Fishermen and kings

The little boy was full of charm. His father was sure he would be the man he had never let himself be. Deep down within himself is the repressed charm he once had as a little boy and now he was just a handsome frame and a tower of strength, responsibility and a living body of met expectations. His father's expectations, his mother's, society's, now his wife's. His life was an ad really, picture perfect with exaggerated good bits. He has the dream car, the dream house, the top job.

All except for the dream girl, whom he thought he would never stumble upon again. Until his heart skipped a beat. Six o'clock sunday, that was when he saw her again, and that was when his heart skipped a beat.

He told her story. She never really ever told me about her pain but I knew, he begun. I could tell, he said, it emanated like body odour from her and her eyes, were the saddest set I have ever seen. But I, I was drawn to her, he said.

Over coffee, he and I talked of castles in the air and wooden clogs, and his eyes glazed a little as he told his story, her story. It began when the knight in him wanted to rescue the damsel in distress.

She would tie her hair up in a pony bob, he smiled as he told me. Her hair was too short for a ponytail. But I was naturally drawn to her, not because she was particularly warm. On the contrary, she had a rather hollow, superficial facade and a cold brash demeanor often setting a distance between herself and another with a wall filled with quick wit, humour and sarcasm. But I was not convinced and feel an intense adventure each time I spoke to her to find her heart, her soul.

She was an adventure and her heart I wanted to conquer.

When I saw her, said he, I thought she was the girl. The dream girl I wish and would wait to marry, and have a picture perfect life with. But she was quite the mean girl. I would have been at her beck and all, for I was that much in love and each time I see her pony bob and her delicate face my heart would ache to do all I could to be close to her and to make her smile. She never smiled easy. And her words like a knife would pierce through make me quite the small man. And he waned a little.

As the word small man escaped his lips I have to say I disagree. To me, he was quite the outstanding man. Visionary and bold, dynamic and quite the leader. And when they were together it was great to see, it was much like a knight and his beautiful lady.

Yet, she was quite an adventure. The adventure. But some dreams were only dreams. Or so it would seem to him when he was a young man, and his heart grew weary awaiting, for more than her, the picture perfect life was what he thought he was after. And a picture perfect life was what he left her to go after.

My heart sank much, I must say, for the romantic in me thought they would be. The sparkle in her eye, and the pony bob, was all a knight needs, but at one point he chose the easy way out, he chose the path arranged, the path expected and not the path that could be.

His lady at home, she was gracious and warm, ready to stoke his fiery ego, ready to have his children. And he chose the picture perfect path. And it was picture perfect, but his heart stopped beating a little. Because as beautiful the wife at home could be, he turned to me with wistful eyes and told me, he misses that pony bob and sparkle, the pony bob and the sparkle that made his heart skip its beat.

I guess, he could not spend his whole life in an intense adventure of searching for her heart, her soul, for that would be a sacrifice of the picture perfect life. Only because he felt he could not save her and that was because he never saw the tears he brought to her eyes that night he left.

It was his son, that stumbled upon her feet at the cobbled walkway along the street. She laughed as she picked him up and placed him on his feet again and as she looked up, pony bob and sparkle in her eye. He approached and picked up the boy and as he caught her eye, his heart skipped a beat. And they engaged in a conversation that made him wanting for more and they engaged in many more conversations that stoked the knight in him that was ready to fight, to rescue.

And so he invited me in and we picked up the conversation, from when I was the lady, and he was my knight. From the heartaches he caused and never knew about, and the bruised ego he nursed, and had moved happily along from. And here I am, sipping my coffee, in my pony bob and wooden clogs.

Fishermen and kings, I told him that day, I often saw in my dream. Pirates and thieves they often steal my ship. But I, I walk on with my wooden clogs, walk on. And it was that night, I poured out my heart, and he saw me cry.

And in that moment, he deeply desired to embrace me, his dream girl with the pony bob, and sweep me off my feet into his life, but it was only too late. He realised his dream girl had a soul, only it was way too late.

And I smiled as he picked up his little growing boy instead, who asked him innocently daddy what could I be? and he replied, be all you really want to be, but whatever will be, he looked at me with his wistful eyes, marry the girl of your dreams.

I turned to walk out and I cried a little, because it was too late, but I gotta put on my wooden clogs and walk on, I should have poured my soul when he was still waiting, and told him he did rescue me that dark night. I should have poured out my heart to him, and come out of my black cocoon. I did, only it was way too late, and my knight already had a lady, and I had become the lady the knight bypassed, but I know, some day my prince will come.