I'm grinning like an idiot and high-fiving strangers I'm so high on gloating about this incident. I wish I had a cane so I could twirl it.
Of course I'm not. I'm happy in one regard - that the body issues my ex tried to project onto me were cleared up. Clearly I didn't feel great about my body during the time I dated this guy. Clearly he made more comments than the ones I mentioned. A year's worth of his insults kept me in check and lingered on in my mind after the break-up. I had started to think that maybe I WAS a little.... well, not heavy but maybe I should be reed-thin like he suggested. Insisted.
It wasn't until I saw him about 2 years later and saw what an extraordinarily thin, worn-out person he was that I was SURE I was fine with my own body. I looked back and thought, "My God it's not true, it's not even VAGUELY true." And if it's gloating to realize someone's verbal abuse has lost it's hold on you... yeah, I gloated.
Maybe try reading my comment again. I was shocked, not remotely pleased, to see how thin Nick had become. It's a goddamn dismaying sight, seeing someone you used to know as a skeleton. Very shocking. Hence the involuntary opening comment about his weight. Usually I'd keep my mouth shut. But I was too shocked.
I'm telling my story, not his. His body issues were not the point of this story. But since you seem to keen on the story of Nick and Bekazzled, I can flood you with a few extras:
Oh, we remained friends for long after the break-up. I tried to approach Nick quite a few times about his weight. He was very proud of losing so much weight, happy and even eager to brag about it. I found it dismaying. I asked him if anyone had commented on his weight. He said a few people had been derogatory. I suggested (tentative voice, Bekazzled, tentative voice) that perhaps he was a little thin and that he looked tired. He got angry at me, saying that's what other people said. I said that other people aren't always right, but wouldn't an objective person assess the majority of evidence around them? (see below.) He said, hesitantly, caught, that yeah.... but HE doesn't have a body issue though. He said, "Well, look at my fiancee!" as though her condition was justification for his mental illness. He was so PROUD of her weight. My help had to stop there.
As above, I used the logical/objective perspective because he was a geology student-cum-geologist for the government and his thinking was ALWAYS logical, always observant. Logic was his God. It almost worked.
He believed that counselling was only for people who had issues growing up and his childhood was just fine, thanks (actually it wasn't).
He loved rocks. They were his passion. I remember the only time I saw him in full rage. He stormed into the house one afternoon and I asked what was wrong and he said, "You know that "rock" holding open the door to the social sciences building? That rock is over x million years old, and they use it as a door stop! That should be in a MUSEUM somewhere!" I did know that rock. It had been there for years, keeping a never-used-door open. I was amused to see the only time he ever got angry was over a rock. But I also thought it was kind of cute (because he wasn't naturally passionate) and started to think about that rock. For years to come, whenever I went past that rock, I'd say, "I know, buddy." As a kind of nice, non-gloating homage to Nick. Because it WAS kind of disrespectful. That rock was x million years old! (I found myself passionately telling someone else. Then I was amused at myself. This offence over a rock's mistreatment was catching.)
I used to like overtly enjoying the changing of the seasons. One time we were walking along the footpath and there were leaves everywhere. I started kicking those beautiful little orange pieces into dancing bundles around us. He gripped my hand and kept hissing, "stop! You're embarrassing us!"
We both knew it was over when we went to the cinema to see Jerry McGuire (sp?), of all things. It struck us both as sappy, but we both sat down afterwards and admit we didn't have that smack-to-the-guts love for each other. Hmmm.
After Tom Cruise's debut as a down-on-his-luck sports manager (and before his debut as Scientology-crazy) I started having anxiety attacks around him, like I couldn't breathe. I ended it.
AFTERWARD: the last time I went out onto that campus was the year before last. I noticed the rock was gone.
I felt a small cheer. But then I thought: what happened to the rock? Did someone finally realize its worth, take it away and put it in a museum somewhere? Or did they fix the swing-doors so that they didn't need the rock, and just threw it out? Did someone just steal it? What happened to you, rock?
I'll never know.
For more information on the mundane story of Bekazzled and Nick, or more talk on THAT rock, or the times that Bekazzled has gloated in life, PM me.