The Bob Blog!: Misery Loves Company Installment #2

Misery Love’s Company

An Autobiography of a Love Life That Never Was.

How to Succeed At Failing in Love In One Easy Step: Making The Attempt.

By Misery Love

The story of a young boy growing up and falling in love, and then growing up some more and falling in love and growing up some more and falling in love and growing up even more and…

Installment 2

My eyes were finally starting to adjust to the bright lights by now. For the first time I was beginning to see this new world of mine. I could make out faint images. As time went on, and as I became more and more relaxed in the soothing hands that held and caressed me, colors began to appear, and then images. I looked up and around to see where all this comfort and caring was coming from. I wanted to see who my rescuer was. All I saw was this green creature, with a white, featureless face. It was my hero. It had saved me from my misery. I cuddled into it and tried to return the feelings it was giving to me.

After I relaxed and had calmed down, the green creatures took me to another large and bright room and laid me in a see-through bed. As far as I could tell I was the only one in the room except for the green creatures and their comforting hands and soothing voices. At times the voices and hands would disappear and I would find myself yearning for them to come back. I looked forward to my next massage, and the squeezing and the rubbing. My whole purpose in life was to get as many body massages as possible. I didn't care about anything else.

When the next massage came, I looked up at my green comforter and saw instead a soft face framed with long flowing hair that was beautiful and caring and full of love. And then I noticed that there were several of them all around, waiting to touch me and to caress me and to take care of me. Later I found out that these creatures were called nurses, and were in actuality the green creatures in disguise. Apparently they used the green disguises to save me from the awful clutches of the hard and cold monster. But I was in their care now, and I longed for those tender hugs and little kisses, each one bestowed on me in their own turn. This is when I first discovered the true meaning of life. But I was soon to discover there were more lessons to learn.

I had been alone and yearning for those nurses to come back and give me some caring attention. All I dreamed of was having them come and hold me and shower me with kisses. I wanted a massage and to be squeezed by their tender and caring hands. I heard them approach and I relaxed expecting more great and wonderful things to happen. My body stopped its constant thrashing and began to tremble in anticipation. The nurse took me by the ankle and gently pulled it towards her. She carefully stroked my leg, up and down. This was a new twist to the full body massage, but it felt wonderful, too. It was a new pleasure in life. This may have even been better than a full body massage. I just kept my eyes closed and smiled and cooed as my leg was gently stroked up and down.

Then I suddenly felt a sharp pain in my foot! Another sharp blow in my thigh! My arm was grabbed and wrapped and squeezed until I thought it would fall off! Then a cold round thing was pressed against my chest and a long, cold, skinny thing was shoved up my, well, you know where! It hurt! My world, all of one hour old, was shattered within seconds. Once again in my short life I was plunged into misery. My rescuer nurses, the kind, loving and gentle hands had turned on me and brought me more pain and torture. Again I cried out as loud as I could to protect myself. My arms and legs began to thrash again like a wild and crazy beast. I was able to scare them off and was left alone in the large, bright room.

After the ordeal, and the cruel change of events, I lay there contemplating further the meaning of life. From now on I would never know if the kind, gentle voices, and the loving, caressing hands would turn out to be nothing more than the cruel instruments of torture. I loved the gentle kindness and warmth they offered, but feared the pain and harshness they could turn to without a moment's notice. I never knew what to expect, or when they would change. I would never enjoy another massage again, fearing what might come next. Then my thoughts were shattered by another cry, far off in the distance at first. But then it got closer and louder. Then it seemed to be right next to me. I struggled to turn my head over to the direction the crying seemed to come. My hands thrashed and my legs kicked and finally, I managed to get my head turned so I was looking over next to me. I looked through my clear bed and saw, right next to me, another me! And to my surprise, the traitorous nurses were massaging and cooing all over this new arrival just as they did me. Fortunately, knowing the true character of the nurses, I was no longer the center of attention. But I felt it was my duty to warn the other me that those gentle and caring hands could turn to terror in an instant. I cried out the warning, louder and louder, but it was no use, the other me only cooed and made sounds of contentment. It's time would come. It would soon learn the true character of the nurses that were caring for it. I tried to warn it. But for now I was growing sleepy and fell into a deep slumber thinking at least that I wasn't alone now. There would be someone to turn to when I woke up. Someone that I could turn and cry to, and maybe someone that could understand me. And we would be able to help one another in our times of misery.

I'm sure I didn't sleep long and when I woke up I struggled to turn my head to look at the other me. The other me was staring back obviously checking me out as much as I was checking it out. I was fascinated by what I saw since I had never seen another me before. I laid there wondering if that was what I looked like, and checked out the other me inch by inch.

"Let's see," I thought to myself, brimming with curiosity. I looked at the head, "Check; A little hair up on top," I thrashed my arms up to my head and wiggled a bit and felt a little fluff that I was sure to be hair, "just like me," I thought, "check." I looked further, "There's one eye," and then the other me turned over a bit more so I could see the other, "And there's the other, just like me, check. Nose, there is a nose, a bit, no, quite a bit smaller than mine, but other than that it's just like mine, check. Mouth, check; cries and sounds just like me, check. And those spastic arms, two of them, just like me, check. Chest, belly button." I continued my checklist and everything was checking out. Then, "Oh-oh!" I thought, noticing something different about the other me. The other me had something missing down there. At first it caught me by surprise. I wasn't quite sure what it was that was missing, but after a quick glance down at my body I saw it. The other me didn't have what I had down there. It was missing it. I didn't know exactly why I had what I had down there, but I had it and it didn't. Then my thoughts were interrupted by another cry that came from the other side of me. It started faint and grew louder as it came closer. I struggled to turn my head to the other side just in time to see the nurses roll another other me into place. The nurses cuddled and cooed over the new arrival and when they had finished, the another other me turned its head over to me and began checking me over just like the other me had. And, like before, I began checking over the another other me. I quickly scanned over the body of the another other me and, just like before, everything was checking out, just like me, except the nose; the another other me, just like the other me had a much smaller nose; but other than that it checked out just fine, until I got there, where something was missing, again. This another other me was different, too. Again I wasn't quite sure what was different, but with a quick jerk of the head so I could check myself out again, I remembered, I had something, it didn't. I turned to look at the other me and then over to the another other me and tried to figure out why they were different from me, and why. Then a terrible thought came to me. It wasn't that the other me and the another other me was different; it was me that was different! All of a sudden I felt awkward and embarrassed. I tried to casually cover up the fact that I was different from the other two. I was hoping that they hadn't noticed yet. I tried to casually move my hands down to the spot where I was different in order to cover up the fact, but every time I tried to move, my feet would thrash and my arms would fly and I would expose myself even more. And every time I would try to put my feet down, my arms would fly up in the air and wave as if saying, "Hey look everybody, look at me! I'm different." Occasionally I would get my hands where I wanted them, but as soon as I got them there I would spasm and squirm, and my arms would pull away just as quickly as I got them there. The only thing I noticed was the other two me's constantly staring at me. It was useless. Any effort I made to cover up my difference only drew more attention to it.

During my attention arousing display, I noticed a nurse walk up to the wall and pull on a rope or a string. The next thing I knew, the wall was turned into a crowd of gawking and pointing people. And I knew they were all pointing at me! They knew. They could see, and I did little to draw their attention away from me. I was there on display, naked for the whole world to see. One of the crowd tapped on the glass and pointed directly to me. Others crowded around him as he smiled and laughed, the whole time gesturing at me. The others slapped him on the back and laughed jovially as well. I could do nothing to hide my shame.

Then one of the nurses walked over and pointed to me as she looked over to the crowd behind the glass. All I could do to protect myself was to cringe and try crying again, it had worked before. But I had cried so much that my throat was beginning to get sore, and my cries began to sound a lot like that of a cat that had been outside all night in the winter. So crying didn't do much for me anymore, except make my throat hurt more. I had no idea what the nurse was going to do to me this time. I wasn't really sure if I really wanted to know, either. But the nurse picked me up and carried me over to the window and with one hand supporting my neck, and the other holding my bottom, she held me up in front of the glass, in full, unobstructed view for all to see. The people got even more excited and seemed to dance around each other. The one that tapped on the window continued pointing at me and smiling, laughing and gesturing to everyone that I was different. I knew I was different, and now, so did the whole world.

After everyone had their eyes filled with my difference, the nurse finally took me and put me back in the see-through bed and shoved some icky plastic thing into my mouth to stop me from crying. And then, after what seemed like a lifetime, and actually it was most of my lifetime up until then, the nurse finally made her way over to the wall of jeering people and covered them up. As soon as the people were gone the nurses made their way back to me, the other me and the another other me and started soothing and comforting us once again. I was sure something awful was about to happen again. I cringed as I kept my eyes on the nurse at all times so I could see what was about to happen to me. But all she did was fold a piece of cloth, shove it under my bottom and wrapped it around me where I was different. I looked over to the other me and the another other me and saw that they, too, had been swaddled with the cloth. My difference was finally covered. What a relief that was. I was no longer different from the others, at least for now.

It had been a hard day, and a long one. I had already experienced and learned a lot. Drowsiness was overtaking me. And now that I was covered I could allow myself to drift off to sleep, to dream of the comforts of the womb from which I had come and the full body massages to which I arrived. My dreams would seem to become the only place I could ever enjoy those comforts again. But then the dreams would be followed by the nightmares of reality; Of the nurses turned torturers and, of course, my own little discovery. I would sleep now, but never sleep too sound. I had to always be alert and on the lookout for the ever present nurses. I never knew what they were going to be up to next.