Dec. 30, 1982
Maybe cutting his finger on Thanksgiving had nothing to do with the
news that Ginger is getting married – to someone other than Jimmy.
But it took Jimmy a long time to come out and tell us.
He said that it didn’t affect him at all.
“It’s only Ginger getting married,” he said. “It had to happen sooner
or later.”
He said she told him over the phone on Thanksgiving, an apparent slip
of the tongue that required her to come north to explain.
Happiness has a way of bubbling out and not likely meant to cause hurt.
Jimmy, however, IS very hurt.
Something is being taken out of his life, if not love, then someone he
considers hugely important.
And he can’t quite bring himself to like this “new” fellow of Ginger’s.
He tells me he thinks the man is beneath her.
But Jimmy has made a goddess of Ginger and that’s the problem.
No one ever be good enough for her – not even Jimmy.
Jimmy said Ginger claims this “new” fellow is a lot like Jimmy –
something Jimmy clearly didn’t want to hear.
I keep recalling the tale Jimmy repeatedly told about how he stole Ginger
from the clutching grasp of Ralph.
He says he remembers the exact day and time and the things they did
together.
He also remembers the failed attempt to live together and the sense of
failure he felt when she said she had to leave.
She’s all grown up now, hardly the 17-year-old Jimmy first swept up,
and in growing up, Ginger has developed her own philosophy of life. She lives
in the real material world while Jimmy seeks some existence less physical.
“It had to happen,” Jimmy told me, the pain in his eyes so obvious I
almost have to cry just looking at him, but a controlled pain, and that, too,
is part of the problem.
Maybe if he had begged her to stay one of those previous times. Maybe if
he had cried like a normal human being might in the same situation.
But his pride seems to make him resist showing the kind of emotions the
rest of us would show.
He keeps the worst for himself, giving everybody else his wit.
Now, the year ends on this long, sad note.
The song which ten years ago had been one of joy is joy again, but not
for Jimmy.
Now, he is alone again.
Now that special hope which had been in the back of his head all along
is shattered, and he sits on a mountain, a nowhere man with no blue meanies to
blame, not unless these meanies are the ambiguous feelings which he has felt
since his first meeting Ginger back in 1970.
He doesn’t have anyone else to whom he can turn, upon whose shoulder he
can cry, or anyone he can cast hate at, or even a place where he can hide.
There is only the sad call of age and the empty years ahead.
Ginger has grown up, and grown away from him, and part his ability to
mature is to learn how to accept the fact of it.
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