“A bird in the hand is worth four in the bush.” (stylized popular saying) To be honest, Joe had decided not to invite his ex-girlfriend to the graduation party, which had many peculiarities. There were two reasons for this. One, more obvious, was that the relationship had ended a few months before while he was […]

I had asked Joe, an engineer specializing in electronic instrumentation for vehicles and industrial machinery, back in the late 1980s, to accompany me for a day to a government agency based in Rio de Janeiro, more precisely in Parada de Lucas, at the zero point of highway BR-116. Th e reason was that the assembly […]

Joe was widowed in the broadest sense. He wanted a partner, but in the face of his downfalls he was quite reticent: “She would have to be someone spectacular, perfect”. Under these circumstances, since he rarely socialized, he would be left, without realizing it, with the chance at an event that taking place annually among […]

The set of complex numbers arose from the impossibility of extracting the root of a negative number, when working with real numbers. In other words, it is impossible in the real world. We are somehow in the realm of the imaginary, when impossible operations are associated with real operations. In the realm of the surreal. […]

Puellae sunt malae There are incredible and surreal things in life, because the years pass and relationships remain, whatever the reasons for them. Joe never crossed paths with Silly again (nicknamed -j, due to the complexity of understanding what was going on in her mind). Silly -j had a strident and unpleasant vocal range in […]

Joe rarely talked to anyone or made new friends. He didn’t go to parties or bars, with friends or relatives, dedicating most of his time to his kids who were slowly leaving childhood. He was just waiting for them to finish college so he could go his own way. I understood this, and found it […]

Joe first met the teenager Natalie Karinest two years before they began dating. Although she had a crush on him when she was fifteen, the lovebirds only started getting involved when she was already worthy of the seventeen club. Her name was commonly given to girls born around X-mas, which was her case, since she […]

There are many stories with the same final moral. This was the story of someone who didn’t want to see anyone “even if he is painted gold”. A fable that starts off wrong. My wife Jane told me that with an old acquaintance, whom she hadn’t seen for over a decade, they went to a […]

In opposite to popular belief, a great man does not always have a great woman by his side, and vice versa. This was possibly the case of Fritz Teddy Schwarz, who began his business life by manufacturing teddy bears (hence his epithet) in exotic colors, which became all the rage in Bavaria, as they were […]

Anjelika met an older man who, after decades of life and a complicated broken marriage, including the lack of a meaningful carnal and conjugal relationship, appeared to be a balanced person who deserved her affection for a relationship. According to Joe, Anjelika was a beautiful woman, not a candidate for perfection, with an unusual face […]

A colleague of mine left this planet a few years ago in a very strange way, which is not worth going into. As they say, when there is not much to say, “sadly”, to quickly wrap up the whole story. When I remembered my memories of conversations, I remembered that (forty years ago) this same […]

The newly engaged couple got permission from the girl’s parents to go to an event (an opening) in the uptown part of the city known as Big Spike. They were accompanied by a friend of the young man, and two other girls, neighbors to the girlfriend. After the vernissage, and upon getting into the vehicle, […]

The Oscar (a male name), an award from the Hollywood film academy, is also the name of several individuals who were honored by local authorities, becoming the name of a street in various parts of the world (for instance, Oscar Wilde Street!). Besides name of streets of American cities (Oscar is a street name there, […]

A classmate from mine undergraduate days, Joe, used to go almost every Saturday to a dance club called Strondus in a small town, not very close to our city. He had a habit of going there to have a few beers, and eat a peculiar snack with French bread, ham, melted cheese, tomato and oregano. […]

In the 1970s and 1980s, when disco music was in full swing, it was relatively common for parents, with some purchasing power, to throw parties for their daughters and hire local sound and lighting experts. These were young men (not professionals) who offered this type of service for an innocent “little party”, with a crowd […]

During a trip between NY Penn Station and D.C. Union Station, Joe had told me that when beauty fades and nothing remains, the person becomes doubly terrifying, especially when it comes to someone in the public eye, who exposes their life in such a way that it is inevitable to recognize their futility and superficiality. […]

“You never forget your first boyfriend” (popular saying) During a wedding event, back in the 1980s, among the whispered topics, a story came up that Joe’s ex-girlfriend, years after they got apart, who had gotten married two years earlier and had a little girl, was going through difficulties, which was related to her husband’s job […]

Joe had said that he had lost his father and two years later, his girlfriend. The loss of his father was something that would mark him for the rest of his life, and it is common even in old age to feel deeply homesick. Dad was the only actual friend he had; others were drinking […]

“Samantha, my everlasting girlfriend and my blessed love … do you marry me?”. In a rush, the beauty and passionate woman says: “Yes, yes, yes! I will marry you forever, my love! Every day, every minute and second of my life! Hold me love, forever! You are my life… I will be your sweet and […]

A pleasant summer evening walking on Boston Common. My academic colleague Joe, and I. He a European East born and I, an East South American origin. During the chat, he told me about a personal incident from the past, when we were talking about the difficulties of dating, for young and not so young people… […]