Breakfast in Middletown

Originally Posted July 15, 2004


"I told them not to" she said with half a smile "but would they
listen to me? Their own sister?" As we sat and listened, I could see
the traits of her parents, one Lebanese the other Greek. Her dark
hair and olive skin was very appealing. Lying just underneath was a
passion for her family.

Her younger brothers were identical twins who had just returned from
a visit to the homeland. "They called every day to tell me how bored
they were in Lebanon; they just wanted to go back to Greece where it
was all sunshine and sexy women on the beach. That was the plan, a
week in Greece, a week in Lebanon, but boy were they sore now."

There must have been a class at university we had together once. She
must have been the one who was an airline attendant while paying her
way through college. Maybe I should have asked her out.

"After a few days, the boys meet up with this gypsy," thinking
twice "matchmaker. And the boys think this is great. All of the
girls in Greece played hard to get, while this old woman took them
door to door in the neighborhood and introduced them to these
beautiful girls, one after another. It's just the way it is done."

The waitress had been quick to fill my coffee cup. It was expected.
The five of us were the only people at the hotel restaurant for the
last two hours.

"She was trying to marry girls to these American boys" her husband
chimed in.

"Oh, yeah, she was very serious, it was more then a match. It was
for matrimony. But the boys thought it was fun, an easy way to meet
attractive women. They were all about fun. The one went to medical
school in Dominican."

"The Dominican Republic?" I asked.

"No, further south. Anyway, he had spent a few weeks there in a hut,
getting great grades, begging me on the phone to send him home. They
are smart boys, just out for fun."

"So what happened in Lebanon?"

"Oh those boys… I told them not to, but they would not listen to
their older sister. With in a few days the two of them had talked
each other in to getting married to these two girls the woman set
them up with. They kept building each other up, how great it would
be. But these girls were not my mother. My brothers are so dependant
on my mother. They couldn't do a thing with out her, or me. But they
get out of our sight for a few weeks and they go and marry these
girls."

"Girls? How young were they"

"Nineteen"

"One of them was nineteen" he corrected her " the other one is
fifteen."

"She turns sixteen this fall."

"Okay, let's say she was sixteen."

"My brother says that the first priest wouldn't perform the
ceremony, but they found a priest that did. Now they are back in
America, with their new wives. They just bought a house outside Los
Angeles – they are going to make more money; but it cost's more to
live there – I told them not to go. But do they listen to their
older sister?"

This pattern of protection reminded me why I don't date. Women have
a way of knowing what is best and reminding you of it. It's for the
best I never did ask her out. "So, where are they now?"

"Well, they bought the house on the internet, didn't even fly out to
inspect it, I told them, but they don't listen to me, got these jobs
that pay more, and are now traveling across the country with two 15
year old Lebanese virgins."

"One of them is nineteen."

"Whatever."