"Sniggerlings: My Perverted Values"

 

My Perverted Values

      My wife bought me a wedding band for my birthday next November. I lost my other one thirty years ago and never had the money or inclination to replace it. She bought herself a matching set of two rings:  diamonds in swirly, girly patterns. When she asked me why I liked the one I chose, I said that it was big enough to give some wise guy a rap in the mouth. Since it's on my left hand, it would have to be delivered with a left hook. My arms are too short to jab with it.  I would wear it like one-fifth of a set of brass(or silver) knuckles. I grew up in the Projects in North Houston, a tough neighborhood.

      By her reaction, I got the sense that women don't have the same reasons to appreciate rings as men. My wife's set has a big diamond in the middle. Her left hook would leave more than a bruise.  Her repertoir also includes a short, violent groin kick.  We've been married thirty-six years.  She grew up near Compton and Watts, in North Long Beach, a tough neighborhood.  She's my best friend.

 

      The other night I told my wife I had bought a carton of salsa and asked her what classic TV show she would like to watch while we made it disappear.  She said CHiPs.   

      Hello, 1976:  Erik Estrada and Disco.  I doubt that the Pearly Gates of Heaven will shine any brighter than Ponch's toothy smile on a CHiP(California Highway Patrol) motorcycle. 

      My grandfather Clyde, who ran with Clyde Barrow and Bonnie Parker in South Dallas in the Roaring Twenties, used to have a country way of describing things.  When I looked at Estrada's smile, I thought of Granddaddy's contemptuous simile.  He would have said the actor looked like he had a "'shit-eating' grin".  I had to go to college to learn that the polite way of saying 'shit-eating' was in Greek -- coprophagous.  For example flies are coprophagous.  My granddaddy would have compared them to Estrada's smile.  I don't think that's fair, but the actor did look a little too ... something.  mm