We’re Here To Walk Each Other Home

[mallorys_camera]

Naught to report except it reached 70° (again!) yesterday, and I am doing the usual pre-trip monologue, which consists of muttering, Why do you want to go again? Honest-to-Gawd, there’s no reason ever to leave the Patrizia-torium, it’s got everything you need. Cancel the trip!

I understand agoraphobia.

###

Oh! And Benito Snowdrop disappeared from my FB flist.

Which hurt my feelings.

My connection to him was very transitory: The Snowdrops lived in L’s basement for 18 months or so five years back while Benito completed a degree at the Culinary Institute.

It is unlikely I will ever see him again.

Nonetheless, he retained a special place in my imagination and affection because he spoke the language.

A quick bit of sleuthing uncovered the fact that Benito had disappeared from everybody’s FB flist including his wife’s and his mother’s.

Yes, I’ve been reading his mother sporadically for years.

She is a Mormon who lives in the Utah outback and writes about her relationship with God and her yearning to travel. Periodically, she does travel. She has a particular affection for the Pre-Raphaelite trail—London, the Lake District, the White Cliffs of Dover.

She struggles to reconcile her religion with her artistic longings and her travel lust.

We’re here to walk each other home, she wrote once.

I found that almost unbearably moving.

Sparky Snowdrop, Benito's wife, didn't like her.

Benito described her as a manic depressive who rarely left her bedroom. But he called her faithfully once a week.

###

I make no apologies for reading what she writes even though it is clearly not intended for the likes of me.

I love reading diaries—that is why I’m here, of course.

And honestly, there is no better diary reader than me. I am that stranger you want to reveal your inner life to—unless, of course, you’re Jeffrey Dahmer or John Wayne Gacy.

###

Sparky had gotten a new, unflattering haircut.

And Benito’s mother had written a long homage to her daughter-in-law: She’s walking with her head held high even after hard, hurting days. Expressing loving concern for the person who hurt her—. (I am paraphrasing.)

From this, I deduced that Benito had finally succeeded in breaking away.

Bravo! I thought. Good for you!

###

L and I used to have long conversations about Benito when he lived in the basement.

He’s gay! I’d tell L.

No, he’s not, she’d reply. They’re married.

Right, I’d say. Because he doesn’t want to break away from the community. I’m pretty sure they never have sex. He calls bras “boob sacks,” for God’s sake. That does not signal an attraction to the female body. In fact, it kinda signals a deep revulsion.

You think everybody’s gay, L would scoff. Which is not quite true: I don’t think BB or RTT are gay, for example.

But I was absolutely positive about Benito.

And my certitude was reinforced by Little Megan whose summer here overlapped with the Snowdrops by a couple of weeks.

“He’s gay, right?” I asked Little Megan.

“Oh, please,” Little Megan said. “There’s absolutely no doubt about that.”

###

Anyway, I am thinking that the cerebral, beautiful, secretive Benito may have finally come to terms with who he is.

And wishing him well this morning.