June Renew: Day Twenty-Five
The Big Guy
My boyfriend is tall. Very tall. Six foot seven tall. But he’s always been tall. He was one of the tallest kids in the class, if not the tallest. I always thought of him as fragile. Just a tall, lanky kid who couldn’t hold his own in a fight. But grade school feelings can sometimes be fleeting. He unlocked another memory from our childhood days where all the boys would run down the hill when the recess bell rang, slide-tackling one another and getting their uniforms all dirty.
I remember rolling my eyes a lot watching these silly boys and their silly boy antics. Only upon retrospect did I realize my friend never really got knocked down. Or if he did it, was rare. He was moreso the one doing the tackling. Or on one occasion throwing someone into the pricker bushes. It’s a boy energy I still don’t understand, but it’s still kind of funny to think about. Because the thought of him slide tackling anyone as an adult, now that he’s a gigantic, long-haired, mustachioed Viking, might end up far differently than a simple nick in the chainmail.
Don’t worry. When we’re together, I feel safe. I feel protected. No one is going to mess with me or him, and it’s not just because he’s large. It’s his presence. He’s someone people just want to talk to, open up to, tell their life stories to, all the while knowing no line must be crossed, or else.
I really feel like he’d go to bat for me if it came down to it. Or grab a bat for me. It’s something I always would have liked to feel in a relationship but never could seem to find. Nor did I think anyone would care that much about me. But it’s here. And all this protective duty makes me wonder what I’ve been missing out on, and why I seemed to tolerate a lack of amour armor.
Poking at Puppy Love
My high school boyfriend didn’t share these same sentiments. I felt hung out to dry a lot around him, especially around his best friend, who never missed an opportunity to poke fun at me about something. My hair, what I was wearing, how I said something, if I said anything at all. It’s not that I disliked this kid, I just wanted him to stop picking on me, and no matter how much I complained, my ex would just laugh right along with him.
It was hurtful. It really upset my mom when I’d tell her about it. She couldn’t understand why he wouldn’t just tell his friend to shaddup about it. “He should be defending you against that!” she’d say. And I agreed. But I knew it just wouldn’t end because I wanted it to. I didn’t deserve defending. Who was I to want to feel safe with someone I loved?
Ah, so what. We were both sixteen then. Is anyone really that self-aware at that age? After all, past relationships end up becoming nothing more than learning experiences. Growing ones. Ones where you can picture the hero coming to save you instead of sitting around wondering where he is.
Dear Brave Knight
My boyfriend is not a violent man. He’s a man who just knows when it’s time to get things done. And sometimes, between men, defending one’s honor comes with the price of getting physical.
In the first few days of us getting back in contact, he told me a story about how he once punched out a guy outside a bar after witnessing him hit his girlfriend. When the bouncer asked why there was a drunk guy in a dumpster, my friend just said, “I took out the trash.” While funny, the retelling did honestly rattle me a bit, because it was framed as “I got into a fight,” and this was more like a veritable ass-kicking, even if for a valiant reason.
Now I must admit, if that were me who got hit, I would have appreciated the medieval rage in my honor. But I also know that based on how I feel right now, I’d want the defense to come with words first before fists. Men do sometimes “communicate” by just beating the sh*t out of each other, while women opt out for stinging words and straight-up cattiness. But we’ve got to be careful about how we launch our defense tactics these days. I didn’t want my high school boyfriend to punch out his friend, but a word here or there would have made sense. I guess that’s what draws the line in the jousting arena to show who really cares for you, and who just didn’t care enough.
I’m just happy to be on the team, finally. Proud that there’s someone out there on this earth who’d take up arms for me, just as I’d do for him. My friend knows I can handle myself, but would know when to step in, whether I had time to ask for help or not. So I keep that knowledge close to my heart and make sure nothing ever gets to a point where the only option is for him to slay the beast.
And yes, I asked permission to re-tell this story. Plus, dumpster guy ended up trying to shake his hand and buy him a drink two weeks later. How noble of him to know when when it’s time to lay down his sword.