Widow

Once the mind-numbing funerals of Mac and my father were over and done with, my mother and I tackled life as Bequia’s newest widows. I was still grappling with the reality of it all, losing my husband and father in one fell swoop was too much for my brain to deal with, and I threw myself into work at the Pizzeria. My mother, stricken with grief over  the loss of her lifetime partner, moved from her house (aptly named “Angels Rest”) into our house at Belmont. This allowed me to work at night knowing that Vanessa and Rachel weren’t alone, and gave mom the comfort of having family near-by while she mourned. This arrangement was necessary but also temporary, Mom would move back to her own home when she was ready to face it without dad.

During the first two weeks of December, I applied myself to getting ready for the Christmas season, the Pizzeria as well as Bequia Villa Rentals would soon become extremely hectic. People were nice to me, at times TOO nice, trying to offer words of condolence to make me feel better about my loss. Too many times I had to listen to inanities such as, “Mac is at peace now”, and wanted to scream at those uttering such stupid sentiments. Mac didn’t WANT to go to heaven, he hadn’t been sick or in pain, and he had certainly been at peace right here on Earth. A few people didn’t know WHAT to say, and as a result tended to avoid me during the weeks following the funerals. I preferred avoidance to lame condolences about Heaven, and put myself on auto-pilot to get through the holiday season.

The one thing I hadn’t given any thought to was the fact that I was just 38, young to be a widow, and that I was considered a “catch” because I owned a restaurant as well as a large house. If the gentlemen who began to pursue me had realized that Barclay’s bank owned my house, and that the Pizzeria boasted a sizeable overdraft, they may not have tried so hard to interest me in romance. The Pizza Queen of Bequia was not the rich widow they obviously thought she was, and I had offers to share my life with a few prospects before Mac had been buried for even three weeks!

The first fellow to pursue the Widow Simmons leased a restaurant on Bequia, and was struggling to make a decent living. He thought it would be a fine idea to merge our places of business through marriage, a notion I quickly nipped in the bud by laughing when he suggested it. The second contender for my hand was younger than I, quite sweet really, whose family owned a store on the mainland. He was a nice young man, and when I gently refused to be “wooed” he seemed genuinely hurt. I had neither the time nor the inclination to be drawn into a relationship, and firmly rejected any and all advances made by the opposite sex.

One day we had a visitor, a man from New Zealand I had been introduced to by a mutual friend. Tall and gangly, he arrived unexpectedly on my front porch in the heat of the afternoon, sweating so profusely that water pooled at his feet. He was topless, and wore little gym shorts and what we used to call “desert boots”.  Shane was his name, and he spoke with such a thick accent it was hard for us to follow what he was saying. He explained that he had been jogging, and as he knew where I lived had decided to pop up for a visit.

Shane sat on a chair and continued to drip, it was amazing how much the man perspired! Vanessa, Rachel and I found it hard to follow what he was saying, and for a good reason; Shane’s very large testicles had a mind of their own, and were dangling through the leg of his gym shorts. The fellow chattered away, seemingly oblivious that his balls were swaying in the breeze, exposed for all to see.  When his one-sided conversation came to an end I had to say SOMETHING, and all I could think of for some reason was the size of his feet in those ridiculous desert boots.  I said, “You certainly have big feet!”, to which he replied (with a broad Kiwi accent and a wink), “Well you know what they say mate, big feet, big shlong!”

Sheesh, welcome to widowhood! Although decades have passed since Shane came a-courting I am sure Vanessa and Rachel remember his visit, I certainly do!