I was engaged to Dan for over 2 years. (The longest I have ever been engaged before getting married. Sometimes I think I have more engagement rings than Elizabeth Taylor.)
Anyway. I met Dan while I was going to school at Lehigh. His girlfriend Kristy was in my sociology lecture. She was a big blonde girl. Our soc lecture was from 6 til 8 p.m. and Dan used to wait outside for her and then take her to dinner.
He was always dressed in a nice suit and had wonderful hair and these beautiful dark eyes. He wore great shoes.
I used to see him waiting for Kristy and always thought he was so handsome.
I never had an idea of, "Oh, I'm so going to steal him from Kristy!" He was someone else's boyfriend. Never crossed my mind. I'm not like that.
Then I went to a party. Dan and Kristy were there but Kristy was very busy chatting up her girlfriends and Dan was just sort of standing there. He didn't know any of these college people. He was standing strategically close to the keg (Note to self: What was your first clue, dumbass?)
I passed him a couple times while on a trek to the fridge to get more wine and said hello to him. Okay, I was flirting but it was harmless. He was someone else's boyfriend.
He was very shy and quiet. Not much for chit chatting.
At one point, he looked at Kristy and at that chosen moment, she started to give him these very dark looks. Dan, who had been very reserved until that point, said to me, "I broke up with her tonight but she really wanted to come to this party and didn't want to show up alone."
Not being one to let a sleeping dog lie peacefully, I asked him, "Why'd you dump her?"
And Dan said to me, "Cause I kept thinking of your beautiful eyes."
Do you think I melted right there, on the spot?
We went to New Hope the next day and had lunch at a Cuban place, Havana's, right down the canal where from where Jessica Savich drowned. ( Note: I was a death hag even then.)
Dan was an FBI agent and had a very nifty Porsche. He let me drive. He was charming and handsome and I really wasn't alarmed that he was sitting in the passenger seat of his own car, swilling Keystone Beer. Not at that point, at least.
We spent all of our free time together. I was going to school at Lehigh and working for Computer Resources. I had a heavy classload and I was a very serious student. My job was a blow off, I was a receptionist at that time. I didn't have a tv at that time but I didn't need one because Dan was such a great conversationalist and read all the papers and knew all the current affairs. Note: This was not alarming to me at that point although it should have been. He was a terrible destructive drunk and I didn't even see it although I had lived it with my father. I was totally in love with the guy.
We both liked to eat out and liked to cook dinner at home together and go for a a drive, ride around. I had a very cool 1984 BMW 318i then and he had a Porsche 911 (yes a cheap Porsche but I loved it nonetheless.) We were both movie buffs and voracious readers.
It was never about sex. We were together and indeed, slept in the same bed together many times over 4 months before we did anything intimate. This was not an alarm to me, either.
Dan was Jewish. I was a nice Italian girl who used to be a staunch Catholic until my mother converted us to Episcopalian when I was 10.
His mother hated me. Called my goyim (a non-Jewish woman who is a slut, basically). She was the director of admissions for Northhampton County Community College and she also was a total nutcase with agraphobia.
She was terrified of going out of her house but she did make it to campus every day after downing several Valiums.
While I fell in love with Dan, it took me a while to realize he was a total alchoholic. I had my own susbstance abuse issues at that time.
Dan got a DUI leaving my house one night. He was a federal agent and he tested way over the limit. He first called me from the Lehigh County Jail. I went to get him and was told he had been transferred. To Fogelsville. Yep, he got transferred to the middle of the state just because he was FBI and drunk and the locals found this fun.
He got his second DUI while waiting to go to trial for his first. He got reassigned at the Buerau to tracking the savings and loan scandal that was happening.
He then got a third DUI and was suspeneded without pay.
Being suspended from work with no pay, he sublet his beautiful town house in Philadelphia and came to live with me and my roommate Kathy. (Kathy and Dan did NOT get along.)
His Porsche was parked in our driveway. I drove it often and loved every minute. I one time took it to Michigan, without Dan knowing about it. The place I lived was up on a hill and viewable from the turnpike down below. Dan's brother saw my BMW in the drive and the Porsche gone and called to ask Dan, "Did the Goyim steal your Porsche?" And indeed I had, since he didn't know I had taken it.
Back in the olden days, when this was the only option , Dan had a big bag carphone. He called me on it. I let it ring several times. I finally picked it up and he asked if I had taken his car. I hung up without answering. After this happened about 6 times, he was just Dan. Said, you could've taken my car anytime, someone should drive it. He at that point, got around Orefield on his bike when he went somewhere when I was at work. He made wonderful dinners every night and rearranged my closet for me.
His drinking drove up apart. I went to Al-Anon with him. We went to therapy. It took a long time for our relationship to die. It even continued when I moved back to Michigan. I loved the guy. We talked about our grandkids.
Once he was able to move back into his own place, he was very sporadic in calling me. This was scary. There was no more talk of marriage, he was always incholehrently drunk. We had talked marriage all the time before. He had clearly been drinking since he got up that morning.
In the meantime, I was devestated. My mom convinced me that a change of locale would be good for me and I started making plans to move back to Michigan.
He dumped me then. His excuse? He loved me too much too hurt me like this. A wise decision in retrospect but awfully damn painful then. Yet we continued to talk on the phone and I went back to PA to visit him and he came to Michigan to visit me. We met in Cleveland a couple times for long week-ends. It was as if neither one of us could let it go.
It finally died on its own. This was a real heartbreak to me.
Note: Dan got married to a girl named Terri who kicked his ass on thier wedding night. He had strippers' signatures on his ass.
He is now divorced from Terri.
I'm pretty sure Dan is dead now. Have good sources.
Sad.
Aaaaah...I was once a goyim too. I rather wore the moniker as a badge of honor (smirk), but those were younger, more foolish days.
I may not comment often, but I have really been enjoying your blog. I subscribed to the RSS feed via Bloglines.
Keep up the good work. We Michiganders, whether native like you, or a transplant like me, gotta stick together. :)
Posted by: Lisa | December 26, 2004 at 09:36 PM
Great entry - so sad. I go to Havana's all the time - love to sit outside in the summer and people watch. I got to your Blog thru Misfitting - another great blog!
Happy New Year!
Posted by: Mary | December 29, 2004 at 10:20 AM
Hey! I always thought that a non-Jewish woman (aka slut) was called a "Shicksa." I could be way wrong!
Oh, and that's actually, "non-Jewish woman who is after my son!" LOL!
Sounds like you got a break from the Love Gods on that one! At least, you're alive to be devastated!
Posted by: vero | December 30, 2004 at 09:29 PM