

And none of that makes me one fucking bit less pissed off.

***

The woman you charge with characterological and habitual wickedness did not stint or wheedle thus.

She, rather, did exactly what I asked you to do.

She listened, in the dawn of this new day and way, with actual and habitual care, to the expressed truth of my desires. She made promises about fulfilling them even though that was more than was required of her, and she delivered on those promises. Abundantly.

She did not recline herself on technical arguments about what was legit or not quite.

She did not toss me infuriating advice about what I was supposed to spend my pitiful trickle of assets on, in order to make her feel better.

Maybe you can notice the difference and maybe you can’t, or never will.

But either way, semantics and rhetoric aside, I got to go to the exact place that made me inclined to actually celebrate, and I did so at a part of the month when I had not two nickels of my own to rub together, nor even so much as three two-dollar bills in my old and well-worn wallet.

So on this day of recovery from that long and unexpectedly arduous and expensive trip, I’m thinking, about which side of my bread is getting the butter, going forward.

Just like you taught me to, in all the ways spoken and unspoken, all those many years ago when that reservoir was first filling up with water, and the water, of life, was turning to poison.

Love me?

I know you do, in your broken and toxic kinds of ways.

The same way I’m loving you back, right now, and for real …

as I struggle to find a better way, to love, and to be a real man at long last.