Christopher Prato - Little Boy or, Enola Gay

I think her reading problem was rooted in her overriding lack of trust in people. One day, for instance, I remember Maria crying on the phone, telling me that when she was asked to recite the Emancipation Proclamation in front of her class, she got so nervous that she ran out of the room and cried in the hallway. She’d said, “Four score and seven months ago,” rather than “four score and seven years ago.” It was a harmless error, but she was horrified. A similar thing had happened to her years before. Maria had this problem, I think, because she didn’t trust her classmates. She always thought they would laugh at her, whether she read well or not.

But when she read all alone in silence, she had less trouble. She could zip through a Shakespeare play with uncanny ease. It still took her a while to read it, but she adored Shakespeare. In fact, she loved almost any book she put her little hands on. Reading alone in her room, in the still of the night, was probably an escape for her.

I wish I knew back then what I know now. I never thought I would leave Maria, or that she would leave me. The confidence I had in our relationship was best expressed in the Beatles song , The Long and Winding Road . It goes: The long and winding road that leads to your door, will never disappear . You left me waiting here, a long, long time ago. Don’t keep me standing here. Lead me to your door .

That was our song, believe it or not. We both felt as if life were a long winding road, nothing more, nothing less. It’s funny, because even at that young age, both Maria and I had very mature attitudes about life. Our peers dreamt of becoming doctors and lawyers and engineers. But Maria and I understood at a very young age that there is nothing in the world more meaningful than a loving relationship between two human beings. Anyone can become a lawyer; anyone can study that hard. Few can truly share themselves with a loved one for a lifetime. Sometimes I wonder if anyone ever has ever come close, besides me and Maria.

Neither of us ever placed much importance in school. We both thought, we’re all going to die, so while we’re here, just be good to everyone, and try to enjoy life . But still, everyone, especially parents, keeps telling us that grades and material things were so important, and that if you didn’t make a lot of money, you were a loser. But I think a loser is a person that equates success and money with happiness. I’d rather live in a hovel and give myself to another rather than live in a mansion and be alone and married or alone and unmarried. That’s what I thought back then, that’s what I think now.

Maria felt much the same way; however, I think it was harder for her to come by considering her tough life. For me, once I met Maria, it was an immediate and logical discovery. For her, it took time, effort, and, most importantly, trust. But we agreed just the same. We just wanted to be happy. We didn’t want to bother anyone. It was pretty simple, really. But if we’d told anyone but each other about our passions, we’d be accused of being crazy.

Parents should tell their kids: “Listen, the two most important things in this world are, first, be happy, and second, avoid hurting others in the process.” That’s it. Why bother screwing with kids’ heads about getting the best job, or the best grades, or worshipping a phony baloney God. Think about it: Does it really make any sense to tell a child otherwise? I think a lot of kids grow up hurting people—sometimes physically, sometimes emotionally—because they are concentrating so intently on their plans for success that they forget simply to be happy. People should stop and look around once in a while and realize that life is very short. Even seventy or eighty years of life on Earth is a terribly short time, when compared to rest of history. So why bother hurting yourself, or anyone else? Why bother killing yourself through an insane amount of work? Why bother?

Maria put it best the day we first made love. Afterward, she turned to me and said: “I want to find someone to grow old with.” What a wonderful concept. In that one sentence, Maria summarized my entire philosophy, only I didn’t call it that, because I didn’t realize how special that feeling was, how worthy it was of being called a philosophy.

Maria and I understood that life on Earth is short, and often sinister, so you might as well find someone to help you along, to make you happy. I remember trying to explain this philosophy to you, Mom. You accused me of being high on drugs, so I kicked a table in the kitchen, hurt my foot, and stormed out of the room. At least you never accused me of being on drugs again.

And you never understood, either, and that’s why you were always so depressed and angry. Like the rest of this crazy world, you were waiting for a miracle to come, never realizing that the world and life itself were a miracle. The only important thing is here and now .

Maria and I thought that organized religion was stupid, and it is. For some reason or another, a group of people occasionally assumes spiritual power over others, convincing the others—sometimes millions, other times just a few dozen—that they know a little more about the meaning of life than the rest. And with that, those in power get everyone to feel bad when they make mistakes. But what is religion if not a fiat organized by just a few people with the skill to sway the masses?

I think it’s evil for anyone to say they know what God said or did, just because they read a bunch of old books. If we’re all sinners like they claim, if we’re all imperfect, then who’s to say they know for sure what a particular passage in the Koran or Bible means?

And it’s all part of the smokescreen created by parents and teachers and priests and ministers and rabbis—the smokescreen that hides the truth and makes people think that there’s more to life than simply being happy. Because once a person thinks there’s more to life than being happy—not making tons of money, not being a “success,” not being a good Catholic or Jew or Muslim—then he’ll seek a path toward an imaginary ideal. And it’s when you seek such an ideal that other people, the people who claim to have already reached it, begin to control you. It’s a tragedy, really. And yet it persists.

With those thoughts in my heart, I was determined to never let Maria go. I remember thinking after we made love, I’ve found my religion. It’s Maria. And Maria’s WEFT . That’s how I knew I loved her. Because I’d shunned religion and my family for my whole love, but in Maria there was something I could believe in.

But even though I loved her dearly, I couldn’t help but get a little jealous now and then.

It’s amazing, you know, how you can want something so badly, and even visualize it or whatever, but still act so differently than you need to. What I mean is, I knew that my jealousy was against my desire to live in the here and now. After all, what is jealousy besides obsessing over what has happened, or what could happen, rather than what is?

It was so weird that I don’t know how to describe it. See, I wanted Maria all to myself. The way I saw it, her father and friends had screwed up her past, and she had no future to speak of when I met here. So she was mine.

It started so innocently. Maria would tell me that she was going to her grandmother’s house, for example, and I would feel left out. Or sometimes a guy would call her house—usually a guy that wanted to talk to her sister—and I would ask Maria, “Did you speak to him? Did he flirt with you?” This would make her very angry.

One night, I remember, we were talking on the phone for three and a half hours, and finally, at midnight, she said, “I gotta go do my math homework.” I looked at the clock. It was 12:01, and we both had to be up by six. But I didn’t care. I was actually jealous of her homework.