You do NOT want to live in my head! It is one busy place. Just before 4:00 this morning, my eyes popped open and I lay in my little bed remembering Kenneth. Him and his wife were 2 of the people I first met when Charlie brought me to Pueblo. That was in 1972. I would divorce Charlie, strike out on my own, get a college degree and briefly wed again over the next 10 years. So to make a long story short, Kenneth and his wife divorced, she remarried and Kenneth and I started dating. We were both looking for stability and we found it. I had been through the mill enough to know that men have a way of changing after the ring slides over that third finger, so I was slow to commit. We came to an agreement. We would live together for one year and if we survived that, we would marry.
So, we found a house and Kenneth, my son and daughter and I moved into it. Seems like that was in the Spring. That fall the fair came as it did every year. I have never been a big fair goer, but Kenneth liked the livestock, especially the pigs. His brother raised pigs for 4H. I digress. Kenneth was reading the paper and was aghast to find the the first prize in the fine arts building had gone to someone who had made a display from "feminine products". His little mind could not let that go unseen.
Now this may not seem like much to you in this day and age, but to him it was a very big deal. He could not believe that such a display actually existed AND that it was open to the public. See, we are dealing with a man who had never even changed a babies diaper let alone had any idea what "feminine hygiene" actually entailed. It was a mystery that happened once a month and if it did not happen, it meant he was going to be a daddy.
So off we went to the Colorado State Fair. I had tea towels that had won a blue ribbon that year, so we stopped in that building first. Next stop, Fine Arts. We entered and looked at paintings, photography, and all kinds of stuff and finally reached the piece we sought! I swear his eyes actually bugged out of his head! There it was in the center of the room. It consisted of StayFree Maxipads sewn into a sleeping bag. Above it suspended and spread to cover it was a "mosquito net" made of Tampax tied to the net. It did not take him long to see enough of that!
My little ruddy faced farmer had seen enough! "Let's just get the hell out of here before someone sees us!" And that is just what we did! We lived together another 20 years after that before he passed to his reward. He has been gone for 20 years now but I will never forget the one and only trip we made to the Colorado State Fair. In later years we actually laughed about it.
Times have changed. What was once taboo is now advertised on television, billboards and every magazine you pick up and read. They do not make men like my Kenneth anymore. That is kind of sad. He used to read Playboy "for the articles". The secrets men and women learned together in the bedroom after the wedding are in your face all day and night on television. Playboy has lost its mystic.
As I get closer to the goal of vaulting out of here and landing on the streets of gold high above, I look back at my ruddy faced little farmer and smile. I would not trade one minute of my past for a whole bucket of tomorrows! Mother always said we are all made of our memories and you should know, I have made a lot of memories!
And all my memories are good!
