Bokelskere.no

I am average in love. I say things like "I love you" and "I need you I really do." I say them too quickly, like an asshole.

"You're not Czechoslovakian, I hope," he would say, always the same joke, and point to the sign on the cash register which said, SORRY, NO CHECKS.

Basically, I realized, I was living in that awful stage of life from the age of twenty-six to thirty-seven known as stupidity.

"Yes," he said, realizing that faced with the large questions of life and not finding large answers, one must settle for makeshift, little answers, just as on any given day a person must at least eat someting, even if it was not marvelous and huge.

But what does one say to a dentist?

“Eye-yi-yi”

“That’s teeth for you.”

“Yes,” I say, “it certainly is.”

“Come in on Tuesday, and I’ll remove your stiches.”

“That sounds interesting.”

“Yes. Well. See you then.”

“Right,” I say. This is like every divorce. You get tears in your eyes and think, “God, all that oral sex and now we’re talking to each other like bureaucrats.”

“You come off it,” I say. This is the old children’s strategy of retort. I’ve learned it from Georgianne or rembembered it or maybe simply saved and practiced it.” You’re being so, well…bourgeois.”

This is the word that intelligent, twentieth-century adults use when they want to criticize each other. It is the thinking man’s insult. It is the wrong word. Don’t let your mouth write a check that your ass can’t cash, Darrel said once, and this time I truly have. Darrel’s been storing up for it and leaps on it like a wild man. “Bourgeois!?” He’s pacing quick and hard, left to right. “You!” he shouts, freezes, points at me.”