Question 1

To reiterate yesterday's post, I am going to answer every question in Gregory Stock's book, The Book of Questions.  It's a very fascinating book and I suggest you buy it and have many stimulating conversations with your family and friends (see this?  I'm advertising--for free even!  His publishers better send me a thank-you note, you know, someday in the future.)

And to help me in answering these questions, I'll be inviting the people who live in my head to join me in the conversation (no I am not seeing a therapist; how dare that cross your mind.)  Today, I'm introducing Waldo Dent, a nice enough guy who hates his first name.  I call him Denny.  He's not too fond of that either.  How are you, Denny?
DENNY: Seriously?  You can't have these conversations in real life so you're vicariously experiencing this through the blog which the general public has no knowledge and probably no interest in--

BRENT: Thanks for being here, Denny!

DENNY: You suck.

BRENT: So, I'm not going to use the exact wording on these questions here (I don't want to get sued or nothing; I'd rather people bought Stock's book and followed along that way) but here is the first question in a nutshell: Would you leave your family and friends for your true love?  I think this is a really good question for you since you're married?

DENNY: Yeah.

BRENT: How many years now?

DENNY: Since I just popped out of your head, it's looking like a grand total of two minutes.

BRENT: Wonderful.  Now how long, really?

DENNY: Three years, give or take a week.

BRENT: Oh, is your anniversary coming up?
DENNY: I dunno.  Probably.

BRENT: Won't you get in trouble with your wife for this?

DENNY: No.  I plan ahead for these situations.  I bought five years worth of Christmas cards, Easter cards, birthday and anniversary cards, all signed and sealed in their pastel envelopes.  Whichever occasion comes up, my wife will undoubtedly mention the event and I find the right card to give to her.

BRENT: Five years worth of cards?  Nothing more?
DENNY: I have $50 gift cards for J.C. Penny and Ross in the cards.

BRENT: And she's fine with that?

DENNY: Considering how much shopping she does, oh yeah.  Those cards are all the excuse she needs.  I won't see her for two days after she sees those cards.

BRENT: Uh-huh.  About the question...

DENNY: If she asked me to leave the country to be with her, I'd totally do it.

BRENT: I'm sure she'd be happy to hear that.

DENNY: Oh, heck, I wouldn't do it for her.  I'd do it for me.  My family is nuts; those millions of miles are barely enough to keep them at bay.  I almost wish she had asked me to; it would be all enough of an excuse to cut them off from all contact.

BRENT: ...I guess I'm sorry things didn't work out that way.

DENNY: It's all right.  My parents don't like her so they generally stay away by themselves.  They only call on my birthday, mostly to remind me that if we haven't given them grandchildren, it's okay for me to dump her, go back home and try again with somebody else.

BRENT: So in a way, you've already moved to your foreign country.

DENNY: And life is beautiful.  ...Well, it's all right.

BRENT: Would your wife move to a foreign country for you?

DENNY: Absolutely not.

BRENT: How come?

DENNY: She's way attached to her folks.  I can't get her to go anywhere away from them for more than an hour.  Our first year of marriage was spent at her house, in the bedroom next to theirs.  I finally got us to move one street over, and wouldn't you know it, the house next-door to us was also for sale.  Her parents bought that place and moved in with us.  She still runs to her mom when she has a nightmare.  I wake up every other morning to find her gone to her folks place.

BRENT: ...and I guess that's all the time we have for today.

DENNY: What about you?

BRENT: What about me?
DENNY: You haven't answered the question.

BRENT: Oh.  I guess I could.

DENNY: You guess?

BRENT: It's not leaving family and friends behind that I mind.  It's moving in general that I hate.  There is so much packing involved just for an overnighter twenty minutes away.  Packing for another country?  The thought makes me cringe.

DENNY: But this is true love we're talking about.  Shouldn't true love conquer moving qualms?

BRENT: Only if marriage is on the table.  Anything less than that, if we break up, I'm stuck in a craphole country not knowing the language, stuck with a craphole job and no family or friends to take me in in my poor, depressed, lovesick condition.

DENNY: You don't take many risks, do you?

BRENT: What?  I am totally a risk taker.  Do you see this?  I'm baring my soul on the internet here.

DENNY: You had one serious sentence in the whole dialogue.  And good luck to your readers figuring out which sentence it was.

BRENT: It looks like two serious sentences now.

DENNY: Whoop-de-do.  I'll bet they still can't guess which ones they are.  I'm hungry, what's for dinner?

BRENT: Bacon.

DENNY: Not for you, for me.

BRENT: Whatever your wife fixed, I guess.

DENNY: Oh please, she's eating her mom's cooking as we speak.  I'll bet you anything on that.

BRENT: You could always go over to her parents' place for dinner then.

DENNY: Yeah.  I married her to get away from my family's craziness but it turns out that her folks have their own brand of nutso as well.

BRENT: Imagine that.

DENNY: I know.  I wish somebody had warned me before we tied the knot.

BRENT: Didn't you meet with them before the wedding day?

DENNY: Nah.  My wife was always nervous about my first impressions; she said she wanted it to be a surprise.