References

Nov 08, 99 | 2:51 am

Lena made a comment to me last year. About how all of my dates should come with references. Screw references, I said. They ought to include owners' manuals. But I knew what she meant.

When there are references, there's a whole lot of bad behavior avoided. You know that this boy, this man, will treat you with a certain amount of dignity the next time you run into him, because you grew up in each others' company, your mothers sit on committees together, and he's probably going to date most of your friends, if he hasn't already. You know his family, his friends, where he works.

It isn't a guarantee. It's more of an understanding. You play by the rules. And maybe we'll do it again, and maybe we won't. But there will always be the possibility because neither one of us screwed it up with any unseemly gossip or scenes.

I had forgotten about this whole concept of references.

The one problem with knowing everything about everyone, though, is that they, in turn, know everything about you. So let's say that Teddy Bax and I have too much to drink one night and end up tearing off each other's clothes on the fairway behind his club. The upside, besides the sex, is that I know he's not going to beat me up, or break my heart, or be nasty to me in the morning.

The downside is that everyone saw us leave together, or noticed that our cars were the only ones left in the valet park at the end of the night. I will come home to no less than four messages on my telephone answering machine. There are no secrets here. The one piece of advice my friend Chris gave me, upon hearing of my return to the island was, "Don't sleep with anyone." And it's a little bit worse for me, because I had a reputation as being completely without limits when we were growing up.

So I've been a Nice Girl. I went out on nice safe dates with my friends' brothers as escorts. I smiled sweetly and made witty conversation. I did not have sex with anyone. I did not wear my pink cowboy boots with Levi's sporting a huge rip in the ass. I sat with my legs crossed at the ankle and did not raise my voice. I can't help my personality, so some evilness slipped through the cracks, but I mainly confined my acting out to a torrid fling in Vegas and this web page.

I needn't have worried about the torrid Vegas fling. As a part of my life, he was roundly disregarded by my group of friends. Is this a natural tendency of all humans? To pretend that what they can't see doesn't exist?

I no longer thought of myself as available. I had removed myself from the fray. But Teddy still called, and my friends rang with names of potential escorts for dinner at Bice. They knew about him, of course, but because he wasn't here, he didn't exist. They can't conceive of anything outside of their immediate orbit. That sort of narrow-mindedness strikes me as the most extreme form of snobbery I encounter down here.

I also felt, having survived the stroke and open heart surgery, that I had been given this gift, my life, and that I should somehow be grateful for the fact that I survived. That I should not rock the boat or take up too much psychic space on the planet. That I should behave myself. I spent a lot of my time apologizing.

Even going back to Robin, he of teaching me bad behavior, had turned into something nice and sweet. First love. A happy ending. A small wedding in my parents' backyard. Moving back to our hometown and starting a family. When did Robin become the safe option?

But you know what? I'm fucking bored. I am really fucking bored. What the hell do nice girls do for fun, anyway? I haven't figured it out, yet.

I'm not very good at being good.