Nudge closer. I want to share with you – not a secret – not in any blabby sense – but a glimpse.

See that guy reading his program four rows back – mid-sixties, neat enough but not showy, hair a little scruffy – remember that face? That’s right – him – but don’t stare – how many years ago now? a dozen? a score! – you couldn’t open a newspaper without seeing him. (We had newspapers then.) A king – in his little kingdom. I knew him – to say hi to – and he to me – with practiced affability – for I was a king too, a princeling maybe – neither of us potentates, but potent enough to be polite to.

A shock, eh? He was so well known! He lost that election by – what? – a few hundred votes? Made a huge fuss, alleged crimes even. Ugly – when he’d worked so hard at being pleasant, buttoned-up, not a hair out of place, then losing, it was like unwrapping a melted chocolate bar, revealing the glop within. What’s that line from Shakespeare? – “Nothing in his life became him like the leaving it.”  With tiny titan here, it was the opposite. Nothing in his life shamed him like losing his big job. It was as if nobody on earth had ever lost a contest before. Sure, it was a surprise – to him anyhow – I sort of saw it coming (at least in hindsight). He’d been so cocky with his aw-shucks humility, taking reelection for granted. Then whammo. And after that he kept running – for tinier and tinier offices – and losing. He needed a job – and couldn’t land one. Nobody wanted him. He wasn’t even a lawyer – or smart enough to be a lobbyist, I guess. He hadn’t been anything really – a mid-level schlub with a nice face – and then he won and won again – and began strutting like a winner (with his practiced affability) – convinced he deserved his eminence – then that loss – by so few votes – and pop, like a balloon.

His tantrum lasted – months maybe – as long as any news-guy would listen – but then everybody got bored, irritated, like at a bedtime mosquito. He dropped out of sight. Must have made a living somehow – not a street-corner bum. If you’ve been famous – in your little way – someone will hire you – to boast about it. “Oh yeh, I’ve got so-and-so in charge of my P.R.” Almost as good as a trophy wife.

Then he started running again – for those penny-ante offices – and losing – until even to have known him was not something to discuss. He made a living somehow, obviously didn’t starve, filing away those famous days, I’m guessing, like a chapter in a story. Has-beens don’t see themselves as has-beens – they’re human beings, with stories, unless they melt down altogether. We fit our facts like mosaic shards into new patterns.

I should say hello – but I’m not going to. He doesn’t want to be remembered. Or maybe it’s I who doesn’t want to remember. Sometimes I bump into my old princeling self and cringe. It’s not like I embarrassed myself back then, I was just so, well, eager – for the wrong things. If only I could be a hot shot! – as if there were such a thing. Him too. We flattered each other by playing hot-shots together, blowing up – what’s that awful phrase? – each other’s skirt.

I’m better now, that’s my story anyhow: kinder, less grand, better values. Happier – much. Less like – you know who. For some folks it takes a lifetime to find a self that fits. With tiny titan too, it can’t have been easy. I’m curious. But no, let him be.