"That's okay. I still love him."
Posted on 10/02/2005 9:33:36 AM PDT by weegee
After the love (for Bill) is gone THE WAY WE WERE Writer recalls the betrayal that ended their political affair
I BROKE up with Bill a long time ago. It's always hard to remember love — years pass and you say to yourself, was I really in love or was I just kidding myself? Was I really in love or was I just pretending he was the man of my dreams? Was I really in love or was I just desperate? But when it came to Bill, I'm pretty sure it was the real deal. I loved the guy.
As for Bill, I have to be honest: He did not love me. In fact, I never even crossed his mind. Not once. But in the beginning that didn't stop me. I loved him, I believed in him, and I didn't even think he was a liar. Of course, I knew he'd lied about his thing with Gennifer, but at the time I believed that lies of that sort didn't count. How stupid was that?
Anyway, I fell out of love with Bill early in the game — over gays in the military. That was in 1993, after he was inaugurated, and at that moment my heart turned to stone. People use that expression and mean it metaphorically, but if your heart can turn to stone and not have it be metaphorical, that's how stony my heart was where Bill was concerned.
I'd had faith in him. I'd been positive he'd never back down. How could he? But then he did, he backed down just like that. He turned out to be just like the others. So that was it. Goodbye, big guy. I'm out of here. Don't even think about calling. And by the way, if your phone rings and your wife answers and the caller hangs up, don't think it's me because it's not.
By the time Bill got involved with Monica, you'd have thought I was past being hurt by him. You'd have thought I'd have shrugged and said, I told you so, you can't trust the guy as far as you can spit. But much to my surprise, Bill broke my heart all over again. I couldn't believe how betrayed I felt. He'd had it all, he'd had everything, and he'd thrown it away, and here's the thing: It wasn't his to throw away. It was ours. We'd given it to him, and he'd squandered it.
Years passed. I'd sit around with friends at dinner talking about How We Got Here and Whose Fault Was It? Was it Nader's fault? Or Gore's? Or Scalia's? Even Monica got onto the list, because after all, she delivered the pizza, and that pizza was truly the beginning of the end.
Most of my friends had a hard time narrowing it down to a choice, but not me: Only one person was at fault, and it was Bill. I drew a straight line from that pizza to the war. The way I saw it, if Bill had behaved, Al would have been elected, and thousands and thousands of people would be alive today who are instead dead.
I bring all this up because I bumped into Bill the other day. I was watching the Sunday news programs, and there he was. I have to say, he looked good. And he was succinct, none of that wordy blah-blah thing that used to drive me nuts. He'd invited a whole bunch of people to a conference in New York and they'd spent the week talking about global warming, and poverty, and all sorts of obscure places he knows a huge amount about.
When Bill described the conference, it was riveting. I could see how much he cared; and of course, I could see how smart he was. It was so refreshing. It was practically moving. To my amazement, I could even see why I'd loved the guy in the first place. It made me sadder than I can say. It's much easier to get over someone if you can delude yourself into thinking you never really cared that much.
Then, later in the week, I was reading about Bill's conference, and I came upon something that made me think, for just a moment, that Bill might even want me back. "I've reached an age now where it doesn't matter whatever happens to me," he said. "I just don't want anyone to die before their time any more." It almost really got to me. But then I came to my senses. And instead I just wanted to pick up the phone and call him and say, if you genuinely believe that, you hypocrite, why don't you stand up and take a position against this war?
But I'm not calling. I haven't called in years and I'm not starting now.
Ephron, based in New York, is a writer and director.
-But then I came to my senses.-
Um...that can be refuted just by reading the article. No wonder lefty's "self esteem" programs never work; they have no experience of it in natural form.
It's even more ridiculous for this dingbat to consider Al Gore anyone to be trusted with leadership.
I don't want neurotic and childish people like this having a say in how serious political and military decisions are made.
These people are so different from the sane and mature folks in our camp, it is really scary they are allowed to vote.
It's like handing a loaded pistol to a pre-schooler.
It just again proves that liberalism is a mental disorder.
The war, she's talking about the war in Iraq. As if leftists ever cared about soldiers.
I need no further reassurance that we will not only win in Iraq, but winning there represents the defeat of the American fifth-column within.
They see it; why can't we?
Isn't Nora Ephron Carl Bernstein's EX-wife?? Didn't he cheat like hell on her? She sounds pitiful...like a little teeny bopper trying to find a date.
Yes.....She's mad that he didn't get the gays in the military OPENLY like he wanted!!! Is she gay? Is Carl Bernstein gay? Is her daughter gay? Why do so many seemingly straight people want OPNELY GAY people in the military??? Do they NOT think of what that would mean in the barracks and on the field and everywhere else? Geesh.
Nora Ephron is, most assuredly, not, ah, "little".
"It's much easier to get over someone if you can delude yourself into thinking you never really cared that much." ----
very true.
One interesting conclusion I draw from the article is that Bill's popularity is not what it was, and it probably won't transfer to Hillary.
Let's hope. But I still have great fear of the ability of the old media to rebuild Bill and portray Hillary as all-wonderful. It started in 1969 at Wellesley after all.
***
By the way...... you never answered my somewhat silly question from a couple of weeks ago: Are you related to Margaret Rutherford?
;-)
LOL! I thought I had. No...I am a long-time fan of the Agatha Christie books, and when I joined back in 1998, we were all doing detective work on Clinton's many scandals...hence the name.
'Miss Marple'........ one of the best and most meaningful screen names on the site.
Some day I'll make a list of my favorites, but yours is great. 'Cats Pajamas' is a good one, but there are so many.
Gotta get out of here now, go out in the nursery in this early morning cool mist (here in Pittsburgh), and feed some plants.
Take care.
It was okay to lie to us and over time liberals are learning that bill was lying to them and not us, we all knew him for what he was.
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