Marcia and Love

Now, then.

You have heard of two of the most embarrassing moments.

Of my life.

Perhaps some of you might refer to them as...poignant. All that I know, is that it wasn't terribly easy to be there. To live through them.

I could wend our way to a year previous to our last installment, upon the occasion of another episode at Marcia's parent's house. This one being the combined graduation party for the siblings, high school for Greg, junior college for Marcia.

I suppose that the most dramatic happening of the evening was the jeans and red t-shirt that Marcia was wearing. They were more than a bit snug...and Marcia had a dynamic figure. Think Vanna White...or for you younger types, Scarlett Johannsen. Trust me, every guy there noticed. She looked spectacular. Inevitably, she spent most of the evening hand in hand with her boyfriend, Scott, and it wasn't exactly the first time that I had seen her in a tight t-shirt and jeans.

Of course, that occasion had been a few years previously, and had to be the summer after Marcia graduated from high school herself. In this case, I suspect that it was a bright yellow t-shirt. No particular reason to think so, just...it fits.

Anyway, I was out cruising one night with Marcia's brother. Doesn't that sound silly, almost twenty-five years later? But well into the night, Greg and I ran into Marcia and a couple of her friends at the Mall. The three girls were standing beside their car, watching the cars pass. This was quite the collection of attractive young women, I tell you.

Greg was more than happy to stop and talk with the girls. Two of them weren't his sister, after all. So I pulled over, and casually wandered over to the trio. By the time I arrived, of course, Greg was doing his level best to distract the other two girls. Completely unintentionally, of course, he's just a natural clown, and I'm quite sure that they regarded him fondly.

Not that he didn't have hopes.

I settled next to Marcia, who was regarding her brother with a bit of fond exasperation, and quietly started a conversation with her. Just what I wanted--an opportunity to talk with Marcia. This was before she met her eventual fiancé, of course.

Yet we hadn't more than started chatting, when a car pulled up in front of us. Annoyed at the interruption, I glanced over to see a guy in an older convertible, a fedora cocked jauntily on his head. He quite obviously was trying to attract the attention of the three good looking girls, but I certainly wasn't impressed. I'm afraid I'd have to admit that a rather derogatory term came to mind.

And it wasn't 'poser'.

After a moment, feeling that I had given him the benefit of the doubt, I quite deliberately turned back to Marcia and friends, expecting that she would be ready to resume our rudely interrupted conversation. I opened my mouth to say something, anything so that the guy would get the hint that he could move along...and froze in shock.

For Marcia most certainly wasn't looking at me.

Indeed, she was gazing quite raptly at the sleazeba--- er, gentleman in the convertible. And there were other signs that he had managed to capture Marcia's complete attention. Let's just say that it was blatantly obvious that somehow he had managed to stimulate her...imagination. 'Flushed' would have been a good starting point. With that tight yellow t-shirt, her reaction...stood out clearly.

Hey, I told you that she was beautiful.

I meant it.

Nonplused and disgusted at my poor showing, I collected Greg and moved along. Yet I always have to remember that Marcia indeed had a vivid imagination. Romance and passion. For a deeply committed Christian, she wasn't a naive, straight-laced sweet thing.

Er, just sweet.

Hmm. I suppose that I could have told you that this section...exists somewhere outside of the pure fairy tale.

And that imagination, especially in combination with her faith, was a large part of what I liked about her.

I had it thrown in my face a few years later, well after I had last seen her, when a supposed friend dragged another acquaintance a couple of hundred miles just to drop a bomb on me regarding Marcia.

That this other acquaintance had slept with her years before, when she was very young.

He was clearly disappointed in my calm acceptance, however.

I knew very well that everyone is human.

I had long since suspected a far deeper passion in this woman...I wouldn't have been so long attracted to her otherwise.

Is there a good way to say that? Passionless...just doesn't appeal to me.

And I belatedly remembered...the rest of the story.

You see, the very first fall after I first met Marcia, she went away to school. You'd think that this would cause some difficulty for a guy who thought that he had found the perfect girl...and you'd be right. But eventually I would hear the reason for her absence, and one day make a connection that I wasn't capable of one night in the wee hours of the morning.

After all, the reason that Marcia spent her sophomore year in Florida was because she was fighting with her parents, and sneaking out at night.

Just as she would one day comment of her brother.

Is it such a reach to recognize that perhaps the other parallels were in place as well? Just because she came back from Florida temperate and well behaved certainly didn't mean that Marcia was suddenly a different person. That's not the way that God makes us.

I remember her return, as it was eagerly awaited amongst the youth group. Marcia had spent a year in the exotic locale of Florida, after all. That summer the youth choir made another trip, and my class, a year removed from graduation, was invited along. Mainly because of a shortage of male voices, I'm sure.

But I remember seeing Marcia again, and it was impossible to penetrate the wall of excited girls around her. Especially when it became evident that Marcia already knew how to water ski. And so it was to be another summer of lost opportunities.

And a year after that summer of cruising, Marcia would return from college with a boyfriend. Who would then become a fiancé, who would eventually become a husband.

Opportunity lost.

And I saw more of the two of them--in the process seeing more of Marcia.

I worked that summer for the City Parks Department, which was headquartered adjacent to the community college. Yes, we're still going backwards here, folks.

In the process of my duties, oftimes I would come across Marcia and her boyfriend adorning one picnic table or another. No, not making out, just touching, holding one another. Studiously and closely entwined.

I saw her for the warm and intimate, sensuous, loving and romantic woman that she was.

And that...hurt.

To know that I had missed it.

That was only one more part of Marcia's life that I looked in on, but it wasn't the only one that fit.

Would have fit.

With me.

As if I hadn't missed it from that very first moment.