A cautionary tale for boys of all ages…

I have a friend who at age eighty acts like a thirteen year old boy, who only just discovered that the little bit dangling between his legs has a use other than just relieving the water pressure built up in his bladder.

He spends hours on the internet looking for those photos where naked young females get twisted in all kinds of contorted positions, experiencing fake ecstasies whilst being filled like Christmas turkeys.

Not being content watching those Oscar winning performances, he then delights telling me all about it… at length… He seriously thinks that something is desperately wrong with me, because I am less than enthusiastic about his enthusiasm.

Recently, just before my wife left for a brief holiday, he insisted that, while she was away, he would take me to the "girls" and "initiate" me.

I failed to point out the obvious to him, namely that with two grown up kids of my own and four grandsons to boast, I am way past the initiation phase of my life and the last time I enthused about pictures of naked women was between the ages of thirteen and seventeen. Also, if I intended to visit those girls in the flesh, I would hardly be interested in his help or advice, no matter how expert he believes himself to be in these matters. Instead, just to please him, or rather, just to shut him up, I faithfully promised to follow his example.

Now I was a grass widower. The cat was away, the mouse should get out and play… or at least, that was the presumption…

Let's go and find some "bad girls"… There is no shortage of women willing to do whatever "bad girls" are willing to do, even if it is only done for a suitable remuneration… if only life was that simple…

It is one thing, I assume, ogling at women in the safety of your own room, eyes glued to the computer screen, and it is an entirely different matter finding a desirable "bad girl" out in the concrete jungle… For one thing how do you know that a woman is a "bad girl?" In this modern age of "dressing down" the vast majority of women look just like any other women and although many-many of them - especially the younger ones - dress for the "kill" - with little left for the imagination - it could be foolhardy indeed to assume that they would eagerly leap at an old man… unless of course their intention was to mug you and run with your valet.

No, it isn't easy to find willing "bad girls" when you passed your prime, unless of course you count incidents like the occasion when I visited my mother in the nursing home, about a moth before she passed away. On my way out one dear old biddy, wearing one of the most awful looking lopsided black wig you could ever set eyes on, walked up to me, grabbed my hands, looked deep into my eyes and said:

       - "Oh I love you so much, because you are so beautiful.... one hundred and seventy six,,, we are all good mates... one hundred and eighty seven.. all good mates stay together, and I just love you very, very much because you are so, so beautiful"...

       - "You are a lovely lady" - I answered with some embarrassment and tried to edge my way towards the exit.
She hooked her arm under mine and started walking with me.

       - "Take me home with you, because I love you and I want to live with you... you beautiful man." - she begged.

This kind of confessing her love of me went on for a while until one of the nurses managed to rescue me and I could finally make my way home sighing with relief and without a newly acquired bride....

As soon as I arrived home, my wife - with a morose face, whilst silently cleaning the kitchen floor - informed me that our daughter just started another fever and would I phone her because she wants to talk to me urgently.

I sighed, quickly looked into the mirror and got to the conclusion that my place is very probably back in the nursing home with my mother, my new bride and all those other delightful inmates... after all if a woman in her late eighties with Alzheimer, wearing a lopsided black wig confesses her love of me, wants to live with me... and thinks that I am so beautiful, and adorable, then there must be some hope for me yet... and who am I to argue with such well informed opinion anyway... especially when all I get at home from my beloved wife is:

       - "I cannot understand you... how many times do I have to beg you not to drop crumbs all over the kitchen floor!"...

But, frankly, when one is a grass widower, taking a delightful old lady with a lopsided wig home isn't the kind of excitement one should be looking for…

So, determined to find some "bad girls" I kept on looking… then getting exhausted from just walking and looking, I finally started thinking… which is what I should have done in the first place…

            "OK, let's assume that I find a desirable "bad girl" - I thought - "what next?"

Would I risk of getting to a stage of undressing in front of a "bad girl" only for her to take one look at me and make a snide remark about my connection to Microsoft… because, quite honestly, at my age that's what I could expect… or alternatively a coronary, or an apoplexy, if for no other reason, then when it came to paying for her services…

I suddenly remembered back to my tender age of thirteen when my mother caught me in an embarrassing situation with our nineteen-year-old live-in maid, who was busy "initiating" me. She called her a "bad girl". Frankly, I thought she was a good girl… a very good girl… nay!... a divine girl!... but I did not mention that to my mother…

After telling her off and sending her packing, she took me aside and told me a short tale about a cat.

This Tom cat had the silly habit - according to her tale - of always walking backwards. Than one day as the cat was busy crossing a railway line - walking backwards - a train thundered along and cut of its head. The moral of the tale being that if you follow your tail, you likely to lose your head.

Cheered up and feeling refreshed remembering this story, I felt reassured of keeping my head… for the time being at any rate…

I went back to visit my eighty year old friend, who was still acting his true age of being stuck permanently at the stage of puberty…

He was in a bit of a tizzy… he spent the whole morning in front of his computer, downloading blue movies.

Now he was in trouble… there were a couple of icons and other traces on his screen that screamed: SEX!

He spent the whole afternoon trying desperately to eliminate the embarrassing traces, without success. He was expecting his grandchildren's visit the following day and was petrified of them finding out about grandpa's favourite pastime.

I helped him out of his predicament, clearing out his unwanted telltale signs from his hard disk. I then told him the tale about the cat.

He listened to me with what seemed like an enigmatic smile of a sage on his lips. I must confess, I felt a bit puzzled.

I never asked him what that smile meant, but by the time I got home, I think I figured it out.

There is a major difference between a Tom cat and a human male. When a cat loses its head, that's the end… Curtains…

When a human male loses his head… that is the time he truly finds his tail….

© P. J. Oszmann (2003)

©Illustration created in Publisher and Photoshop