The Nut

I make mention often of my partner Patrick. No I'm not a gay man but what the hell do you call your boyfriend after 20 odd years that isn't yet your husband?  There is no commonlaw in New York.  Anyway, I call him P in the blog to protect his anonymity.  My sister calls him Peanut, which I found hysterical and since we like to collect nicknames for each other, Pnut stuck and later became just 'the nut'. 
He's been my guinea pig  for all concoctions good or bad throughout the years. I've almost sent him to his death bed more than a few times with bad chicken alone. I blew his ass out once when I put a few habaneros under his meat on his plate to add some heat but they weren't meant to eat. Bad thing was, I forgot to tell him.  He ate one whole and couldn't breathe, then for some reason, he took another huge bite! He thought he was gonna die for like an hour. That was really funny to me.
But he remains a good sport and still trusts enough to try just about anything I put in front of him.

We met in San Francisco in the beginning of the fabulous 90's.  He was just a boy of 27. He was a bit of a drifter and had been living all around.  I wasn't sure what to make of him for about 7 years. Speaking of gay,  since there were almost zero suitors in that town that used their penis for good, (that's a joke!)  as we desperate girls used to say, I was happily planning on being alone forever.  A sad excuse for a hag. I was skinny and had no boobs. Am I wrong or do the boys seem to prefer their gal pals chubby and heavy chested?! Yes it seemed I was destined to kick around on Polk Street forever with my skinny male pal KK. 

KK actually introduced me to P.  He was a coworker and friend at a local record store that later KK  ended up buying and running with his partner John. One day KK said 'I have a cowboy for you' or something to that effect.  I'm no dummy,  so I got myself 'man ready' and stomped down to that store to fetch me a mate.  P wore a cowboy hat & boots, had the best lips ever and was from the Midwest.  Sold!

22 years later we're still making each other miserable laugh.

I've always loved the old television comics from the past that spoke disrespectfully of their spouses.  Like Phyllis Diller and Fang.  Remember on the Dick Van Dyke Show when Morey Amsterdam's character Buddy Sorrell spoke of 'Pickles'?  I got such a kick out of those mystery mates.  P is my Fang, partly truth and partly fiction (and a problem when he's stoned).  He loves his beer or as I call it, his true love.  He's an amazing songwriter.  He plays the guitar every night and even though he can sing purdy, he likes to taunt me by croaking out the lyrics many times. Let's face it, men are strange.  I can't figure him.  He's either being a simple man that is drunk over-the-moon about life or he is afflicted with some unspoken torment and spreads enough stink around the apartment to take out every ounce of peace I've tried to build up.   But alas, it's New York and we can't afford to live apart, so you learn to block out love each others idiosyncrasies. 

Update: Married the nut 8/2014, so it's official, friends no more. And due to complications of getting older, P's beer drinking came to a slow drip.  All good things.