A Club for Exclusivity

The Club Toruño-Martin Celebrates 10 Years of Exclusivity 

                When I told my mother that, yes, the man in my life was absolutely wonderful but "I know he lies," she said, "That could work."  When I laughed, she said, "I mean, as long as you know he's lying."

                Before I talk about that, let me talk about what has, in fact, worked.

                My meque and I celebrated the tenth anniversary of The Club Toruño-Martin this past September, when we went to the Oakland Museum, a short BART ride from San Francisco, to see an exhibition of 1968, the year I graduated from college and he returned from what he refers to as his “deportation” to his native country.  (His student visa had expired, so he drove back to Costa Rica in his VW bug to get another one.)  We did other things too, my meque and I.

                Meque is a word I created to stand for Mejor Que Un Esposo, Better than a Husband, which is what Javier is, and I try to be better than a wife—same acronym (mejor que una esposa—feminine ending).  But before I encourage you to find a meque of your own and form your own club, I’ll provide some background.

                After two marriages, I’d figured out that I really liked living alone, but I hadn’t given up on men and the idea of an exclusive relationship, sharing a life if not a home.  I am faithful in love and love continuity.    The last relationship  I’d been in was  with a man who was absolutely charming but gave me the feeling that he was living a double life, a thought I shared with my  friend Steve, who was my boyfriend when I was sixteen.  (As I say, I am faithful in love and love continuity.)  In fact, Steve called on New Year’s Eve when the Double Lifer was with me in the living room, where I was still unwrapping all the presents he’d gotten for me for Christmas.  (He said he had to be away with his two sons on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day so was lavishing me with gifts afterwards.)    When the phone rang, I stayed on the couch and let the message machine do its job.  Steve’s voice came on, “I just wanted to wish you a happy new year and a happy trip with this slightly duplicitous man who’s taking you to London.”  It was after returning from the trip to London with this “slightly duplicitous man” that I got a call from another woman in his life, who informed me that I was The Other Woman.  She’d had him first, she said, and he’d never broken up with her.    I told them both that she could have him. 

               

                I took a long break, and then on a study sabbatical over a decade ago, I was on campus in the Women’s restroom, which had a lounge being used as a copy room.    I missed having a man in my life, but there were too few hours in a day.  I wanted to brush up on my Spanish, and I wanted to date, and I knew that the only way I could do both was to date a Spanish-speaking man.  As I was thinking this, a man of retirement age walked into the room, greeted me politely, and asked whether I was using the copy machine.  I was impressed that he asked me because some instructors, in a frantic effort to get their handouts duplicated before class, ignore the person already at the copier and plop their original down on the glass, proceeding to make thirty copies.  I was seated and not in the motion of pressing the Start button, so I noticed right away that this man was courteous.  I also noticed that he had an accent.

                We talked, and I found out that he was from Costa Rica.  He found out that I was going to Oaxaca in a couple of months and that I really wanted to work on my Spanish.

                As we talked, he started to look younger and younger and more and more interesting.   

                We eventually set a date and went to Tiburon, where we walked, had lunch on the water, and switched to Spanish midway through the day.

                This is perfect!  I thought.  He was charming, warm, a lot of fun to be with, and his Spanish was excellent!  But  when he said, “So would you like to get together again?” I prefaced my “Yes!  Oh, yes!” with a statement a friend had made around that time.

                “You know, a friend of mine was saying, ‘I’d like to do less more slowly.”  

                He said, “Well, we could get together once a month.”

                I wanted to take back what I’d just said about less more slowly.  I wanted to do more faster.  But I just said, “Once a month, like a book club.”

                “Why not?” he said.

                I liked his “why not?” spirit, and after he dropped me off, I wrote up the minutes for our first club meeting-- in Spanish-- and left them in his faculty mail box for correction.  This is how we started a very special use of our inner-departmental envelope. 

                The next month, when we went out again, we spoke exclusively in Spanish and I offered to pay for lunch because he’d paid the first time, but he said, “No, it’s my job to pay because you write up the minutes of our meetings.”

                “Then if I’m secretary,” I said, “you can be president.  By acclamation.”

                He accepted my unanimous vote and took on the position, even suggesting that we have an objective for our club.  Para promover la paz, la tranquilidad, la alegría, y el cariño entre socios, which translates to promote peace, tranquility, joy and affection between members. 

                That’s when I knew I would love him forever.

                I created a letter head for our club stationary, which I used for all the minutes.

Club Toruño-Martin

Establecido septiembre 2002

Una organización para promover

la alegría, la paz, la tranquilidad, y el cariño entre socios

                To the question “Are there any additions or corrections to the minutes as read?” there were always corrections, and my Spanish has gotten no worse that it was after a year in Spain.

                In our third month, during a particularly warm embrace, I informed Javier, who often gave me compliments but had never said he loved me, that I would never make love with a man who didn’t love me.

                “Te quiero!”  (I love you!) he said, without missing a beat.

                Soon he was closing all e-mail messages with “Te adoro,” and I was closing mine “Te quiero.”

                He almost immediately wrote into the bylaws of the Club Toruño-Martin that he would never come to the door of the club house without flowers for the other member of our club, and in the past ten years, even after our club started meeting more than monthly, he has never broken this rule.   I wish I could say that I have done as good a job as secretary, but he doesn’t wish I could.  I think he was relieved when he retired and was no longer on campus to pick up the minutes of the meeting  to correct.  I soon stopped writing them.  But I have a whole shelf full of binders from the years 2002-2007.  Since then I’ve tried to substitute for the minutes by copying and pasting every single e-mail message between us.  Just to give you an idea, this year so far I see that there are 942 messages in the Club Toruño-Martin Mail Folder in Outlook, and we used texting instead of e-mail for the month he was attending to family business in Costa Rica.  (His sister died this past year, leaving behind money and two houses.)     Last year there were only 329 for the whole year, but that may be because there was some dissension in the club and less cariño entre socios than usual.  (But that’s another essay.)  The year before, however, in 2010, there were 1114!  That’s communication!  That’s keeping in touch as only people living apart can do.

                The Club Toruño-Martin has regular meetings every weekend, from Saturday afternoon until Sunday afternoon during which time we sometimes take excursions and  sing together in Spanish on our ride across Golden Gate Bridge.   He has an amazing repertoire of songs from all countries of Central and South America, and he also knows some songs in English.  I especially like to hear him sing  “Take Me Home Country Roads” and “Come on Baby Light Papaya,”  which is how he first understood the song by the Doors.  But our club members like down time too, when we  watch movies on Netflix, read the newspaper,   have dinner, and (fade out).  On Sunday mornings, newly energized, we resume our club activities.   Then we walk to breakfast at our favorite spot in my neighborhood and partake of the Sunday paper, which we still read in print as we immerse ourselves in the peace, tranquility, joy, and affection between members of the club. 

                My meque also meets special needs, accompanying when I  go to see my brother, who  lives in a locked facility for those with neurological problems,  to take him out to lunch so that I won’t be alone if my brother has a seizure.  Not everyone’s partner wants to do this kind of thing, but my meque is always does it willingly and warmly, helping my brother and me both feel loved.

                In  the ten years since our club was founded,  the activities that can be mentioned include day trips to Point Reyes and Stern Grove, overnights in Carmel , Bodega Bay, and Napa and  longer trips through Alajuela in Costa Rica, Peru and Ecuador, China, New Mexico, and Kaua’i.   (Before he moved to Manhattan,  my son picked us up at the airport with a sign specifying CLUB TORUNO-MARTIN.)       Members of the Club Toruño-Martin   have sometimes invited others to join us in some of our activities, but the club has maintained its exclusivity of two and plans to para siempre.

                He also gives the world’s best massages, and of all the men I’ve ever loved, he’s the one who has shown the greatest talent for sustaining  the romantic and the sexual.  He’s also the most uninhibited.  This amazes me because he looks like everyone’s favorite granddad, and I just don’t think his grandchildren have any idea! 

                I love my meque’s  sense of humor and the fact that my laugh excites him.  I’m glad that he’s less difficult than I am and more of a nurturer—a gardener for  my desire to be the potted plant.  He says he’ll take care of me in my old age or send for someone from Costa Rica to take care of us both, and that sounds good to me because, as  I told him,  if he ever gets ill, I won’t  be a good nurse, but I’ll be there to crawl into bed with him and let a nurse take care of both of us.

                Except for an assisted-living nurse, I don’t think our club will ever  broaden its membership.  But don’t feel bad.  You can start one of your own.