Mesarchia (mes-ar’-chi-a): The repetition of the same word or words at the beginning and middle of successive sentences.
“Love is to love without question. Affection gives endless affection without expectation.” These qualities of experience wreaked of silliness. In the cruel battle of life I thought they made weak. They made me a loser, a jerk, a stain on the carpet of life. I tried living in accord with the golden rule—but I thought I would become a golden fool.
I had a girlfriend. Her name was Nelly. She wanted to “do it” every night. I would say “Whoah Nelly.” She would get up and leave. On average, she’d be gone for 2 days. I wanted to be understanding, an endless source of caring and a peaceful man. I was certain she was seeing other men, so I never asked her what she was doing when she left home in the middle of the night. I tried and tried not to get angry, but I was cracking. So, against my will, I followed Nellie one night. I had a bad idea of what I was going to see: Nelly picked up on a street corner by a rich guy in a limousine. I followed her to a non-descript dimly lit building: “Clarksville Home for the Maimed.” I looked in the window and Nelly was reading a book to a man with no hands. One look at his eyes and you could tell he was blind—probably the victim of some kind of explosion. Nelly saw me and smiled and motioned me over. She said, “This is Mike. He was blown up in a July 4th accident. His wife threw him out after the accident and he’s been living here ever since.” “Wow.” My pity meter went through the roof. I almost started crying.
So this is what Nelly did when she disappeared. Then I noticed Mike’s fly was unzipped. I asked him how he could do that with no hands. He told me that when Nelly was there she unzipped and aimed him at the urinal, otherwise a nurse would do it. I was starting to crack again.
I threw Nelly out when she came home the next morning. Eight months later, I ran into her in line at the Post Office,
She was massively pregnant. She pointed at her stomach and said “Yours.” In the light of her smile, my paranoia faded. We went to my house, and we talked. She told me her sexual needs are normal, and I agreed. I had Googled it months ago and determined it was me who had the problem. As far as maimed Mike went, she told me her father was an amputee and blinded from the Vietnam War and she would go to the VA hospital and read to him. When he died of cancer, she started going to the Clarksville Home for the Maimed when I refused to offer her the warmth and comfort she desperately needed.
“But what about Mike’s penis?” I asked. She stood up, grabbed the clock from the mantle, and threw it at me with both hands. It hit me in the head and drove the demons out. It’s ten been years since that day when I learned how to trust. Our daughter Ella looks just like me. That’s good.
Definition courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu)
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