you're dense
you were in bed one night, in the softness that comes at the beginning of a relationship. she ran her fingers over your body and murmured in english, 'you're dense.'
rather than get defensive as a native speaker and assume the worst, you hesitated. a pregnant pause and a playful pinch of her earlobe later you asked her to explain.
she had clearly looked up the word earlier in the day, not knowing the negative connotations - slow-witted, obtuse, narrow-minded. she worked through her vocabulary patiently.
she meant that you seemed to have a lot of mass relative to your body size. like a neutron star - you figured out together after a few minutes.
it was then you understood. you had been with one woman before who had the same physiological quality, though at the time you couldn't put it into words or thoughts.
but, you had never realized it about yourself. why would you - you'd been in the same body for decades.
you're not sure why the memory came up today. perhaps because you're exercising again and the muscle has come up easily like it always does. perhaps you're just becoming even more aware of your physical presence in space.
whatever the case, it's not a coincidence that the memory revealed itself today, a day when you've felt yourself - serious, jaw-clenched and a surge of pissed off in your eyes and blood.
that's your real self, and you've missed him. not the clown, not the soft-spoken, soft-bodied phantom. not the man who 'understands' that people may have their reasons for acting cruel.
the dense man - deliberately so - and very much welcome and needed.