I Married a Moron

“Yes, yes, I’m fine.” I said weakly.

“Thank God,” she replied and sat back in her seat, “I don’t know the Heimlich maneuver.”

“I’ll teach it to you sometime.”

“Great! How about now? I’ve always wanted to know how to save a life! Should I stand up to do it?” She asked gleefully.

“How about doing it later… we don’t want everyone in the restaurant to think that you’re choking.”  

“Okay, Doc, but don’t forget your offer… so anyway, getting back to the conversation, why is Rand McNally your favorite author? I thought he just made maps?”

I knew she was confused… I just had no idea the degree of confusion. “I didn’t say Rand McNally was my favorite author… I said Ayn Rand was.”

“Oh! That’s right! You did say that. I guess I just heard Rand and I ran with it!” She started laughing hysterically and then asked, “I’ve never heard of her… what did she write?”

The thought of the woman sitting across from me never hearing of Ayn Rand (one of the greatest writers of the Twentieth Century), was a shocker, but I calmly responded, “She wrote The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged.” By the blank look on her face, I could tell nothing registered. It was obvious there was no reason to waste my time explaining, so I quickly changed the subject. “So how long have you lived in Los Angeles?”

The rest of the evening went by quickly which amazed me.  She definitely was a conversationalist, interesting and bright in a non-cerebral type way, innocently funny, and Hollywood beautiful. Periodically, I tried to envision us together, but realized our worlds were just too different.

I concluded this would probably be our first and last date, but a walk on a balmy moonlit night couldn’t hurt, so as we left the restaurant, I asked if she’d like to join me for a stroll.

“I already walked today… five miles on the track.”

It took me a moment to absorb what she had said… because she had already walked during the day, she couldn’t walk in the evening?

She interrupted my thoughts by saying, “Oh, I suppose it will do no harm.”

She sure knew how to make a guy feel warm and fuzzy! Do no harm? I had already concluded we weren’t right for each other, but I wanted to end it on my terms!

“Good. A little exercise after eating does the body good,” I replied. Once we reached an intersection, I offered her my arm. It was a small but polite gesture that seemed insignificant at the time until she gently put her arm through mine.

A shock (coming from where I did not know), coursed through my body, but before I could analyze the impact, she looked up at me and asked, “So how long were you on the wrestling team in high school?”

I stopped in my tracks, turned to her and asked incredulously, “Wrestling team?”

“Yeah,” she said, “don’t you remember you mentioned over dinner that you were a wrestler?”

I had no idea what in the hell she was talking about. Me wrestle? I started to laugh and replied, “I never said I wrestled in high school.”

She cut me off, “Yes, you did… you said you were a Sumo wrestler…”

I burst out laughing and interrupted, “I said I graduated Summa Cum Laude… not that I was a Sumo wrestler!”

“Oh,” she giggled, “I knew you were pulling my leg… you’re way too skinny to be one of those guys!”

As I tried to digest the absurd conversation we were having, a cold wind blew up abruptly.

“It’s freezing out!” she complained.

“Ready to go back and call it a night?” I asked.

Before I could get the entire question out, she had already done an about face and was literally dragging me back to the valets to pick up our cars. She extended her hand to shake mine and said, “Thanks for a wonderful evening.”

“My pleasure, it was a nice evening.” I replied.