Whenever I read of a profile of a serial rapist or killer or a manifesto from an outcast, political fanatic/assassin, I think, “Sounds like someone I know.”
It is just my lack of ambition, my low-energy nature that have saved me from wreaking more havoc than the small amount I have.
I am, self-diagnosed, “on the spectrum”. Or would be, had the spectrum not been taken away. Lacking ambition, low on energy, I am not likely to query DSM-5 to find what experts now call me.
So, what am I? Me, I. Well, yes, but what does that mean? Once, fifty-plus years back, at a party with then wife’s office mates, I was quipping, riffing on who knows what with someone I’d never before met, when he asked who I was. “Kathy’s husband,” I said. He did not know Kathy. Different department, I assume. In that context, I could not think of any other answer.
Kathy was not there. Computer room had tracked her down and called her to come and fix something that was malfunctioning. We both worked in IT. She had the beginnings of a career. I had a job.
I did meet one serial killer. Though until his headline arrest, I had no knowledge of his extracurricular activities. A computer operator where I worked. I had been drafted to spell a more knowledgeable colleague in teaching IBM Utilities to operations personnel. Colleague needed time to attend Lamaze classes with his wife pending birth of their first child. I was, by this time, wifeless.
My killer “presented” as controlled, smoldering, angry. Just like everyone else. I, I hope, present as calmer. Detached. That’s what I strive for. I would later learn that Frank (not his name), had a reputation for volatility. His company—I was a consultant, a for-hire programmer, not yet an employee—was transitioning from Honeywell to IBM and operations staff feared dismissal. Hence IBM Utilities classes. Unlike automobiles, mainframe computers were not interchangeable as are Chevys, Fords, and Plymouths. (Plymouths, remember them? Well, you have to be a certain age. I once owned a Studebaker. I am old.)
Frank (still not his name), was a senior Honeywell console operator. That was his skill set. Useless in an IBM shop. Since the conversion was not complete, the IBM mainframe was not always staffed and was available for testing. Though not a computer operator, I was able to back it out of the driveway, as it were, and get it on the road. Sometimes. In those more trusting days, the company allowed a non-employee, untrained, non-operator access to their million dollar mainframe. Someone should have been fired.
I got stuck. So I wandered over to Honeywell area and asked for help. Frank came over and got things running. The S/360s monitor screen had been keyed. Someone later speculated it was Frank’s handiwork. I got back to my testing. Mounting tapes, feeding card reader. Whatever.
Much later, after most systems had been transitioned to IBM and tape drives were removed from console area, I, now an employee, was testing another system. Frank, now a tape mounter, sitting on a high stool before a monitor (unkeyed), fetching, replacing, mounting, dismounting reels from the racks. A comedown from chief console operator. We were chatting about something as I awaited completion of my run.
Prompted by my marriage disaster, I was reading pop psychology—I’m Okay, You’re Okay sort of stuff. Seeing Frank, on his high stool, hands tucked into his pants, awaiting instructions from the computer, I thought, “Castration fear.”
No other contact with serial rapists and killers. That I know of.
But, yes, there but for the grace of God—which art neither in heaven nor elsewhere—go I. Put it down to lack of ambition. Low energy. (Lack of opportunity?) Thank God.
I recall telling future-ex-wife-to-be my ambition: “To live as comfortably as I can with as little inconvenience as possible.” I later added “for myself and others”. Grandiose generosity, that. I suspect this came to me after Classics 101. Epictetus and Epicurus. Upper frosh, lower soph. 18 or 19.
Except marriage, I have managed to do that. Mostly. FEWTB got on with her life, raised a family (yes, I cyberstalk), ended up chief of IT at her company. I, albeit in a negative way, contributed to that. My crowning achievement. Had we, as I proposed, parted post graduation—mine college, hers high school—would she have fared as well?
Anyway, that breakup. I said I did not want to get married. Did not want children. She did not want to be friends unless marriage and children were on the agenda. Though unchaste, we were not intimate.
Breakup lasted four days. I caved.
I take some small comfort in acknowledging wisdom of my younger self. Had I but listened.
Wudda-shudda-cudda. Less to regret.
