“Okay,” he said, and left.
I returned to the living room, settled back on the couch, and turned my cell phone back on. Lordy, it looked like it had blown up. I saw there were several calls from Cindy, and a few texts as well, all to the effect of, ‘Call me, dammit!’ The calls from Frank I ignored for now.
Cindy picked up on the first ring.
“There you are! You’re lucky I knew you were going down to that awful place, or I’d be mad right now. I’m mad anyway. Kevin’s been bugging me to convince you to commit to Ohio State, now that you’re done with that foolish romance with the Blue Monster up north.”
It was interesting that she’d caught the bug. Now she couldn’t call the University of Michigan by name. The last time they’d played each other, Ohio State had handed Oklahoma their ass, so I guess that’s how they became ‘that awful place.’ Anyway, I hadn’t known Cindy had it in her.
“Not happening because they won’t commit to my guys as well as me,” I responded.
To get her back on track, I asked her how Scarlet was doing.
“The reason I had to talk with you is that there’s something you have to do for her, and that’s to comfort her.”
“What?” I asked, perplexed.
“In spite of how happy she is, she desperately needs to be reassured, and I mean reassured by you personally. She needs to know you still approve of her,” Cindy explained.
Cindy had told me I represented an authority figure in Scarlet’s life, effectively replacing her father after he let her down and tried to force her into marrying. My approval was important to her well-being.
“Call her and invite her over. When Scarlet gets there, hold her and tell her she has your approval,” Cindy explained, detailing what my role had to be.
I honestly couldn’t say I fully understood Scarlet’s needs. My world view had been shaped by women like Tami and my mom. Those two both needed love and support but were clearly different from Scarlet.
If she needed me to reassure her, I would do that. I thanked Cindy for her help and took my laundry downstairs.
◊◊◊
Because I’d missed church the last few weeks, my mom decided we were going to the Sunday evening service. Those services tended to draw a younger crowd for two reasons. The first was the music: they played Christian rock.
The second was that Reverend Byron, who had recently joined our congregation, preached at the late service. He was a couple years out of college, so he related to the younger members better than Reverend Jackson.
“I want to give you a piece of advice today, something I was given by my grandfather when I graduated from high school. You had to know my grandfather to realize that he wasn’t the person you usually took advice from. He was more the cautionary tale used to keep us in line when we were kids.
“I can still hear my mother saying, ‘Don’t do thus-and-such because you’ll turn out like your grandfather.’
“My grandfather worked in a factory. From all accounts, he was at best an average worker. The problems started when he got off work. He was a hard man, a drinker and a gambler. My mom remembers a time when she was twelve when they had to live in their car for a few weeks because he’d lost their home in a card game.
“When I was growing up, my grandfather was the crazy uncle everyone has. He would show up at family events half in the bag and become abusive. I was half afraid of the man until I got older and realized he was deeply troubled.
“So, you can imagine that when he showed up at my graduation party, I was more than a little nervous when he said he wanted to talk to me. To be honest, he was probably half drunk because he had a strong smell of cigarettes, whiskey, and body odor.
“Funny how you remember the oddest things,” Reverend Byron said and then paused.
He stared off into space as if he were remembering that day. Then he smiled and looked at us as if he were self-conscious for being caught doing something wrong.
“He took me aside and told me this: ‘
He suddenly had an intense look, and his voice raised to make his point.
“At the time, I had no idea what a profound impact that would have on my life. I chalked it up to the ravings of my ‘crazy’ grandfather. Then I had someone break a promise they’d made to me. I’ll just say it was a pretty horrible feeling.
“It made me reflect on all the promises I’d made to myself and had broken. I promised to be better with my money and promptly blew it on a new phone I decided I had to have. I promised I would spend more time with my friends and family, but found other things to do. When we don’t live up to our personal commitments, we are only hurting ourselves.
“So, instead of making a lot of promises, I decided to follow my grandfather’s advice and just make one and stick to it. It needs to be something that means the world to you, something that makes you, you. Find that something in your life that would make you a better version of yourself, or happy, or content.
