Dr. Jedidiah is a psychiatrist who loves
traveling, meeting new people, and exploring different cultures. As a single
father who lost his wife Demi to drug overdose 10 years ago, he has not been
his old perky self for the last decade. During those hard years, he has met
hundreds of, thousands of people from various walks of life around all over the
world. Meeting new people and listening to their stories outside his office have
given him different feelings from the ones through the formal encounter groups
or support groups for therapy. These people he has accidentally come across
were the paths through which Dr. Jedidiah could look back on his own life,
being truly honest with himself. Here is Dr. Jedidiah’s monologue that has left
him with some food for thoughts in life….or a fodder to justify his own
mistakes in the past.
Episode # 28. Eddy’s Lady in a Mask
Helen looked somewhat uneasy and nervous when I asked her
about what she was doing for a living. It seemed to me that she felt like
everybody in the café was unnoticeably eavesdropping on our conversation.
From the moment I heard about their upcoming wedding, I
had started to wonder what was behind this relationship. I knew that my close friend
Eddy - the luckiest guy to get this beautiful young lady as his bride-to-be, had
literally nothing left in his life after he divorced and his struggling
restaurant went out of business. When our mutual old buddies from college heard
the news of Eddy’s happily dramatic reversal of life, they were developing some
kind of ambivalent feelings: happy for the couple but suspicious of a
possible quid pro quo between the two. Eddy wanted me to have some
quality small talk with his loving woman here in our major hangout brunch café “First
Watch”. The name of this café happened to make me feel as if I had been given
the duties of a sailor carrying the first watch responsibilities. I said to
myself ‘Am I supposed to decode or even diagnose what I see in Helen?’ If so, I’d
say she must have been a mythomaniac or a jaded scammer.
For the past year, Eddy and Helen had truly had time of
their lives. They traveled around a lot of European countries, shopped ‘til
they dropped, stayed several weeks in a posh resort for Ayurveda
and meditation program for the rich from all over the world. I kept wondering
if Eddy had ever asked Helen how she was able to build her world of such a huge
wealth at her age. She said she immigrated to the States as a little kid, but I
could tell her English was full of thick accents of an immigrant. Quite against
my own intention, I found myself bombarding her with all those big or
small questions that came to my mind. “What brought you and your family to
America? Where did you go to college? What did you study in college? How did you
come to learn about my close friend Eddy? How were you able to make a fortune at
your age?.........and what line of work have you been engaged in?” It was funny
that I kept grilling her with questions to no avail. While I was trying
to look Helen in the eye, she was avoiding my eyes through it all and staying
silent. One thing that finally came out of her mouth was “I feel so
uncomfortable getting too personal with you.” Eddy also interrupted my awkward
interrogation and said that I needed to drop that mean streak. Actually,
I didn’t intend to be mean to his bride-to-be at all, but just wanted to make
sure my friend Eddy is walking the aisle with a right woman in sound mind and
body. By the time I became weary from Helen’s surly attitude in silence, I happened
to see her taking out a pill from her purse. As a shrink, that pill looked
familiar even at a glance. It was a psychotropic medication for
borderline personality disorder or depression. I freaked out, but could not and
would not mention any of what I saw in their presence.
Since that day we shared our goodbyes and hugs, I haven’t
heard from Eddy. The only thing I heard through the grapevine is that
Helen had been running an illegal business of escort agency, which must have
had secretive connections with corrupted big wheels in politics and even
legal circles. Eddy left her and moved to San Francisco a few years ago.
I had hoped that Helen was just a mentally ill or weak
person who needed to be medicated. To my consternation, she was hiding
such a dark secret and putting on an innocent smile to be with my friend Eddy. Today,
I am still thinking about what was on Helen’s mind. Did she really want to give
her all to Eddy because she loved him so much? Did Eddy know nothing about what
she was doing behind the curtain? Aside all the suspicion, doubt, and betrayal,
was their love for each other true? Maybe what I heard about Eddy and Helen was
no more than a wild imagination or addle-headed story made up by random people.
I do hope they are living their dream life somewhere as I speak.
Expressions
1.
ambivalent: having
or showing simultaneous and contradictory attitudes or feelings toward
something or someone
2.
quid pro quo: something
given or received for something else as a deal
3.
mythomaniac: an
excessive or abnormal propensity for lying and exaggerating
4.
Jaded: made
dull, apathetic, or cynical by experience or by having or seeing too much of
something
5. posh:
luxurious
and expensive
6. Ayurveda: an
ancient medical treatise on the art of healing and prolonging life, sometimes
regarded as a fifth Veda
7.
to bombard….: to
ask someone a lot of questions, typically in quick succession.
8.
to no avail: having
or with very little benefit, efficacy, or effect.
9.
mean streak: a
tendency for a person to do things that are mean or nasty
10.
Psychotropic medication: affecting
mental activity, behavior, or perception, as a mood-altering drug. a
psychotropic drug, as a tranquilizer, sedative, or antidepressant.
11.
to hear… through the grapevine: to
hear or learn of something through an informal means of communication,
especially gossip
12.
big wheels: important
or influential person especially in a particular field/ sphere
13.
to one’s consternation: to
one’s dismay; to one’s frustration; to one’s disappointment
No comments:
Post a Comment