He was nothing special, one of those people who you see and immediately forget. He was not eminent with anything. He had ordinary looks, not ugly but so ordinary that he seemed ugly. He was common and ordinary and simple. He had simple rules learned from his grandparents from the countryside and he followed them blindly. In fact they worked, but only for people like him. He was from the countryside too. He was trying to settle in the big city and to become a citizen of the capital. He wanted to marry in the capital to a nice woman and to have good family, as the old grandparents taught him.
We worked in the same department as me and from time to time we drank beer together after work. The first time he invited me as a gentleman then as a gentleman he started to show indifference towards me, trying to manipulate me and to evoke in me the feelings: “O, why doesn’t he like me anymore? Am I not good? Am I not beautiful?” But those are thoughts of a simple girl and I wasn’t so stupid that time. Life has learned me that already. He started to try to impose upon me. I liked one café where we spent our lunch breaks and drank coffee and after several times he said he didn’t want to go there. He started to whimsical. He didn`t want to go there, to sit here, to eat somewhere. He started to play old tricks. I asked him once out, to go to a lunch break and he said: “No. I will go out and have one sandwich. I don’t want to go out.” I never called him again after that. The manipulation he was trying to apply on me only cheered me up and I was entertained. Entertained in that way that I started to tease him to tell him how rich am I in order he to think that he had come across to a diamond and a very good victim. I did it slightly and he never knew. He thought he was playing the game but the game was played by me. I spoke I had some possessions, cars, apartments, real estates, I told him about vacations abroad and he get the hook. After that I felt regret but he deserved it. And I believe that everyone must get what he deserves. And I don`t say it. Don’t you remember the parable about the Judgment Day.
Often on our beer meetings I was speaking and he was listening. He was not secret, he just was simple and hadn’t much to say.
“What happened today in your office?” - he was sounding.
“Hm. Nothing special, just ordinary things.”
“How was your colleague Angy today?”
“She was fine. Demonic as always.”
“What do you think about Patrick?”
Patrick was the chief of the other department.
“He is a clever man, I like him.”
He smiled.
I knew what simple thought is rounding in his mind, but for a pity that was all his ability.
For him I was strange though he never said that to me. With his simple mind and simple rules he couldn’t understand my vigor, wish to entertain, necessity to smile every time 1000 times. He didn’t understand even the passion with which I spoke for everything. We were too different.
He was already 31 years old and it was (as simple men think) time to create your own nest – family and to continue to live the ordinary life but with a partner. He thought that it is time for him to marry. And he was looking around. I was one of his victims. I had to be pleased.
He was so ordinary, so simple. Of great importance of him were the social and living kitchen-sink standards and everything besides this was strange and unneeded. For happiness or not he guessed the right philosophy for living in order to suffer in minimal amounts and to lead and in future painless life. Maybe his grandparents are not so stupid or they just copy what was said to them from their grandparents, got from the wisdom of the generations and from the past, from where all truths emerge. Old philosophy, which saves you, but is not so interesting and entertaining. We must learn and entertain ourselves in this world not to save ourselves doing the most ordinary and the very simple. We must try to learn to fly.
So this man was given that simple philosophy God knows from where, he had simple looks, simple mind, simple life and he was looking for a woman to marry if it could be a pretty one. But she can be and slightly ugly – the philosophy accepted this even recommended it. He was looking for a simple woman like him, but he didn’t know it. I was a target but I was not so good according to the philosophy. I don’t believe he had ever fall in love with anyone. But maybe here I may be wrong.
“What is doing Martha?"
Martha was one of my colleagues.
“Nothing, I don’t know.”
“Does she have a boyfriend?”
“Yes, I think she has. Do you like her?”
“No, just asking.”
This man will not contribute to the world with nothing as hundred others. But he didn’t care or didn’t realize it. He just wanted to marry, because it is time. Men often show off with their wish of freedom and independence, with their fear of relationships and marriage. But this is one delusion. Most of them are afraid, more afraid than women. They fear from loneliness and they try to guarantee themselves. It is often met, man around 30s to look for a woman to marry and he wants this on any price and after that (after approximately 4 years) he realizes that he was wrong. Man can not marry because it is necessary and it is time. Man must marry when he is ready for this. No because "it is time", or because "the time came".
“What happened with Cloud and Diana? Did they come back from Vienna?”
“Not yet. They come tomorrow.”
“Is there some news about the deal with the selling of the company? Have you heard something? Have you heard something for the new owners?”
“No. I receive just the e- mails they send to all of us with the information about the process.”
“What is doing Renate?"
“I don’t know. I don’t like her. I m not interested in her.”
On our meetings for a mug of beer after work I often retold him stories from my life which was full of adventures. He was listening and often secretly sniggered at me because he thought he was more clever then me. He only was questioning for ordinary things not telling anything about his life and was sounding around to get information. And as I was talkative I was interesting and useful to him. One day as I was his target for marring or whatever he thought he asked me again sounding around how many relationships I have had.
“One long and several short” – was my answer – “But I have many relationships with boys which for one or other reason didn’t develop in real intimate relationship and they stayed on the level of friendship. I fall often strongly in love and my feelings are deep. And I even liked one boy 3 years!"
He was pragmatic and asked: “Were you a couple?”
“No. It didn’t happen.”
“How can you be in love with a man 3 years not having anything with him?"
“I had.” – I told him – "I had friendship.”
In that moment I realized that the strange is not me but he – the ordinary. And this question for the very same time proved how simple he is and how simple he thinks and how simple life lies in front of him full of emptiness. This question maybe proves that he never felt the feeling of love. He never tasted the bitter taste of unshared love, the pain of not being the one and the secret hope that one day you will be. He never dreamed for a beloved person. He was an empty man. He was pragmatic, so simple and clear.
Till now I can’t believe that this happened and that there is such a man in the world. I often ask myself remaining this dialogue: “Who is the more strange?”
“What are you going to do in the weekend?” – he asked
“I don’t know yet.”
“We can go to a walk in the park.”
“Yes, why not.”
But we never went.
