Time Marches On

Friday, April 15, 2022

Basically, it has been all downhill since Abraham Lincoln died. Some declare that it was the John F. Kennedy assassination, but for me, it’s Lincoln’s death that has caused me a great deal of depression and regret.  This is strange because surely I wasn’t even alive when Lincoln died, but the sentiment is still sentiment, and it’s hard to lose that feeling of disappointment.  Friends (the few I have) have commented that I’m such a sad boy, but I find enjoyment in the little things in life; for instance, I think back to my first real love, Lita.

We were briefly married, but it didn’t last long.  Primarily due to that, we didn’t share many interests besides sex.  When I married her, I was 35, and she was 16.  It caused a scandal at the time within our social world, but from my point of view, love is love, and it is no one else’s business besides ours.  But alas, in our world, we don’t maintain love alone.  When I first met her, she was employed at the May Company make-up counter, and at the time, I was very much into the new romantic look so I would shop for my make-up there.  I was going for the Charlie Chaplin’s ‘Tramp’ look.  I didn’t have a mustache, but I purchased this old suit and carried a walking stick with me.  When I walked around the make-up section, I felt like Alex from “A Clockwork Orange, ” with my cane resting on my shoulders as I peacefully paced around the area.

Lita showed me eye make-up, and when she got around the counter to my side of the world, I felt a charge when she applied the eyeliner around my eyes.   I grabbed her hand and then asked her if she would go on a date with me.  She said yes, and I swear to God, I didn’t know her age at the time.  Her ability to wear make-up made her look older than her actual age, but my history shows that this is not the case.

I have not previously been comfortable with women within my age bracket.  I’m not sure why?  I think it may have to do with the way young people look at the world.  Some are sad, and most naively so. But for me, the depression at my age is quite crippling, and this is one of the reasons I was attracted to the presence of men wearing make-up.  I wanted to disguise my aging, or at the very least, have the ability to laugh at the cruelty of the aging process.  I never even thought about it in my twenties, but once I reached thirty, it became a huge concern of mine.  Younger girls were always attracted to me, which may be due to my interest in their culture.   But who knows?  I never seriously considered ‘why’ they would be interested in me.  I was only grateful that I got the attention that I desperately needed.

When we got married in Mexico, I was concerned about what her parents would think, but it seemed that my new bride could care less what they thought, which made me happy at that specific time.  Nevertheless, time caught up with us, and we realized that perhaps the marriage was a mistake.   I remember taking her to the Egyptian theater to see Chaplin’s “Gold Rush, ” which has always been my favorite. Since childhood, when I saw this film on a morning TV show, I developed a crush on the leading lady at the time.  It never left me with that feeling, and it was after the screening I told Lita that it is perhaps best for us to obtain a divorce.

As I sit down trying to work on a book about Lincoln, I am thinking back about our marriage, which surprises me that I don’t even have a photograph of Lita or any of the possessions we or I owned.  I gave her everything, and once the papers were signed, I never saw her again.   As with the makeup, I still add a petite rouge here and there, and at night, once in bed, I think of my health, or lack of it, as time marches on.