Channeling the Verbal Deluge
Previous Chapter: After Action Review
Sometimes I make use of private air travel, smugglers, really. Usually when I need to be somewhere commercial doesn’t reach, and everytime when I’m moving something illegal. My favorite is Jim. He and I have worked together off and on for a couple of decades, starting back when we were still in the military. I saved his life a couple of times and he always insists he owes me. Despite this, I always pay him the going rate when I need his services.
Jim’s plane is comfortable, he specialized in smuggling people. However, it doesn’t have real beds, showers or flight attendants. I often sit with him in the cockpit. I know how to fly planes, but found the burdens of ownership too onerous to bother with. He’s usually alone, and, being a chatty fellow, tends to run over at the mouth when we’re together. I don’t mind, most of his chatter is interesting. I’ve found, over the years, I can direct the flow of his conversation with an occasional question or comment.
As is usual, at some point he starts to talk about his latest girlfriend. They’ve been together a year so far. I use that as my point of divergence.
“How do you pick your girlfriends?”
“Pick them? They pick me! Women have half the money and _all_ the pussy!”
I chuckle at that, a line from “DC Cab;” though no doubt many men have had similar thoughts over the eons.
“It’s harder to get rid of one than to get a new one. I guess I’m just too nice a guy. When things don’t seem to be working out, I take more work, so I can avoid the issue. Usually what happens is we have a phone conversation when I’m away that ends poorly, then they’re gone when I get back. I mope around for a few days, then it seems they start looking for me.”
I raise my eyebrows at that, though I doubt he needs the encouragement.
“I never look for women, at least not consciously. Sometimes I’ll know the woman from before my breakup, but usually they’re completely new to me. Take my latest girlfriend: Debbie. I’m quite sure that I wasn’t looking for her. I decided to go to a movie and was standing in line behind her. All I said was ‘you have nice perfume.’ We wound up sitting together at the movie, then went to dinner afterwards and a month later she’s moved in.”
“Surely there’s more to it than that.”
“If there is, I’m not aware of it. Once I was in a grocery store and wound up talking with a woman who afterward lived with me for nearly three years. The beginning is the best time. Then they all start to resent that I’m away so much; finally they start accusing me of cheating on them. That’s when it ends.”
Hmm, “it just happens” seems rather random. Of course, Isabel and I getting together was certainly the end of a rather bizarre series of events. I guess random is as good a way to view it as any.