Best friends.
This change began in the three years after our separation, the beginning of his hatred of her, a clash of personalities which increased every year as his character developed and solidified. He was like me, loved my company and attention. I spent every weekend with him and his friends at our cottage in Rincon, no matter how busy with work in S.J. spending every hour together playing outside by day or watching movies after dark, as we bonded all the more.
Even though real sex and intimacy had been near dead between Sanita and me for a long while, the wealth of vivid experiences we shared over those seven years contributed to the strange kindness we kept up in our relations the following three years. We shared Willy with perfect compliancy. We never argued. She had me over for Sunday dinner, regularly, when I returned Will to her, lasting till about nine p.m. so I could head straight home to bed, to facilitate my early schedule the next morning and head off around five a.m. to S.J. for another busy work week. We enjoyed those dinners together with much talk, each other’s news, my latest stores and developments in San Juan, and all the latest gossip she heard in Rincon.
Whenever any of my relatives visited, (which happened several times a year) she spent days finding them the best accommodations and then daily administered to all their needs, the perfect hostess. This is not what a typical divorcee does. But in the months and first few years after our divorce there was no bitterness. It was so strange, even my friends and her’s, like Laura and Joe and Cindy, told me how odd it was. I remember Laura telling me once: “You two get along so well. Why aren’t you still married”? I couldn’t answer that question. It was all in her mind and hidden from everyone.
I admit I can’t fathom the major differences between a man and a woman’s brain, and never found a book or a person who could come close to explaining it, or the complexities of marriage. Now on to the next philosophic conundrum and a new jungle of perplexities: life after marriage with a child.
Sanita moved to the other side of Rincon, about five miles away (as I said) and for the next three years lived there in a state of limbo, rid of me as a husband but not knowing her next move. It was a comfortable home, two bedroom, and I bought Will his first good computer there, (along with a Sega Genesis) a Hewlett Packard with a color monitor.
The Hewlett-Packard on his desk.
It cost 2,600 dollars, a good deal of money in 1994 but was well worth it, as he developed a life-long love of computers, an infatuation even. Over time this turned into a talent and command using them, his skills stronger each year with all the focus he poured into them, which in return gave him a sense of pride and accomplishment. This was the golden age of gaming. Doom, Tomb Raider, Warcraft, The Incredible Machine, Load Runner, Flying Carpet, were all coming out, fascinating him and starting him off on this life-long love. I played some games with him as often as I could. I remember especially ‘The Incredible Machine’, a puzzle solving match, at which, by the age of seven, he was about as good as me. And ‘Load Runner’ which we played as a team, simultaneously, on different sides of the keyboard, fighting a common enemy, learning to work in tandem.
His mother never shared this interest with him, which only drew him closer to me. He recognized we had the same interests, almost the same mind at work. One thing she disapproved of was violence in games. But I had no problem with that. When I bought him ‘Mortal Combat’ and we first played it together on her T.V., she said it was too violent and demanded I remove it from her pure household. I snuck the disk into an acceptable case, ‘Ren and Stimpy’ a cartoon game, and every time she went grocery shopping, or left him there on some errand, he’d pull it out and play it. She never caught this switch in the three years they lived there. She was incurious to a fault in his own interests, would hardly glance at his game playing, and always with no comment, or the other one, disapproval. This only alienated him more towards her as he matured. At my house, every game we played, every movie we watched, every hike we took we enjoyed with equal enthusiasm and pleasure, Ben and Jeff and Vanessa eagerly joining us every weekend to share in this ecstasy.
One quality I’ve taken great pleasure in, is my ability to enter into the mind-set of a seven year old and talk and play with them as an equal. I slid with equal delight down the grassy hillside on pieces of cardboard. It never demeaned my self-image as an adult and I didn’t care in the least what other adults thought of me doing this. A few in fact, like Laura and Joe, told me they envied me this talent, as I’d play with their eight year old Sammy, part of our group and he’d tell them of our adventures together when he got home. Besides the pure joy I shared, the children actually respected me more and obeyed any slight request I made because they liked me so much.
Best friends too.
Sanita, with her stern indifference to Will in all matters except eating, hygiene, dress and school grades (though she never helped him with his homework), slowly lost his love and respect for her. I could see this happening even before she left the island with Mark, in the short hours I spent at her house each weekend, picking him up or dropping him off.
She had only two tones when addressing him. It was either a censure or a command. She hugged him less than she did me in our last years together. She seemed happy to see him off with a quick wave Saturday morning and when we returned Sunday eve her first words to him were: “wash your hands and get ready for dinner”. Then she’d turn to me and with a much more pleasant tone of voice make light talk, not about Will, and he noticed this disinterest from seven through the age of nine. I’m sure it grew even worse after that. But I wasn’t there to see it.
I could see their relationship going downhill and my need to step in, for his mental well-being. And I knew it was another hole in her heart, created since her own sad childhood, mostly loveless, neglected and probably abused.
She had some blockage, an inability to share unconditional love, just as she had with me, or anyone in her life, because unconditional love means you share everything in your heart and on your mind, good and bad, no secrets, and she could never do that. She treated him like her parents treated her. A child was a duty, something to be fed, disciplined and trained. I never saw her read him a bedtime story. I saw her tuck him in, turn out the light and close the door, a cold upbringing. So I gave him all the love and attention I could, every hour of our weekends together, to repair this deficit. He and his friends were my only focus.
In these early days at my cottage, playing with Ben and Jeff, sometimes Sammy and then a new arrival, Vanessa, from Spain joining us, we had pure, happy, innocent, fun exploring the hills. We made up a game called ‘find Charlie’. Charlie was the dozen or so cows scattered in the fields below my house along with a few bulls, who would chase us if provoked enough, which we did. The game involved each of us finding a stick, our guns, then sneaking close enough to tap a cow on the butt. That was a kill. The most kills made the winner. A few times we all had to scramble up trees to barely escape the bulls chasing us, only a few feet behind, as Ben was brave, (or stupid) enough to even poke them, as they counted three points, so he often won. Cow patties were land mines, which we had to avoid. If you stepped in one you lost two points. Jeff and his shoes were frequently unlucky in this rule.
It was the Vietnam war, re-created in Rincon. There was no one around to watch our folly, so we indulged in it freely, with shouts and laughter. Then we walked to town for an ice cream, then to the video store nearby, for the latest kid’s movie and a bag of popcorn. Then to my house to watch it, the kids all squeezed together on our two-seat couch. I remember ‘Jumanji’, ‘Toy Story’ and ‘Jurassic Park’ were our favorites and the perfect end to a long, sunny day of pure joy, the bliss of childhood fully indulged.
After the Hike.
After a long hike through the hills that morning, they took the couch upstairs at the Calypso while I enjoyed a beer downstairs. They were so tired they fell asleep on the living room couch, mid-afternoon. Look where Will’s hands are, and Vanessa’s, a premonition of things to come, yet perfect innocents here.
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