A Ronulian Story: RonJeff

Ron is a real person.  A Ronulian is someone who acts like Ron.  A Ronduh puts up with him.  Happy Ronday!

Jeff and I met in college. We were in the same performance group, and often got paired together on stage – so we struck up a camaraderie that went from a light-hearted friendship to an off-and-on dating relationship. No commitments, we just accompanied each other to some on-campus events and had occasional meals together at the campus dining common.

I took a job in town after my junior year, and Jeff went to Nova Scotia for the summer. When Jeff returned for his senior year, he met some of my summertime friends, including someone I had gone on a few dates with.

Strangely, each meeting the other brought out their competitive nature, and the two of them were suddenly asking me on dates every weekend. It was slightly flattering, until you realized it was just one-upmanship vs. actual ardor. This went on for several months until I decided to move back home to help out my mother.

I talked to Jeff occasionally on the phone, and we would sometimes write, but we both moved on with our lives and returned to our friendship status.

Then, almost 7 months after I had moved away, Jeff called and announced he was coming to visit me. He was making a road trip with 2 other stops on the way, and would be at my house in a week. I hung up the phone and went down to tell my mother.

“Why is he coming?” my mother asked.

“I have no idea,” I admitted.

When Jeff arrived, there were hugs and smiles. We chatted about our lives and I introduced him to my mother. He told me about his trip so far, and the people he had stopped to visit along the way: a girl from college whom he had dated off-and-on but had broken his heart, and another girl he had met through the first girl, and with whom he had started a long distance friendship. And now he was here.

My mom and I looked wordlessly at each other across the table, and then went back to eating our meal. The three of us played a few board games after dinner before calling it a night.

The next morning after breakfast, I took Jeff for a walk around my town. Once we were about a half a mile down the road, I asked him, “Why are you here? Not that I’m not happy to see you – but what’s up?”

Jeff smiled and said, “Well, now that I’ve graduated from college I feel like it’s time to start my life. Y’know – find a wife, get a job, settle down. So I figured I would take a trip, visit my three top choices and see which one I should marry.”

I thanked Jeff for including me as one of his “three top choices” but informed him kindly that I was disqualifying myself because I just didn’t care for him that way.

“Okay,” he accepted graciously. “I was a little worried because of your weight anyway. But I was willing to overlook that if everything else seemed workable.”

Girls, can you believe I let him get away?