Louis Monza: Corn Eaters Reunion (1940s)

"Life would be tragic if it weren't so goddamned beautiful sometimes!"

She insisted that she would not attend, that the experience would prove too painful to bear. She had helped organize the last reunion. She had participated but with a role to play, a role she could hide behind. She had been charged with taking pictures, and she'd successfully hidden behind her camera so she could witness without engaging. She felt too vulnerable and exposed this time, so she wouldn't go.

Then she told the most remarkable story. She confessed to having a childhood crush on a classmate. She was convinced that they would grow up to be together, that they were destined to belong together. She never confessed her attraction to him then because she feared that her circumstances would tarnish his experience. You see, she was a battered child. Her dad routinely beat her with a belt for one or another, primarily imagined infractions. Her mom knew and wouldn't intervene. She was forced to attend church, a congregation her paramour also belonged to, so she would see him on weekends, too. One evening, after a beating, she ran away down the broad creekbed behind her neighborhood to that church. She remembered the pastor being a good man who made her feel safe. She found a sanctuary there, her hair sticking to the sides of her face from rain and tears.

The pastor called the cops, of course, and a hard man drove her home. He went inside and spoke with her dad before returning to escort her back inside, confiding to her as they walked up the front sidewalk, "He promised never to do that again." It had been a false promise. Her paramour never knew, never suspected. He grew up, moved away, and got married. She saw him at reunions. At one, he confessed to her that he had thought that they would grow up to get married and live together happily ever after. She told me she'd just cast her eyes downward at this news and said nothing in return. She knew, but he wouldn't.

I went to the reunion with permission to remember her to him, to report that she couldn't face the crowd but that she might welcome a chat. He gave me his contact information, which I passed on to her. Later, she sent me a text reporting that he'd called and that she'd even agreed to meet him at the bandstand in the park. She confessed this time, and he repeated his earlier insistence. He's happily married and not yet retired. She will always suffer from the effects of her childhood beatings. She has struggled to make sense of her non-sensical world, but that conversation, almost stolen from the reunion weekend, switched something. Love, even unrequited, serves as a great leveler. It boosts self-esteem to come to know that somebody loved you and that you loved them in return, even if unrequited, even if secret. They were apparently united in spirit back in prepubescent childhood in ways that not even more than half a century could rend asunder.

The rest of us gathered at the brewpub to recount olden days, then assembled the following evening for a more formal supper before a few remaining enjoyed a picnic lunch in one of the more obscure city parks the next afternoon. We made connections, retold stories, and experienced a few revelations. One couple reported how they'd reconnected at a prior reunion, between marriages, fell in love, and married each other to live happily ever after. Others had wed right out of high school or college and remained together. I had no idea how many were accompanying second or, like me, third spouses. If all's not fair in life and love, it tends to improve in retrospect. I suspect nobody had a better Reunion than her and her long-lost friend. They shared their unspeakable and sealed some deal that can never be undone. This life would be tragic if it weren't so goddamned beautiful sometimes!

©2024 by David A. Schmaltz - all rights reserved

Tags: #Grace, #PureSchmaltz