Schadenfreude

My favorite word in the world. From the German (who else would have such a word?) - “Malicious pleasure taken from observing the misery of another.”

Our office is rife with it today. I made the mistake of telling someone about Saturday night.

Friday night was my typical Friday night, where I collapse on the couch with my soft warm bitches and go comatose. I figured this weekend I was going to make up for it Saturday night. “Woo fuckin’ hoo.”

There was big doin’s at CinCin, the upscale freak show in Fort Myers. This was a convergence of three or four singles groups, all mostly dysfunctional cliques who rarely cross over.

I posted the event to my group. It’s good for the person who organizes these groups to post events now and again. Especially since I’ve started charging $5 to join.

My biggest concern was running into one member I REALLY don’t enjoy. He reminds me of a Creative Director I worked for in Detroit … Jewish with prescription mood stabilizers and a combo napoleon complex/Nazi fraulein fantasy.

This guy I didn’t want to run into comes up to my nose. He and another short person climbed my ass when I posted a debate watch for Obama, even though I invited Republicans to post their own. He made a very big deal about never meaning to come across like the jerk he came across as; I made a mental note to avoid him like the plague from that point on.

Especially after he confessed to having downloaded my photo so he could stare at my skin.

So Saturday night I’m out and the first people I run into are friends associated with the ad agency I work for. I nabbed an outer table and we all decided to hang there. It felt a bit like a social fortress against the unknown.

Short Guy passed three times and tried to catch my eye. Like dogs watching you eat bacon from beneath a glass table. I like to think he didn’t notice I was deliberately avoiding eye contact, but I could not bring myself to wave or smile.

The temperature was beautiful, live music was drifting outside, flowered branches were literally grazing my head as I sipped my Riesling. Tealights … people in varied styles of dress, from fresh off the tennis courts to … well, I think there was a professional whore or two.

I was talking to the friend of my friend. I was told he had lost his wife three months ago. I am amazed at these people who can be married all their adult lives, lose a spouse unexpectedly and go on about their lives without falling apart.

This guy was out and about, playing golf, spending time with friends. We talked laundry technique (he was doing his own for the first time in his life) and we talked about his bereavement group at church. The conversation was a yawnerama but I was being a Good Buddhist. Compassionate.

He said he was afraid of becoming the area handyman for all available widows. I warned he could land in for far thornier situations than that.

He’s a retired auto exec from the Detroit area, so we talked about the good old days of freebies, expense accounts and people buying cars and trucks. I’m sure we know people in common.

I lost my focus for a split second and Short Guy magically appeared on my left. I stammered “Hi, how ya bin?”

He says “I had a boil.”

He rambles on about the boil for ten minutes. He is too close to my face. I resist the urge to ask him where the boil was so I can regale the people here at work with details on Monday. But I couldn’t do it. I was too grossed out.

Then he talks about his career in real estate. He is losing his house and his rental property and will have to move back into the trailer he lived in when he first moved down here.

This guy really knows how to impress a gal.

When he left, I turned to my new widower friend and said “Is it just me, or do you feel like running a warm bath and slitting your wrists?”

He laughed. Then he asked if he could take me out sometime.

I was flabbergasted. I am rarely flabbergasted. His wife’s body can’t even be cold yet. So I whipped out a business card, forced a smile and (hoping he wouldn’t) told him to give me a call.

Here at work they say I should go. I said I would much rather stay home with my dogs.

CinCin is back on my shit list. I’m going back to the beach where I don’t have to interact with anyone; I can just sit back and watch.