George and Lizzie

by Nancy Pearl

  It soon became evident that Elaine was already caught up in a kind of wedding madness. On the way to the airport the next day, she pulled into a parking space in front of Steve’s Sundries. “This’ll just take a sec,” she called back to them as she hurried inside. A few minutes later she came back with an armful of magazines and said triumphantly, “Look! I got a copy of every bridal magazine they had. Do you want to take some to read on the plane?”

  George was inclined to accept his mother’s offer of an issue or two until Lizzie looked at him sternly. “Oh, no, you keep those. We’ll pick up some in Ann Arbor,” he said, a bit reluctantly. It seemed he was actually interested in weddings and their complicated etiquette. For herself, Lizzie couldn’t imagine perusing a magazine called anything like Happy Bride or Modern Weddings, unless there was one called something like Weddings for the Reluctant Bride Who Is Probably in Love with a Previous Boyfriend. In any case, there was really no need for her to actually read anything on the subject of weddings, because from then until the party the following December, Elaine clipped countless articles and pictures that she sent to Lizzie, underlining the parts that she thought were particularly relevant to the upcoming event.

  * George & Lizzie Tell Mendel & Lydia the News *

  As soon as they got back to Ann Arbor, George insisted that they go tell Lydia and Mendel the big news, though he’d still not yet even met Lydia. George hadn’t been at the last Bultmann Thanksgiving because his grandmother had fallen and broken her hip and George wanted to see her, even though he and Lizzie would be back in Tulsa a few weeks later. That was the kind of guy George was. So it was utterly shocking to him that he hadn’t even met his future mother-in-law. That situation needed to be rectified at once. They were all going to be part of the same family.

  Lizzie warned George not to expect too much from either parent. “First of all, don’t count on any excitement at all,” she went on. “And I wouldn’t be surprised if Mendel didn’t remember you. Plus they’ll be annoyed we interrupted them doing whatever they were doing.” George nodded but didn’t believe any of these were accurate predictions.

  Lizzie, however, was correct on all counts. When she and George came into the dining room, the Bultmanns were sitting at the table, smoking and drinking coffee. Mendel got up and shook George’s hand, saying that he was pleased to meet him. Lizzie looked at George with satisfaction. Right again.

  “You met him last year at Thanksgiving,” Lizzie told her father.

  “Oh, did I? There are always so many people here it’s hard to keep track.”

  “Did I meet you then?” Lydia asked George.

  Lizzie spoke before George could say anything. “No, we couldn’t find you when George got here and we still couldn’t find you when we left.”

  “I suppose you didn’t check my office, did you?”

  Ever since meeting George, Lizzie had made a conscious effort not to clench her teeth, but right now it was impossible not to. “No,” she said. “I didn’t think to check your office. It was Thanksgiving, I thought you’d be down here with everyone else.”

  Lydia made a noise that sounded like “pfui.”

  “But you should probably imprint George on your memory, because we’re getting married,” Lizzie added flatly.

  “Married,” echoed Mendel.

  “Yes,” George said, speaking formally, saying just what your usual parent would want to hear from the man your daughter was going to marry, that he adored their daughter more than they could ever imagine. Lizzie believed that sentence contained probably the truest words George had ever spoken. Lizzie was sure that Mendel and Lydia couldn’t imagine anyone adoring their daughter.

  Mendel shook George’s hand again, murmuring his congratulations. Lydia got up and gave them each a traditional Bultmann hug, but that was that. Neither asked to see Lizzie’s ring or inquired about when the wedding would be. They were in the house and then they were out. Ten minutes after Lizzie opened the front door, she closed it behind them.

  “Whoof,” George said, taking a deep breath of fresh air. It had been very smoky inside. “I might have to rethink some things that I’ve always believed to be true.”

  In the car, Lizzie leaned over and kissed George. “I love you,” she said, and it might at that moment have been true. And then she poked him in the side and said, “Told you so.”

  * Marla & James Get Married, June 1995 *

  James and Marla got married immediately after they graduated; George and Lizzie six months later. Mrs. Cantor and James’s mother planned it down to its final sumptuous detail. Lizzie knew that Marla thought her wedding day was almost exactly four years too late and that James was still so angry at his parents and Marla’s that he could barely remain civil when he was with them.

  Lizzie and Marla drove back and forth from Ann Arbor to Cleveland often that spring, because between James’s and Marla’s extended families and their parents’ many friends there were wedding showers galore, and Marla wanted Lizzie to be at every one. After each of them, Marla would go through the gifts and give Lizzie any duplicates as well as anything that she didn’t want to keep. There were many rejected items. Marla hadn’t wanted to register for gifts anywhere, so the two mothers filled out the registries themselves, spending several satisfying Saturdays selecting towels and linen sets, china (both everyday and good), silver (sterling and silver plate), and kitchenware (which came in many more colors than were available when the mothers themselves had gotten married more than a quarter of a century before). This was how Lizzie and George eventually ended up with a lot of Marla and James’s discarded loot, including a whistling teakettle (red), a teak salad bowl set, some dish towels, a travel clock, two books (The Silver Palate Cookbook and The New Moosewood Cookbook), and a pair of crystal candlesticks, as well as various pieces of silverware that weren’t the same pattern that the mothers had registered for.

  Since Marla had refused to ask James to convert, the rabbi at the Park, the Cantors’ synagogue, declined to perform the ceremony. Instead the wedding took place at a big downtown hotel, with a more liberal rabbi and James’s family’s priest sharing the duties of marrying them. Lizzie was the maid of honor and George was one of James’s groomsmen. After James had broken the glass—a Jewish tradition—and taken Marla into his arms for their first kiss as husband and wife, both of them burst into tears. Looking at the photos later, there was no sign that they’d cried. In fact, the naked happiness on their faces frightened Lizzie. It was unlikely she’d look that elated when she married George in, let’s see, about a hundred and eighty days from now, although George undoubtedly would. Why, Lizzie wondered for the umpteenth time, why did he love her so much? Couldn’t he see what a flawed, imperfect, pretty terrible person she was? Why couldn’t Jack have loved her more? Because he obviously saw everything negative about her that George missed. Maybe she could request that there be no photos taken at their wedding. Ha! Good luck with that, Lizzie: there was simply no way that Allan and Elaine would ever let this occasion pass without several formal portraits of the newlyweds to mark it by. She’d just have to lie her way through the event. Lizzie the liar. If only George knew.

  Marla and James left for a backpacking trip around Europe. They wouldn’t be back in Ann Arbor until the start of grad school, James in classics and Marla in art history. Didn’t Jack say that to her? That he was leaving for the summer and would be back in August to start grad school? What if Marla never came back as well? Lizzie didn’t think she would ever recover from the loss of the two people she cared about most.

  But Marla returned from her honeymoon already pregnant; she decided not to go to grad school after all.

  They named their daughter Beezie (short for Elizabeth, after Lizzie).

  * The Free Safety *

  Maverick told Lizzie that the free safety, Antonio Doll, had the best football instincts of anyone on the team. “To be an outstanding free safety a guy has to have a feel for the entire field. They direct the defens
e, just like the quarterback does for the offense,” he explained. Antonio went on to play for Youngstown State, where for two years in a row he set a school record in interceptions, but forsook football after he graduated. He went on to Oxford as a Rhodes scholar and eventually became an assistant secretary of state. For no particular reason Lizzie never forgot what Maverick told her about free safeties. When she passed on that tidbit to George, it turned out that he already knew it. “It’s sort of like the point guard on a basketball team,” he told her. “They run the court. Think of the free safety as the Magic Johnson of their team.” And ever after Lizzie did think that, although the subject never came up again.

  * Lizzie & George Talk About Names *

  Lizzie and George were both sitting up in bed. Lizzie was turning the pages of A Tree Grows in Brooklyn but not really reading it. George was underlining passages in Andrew Weil’s From Chocolate to Morphine. They couldn’t be said to be conversing until Lizzie put down her book, looked at George, and took a deep breath.

  “George, I really don’t want to change my name to Goldrosen when we get married.”

  “Well, there’s no need to. I certainly don’t care about it. You can always stay a Bultmann.”

  Lizzie stared at him in disbelief. “You know that’s not possible. I’ve been waiting my whole life not to be a Bultmann. Possibly that’s why I’m marrying you. But I don’t want to be a Goldrosen either.”

  “Why not? It’s never bothered me. I like being George Goldrosen.”

  “Oh, George. Nothing ever bothers you.”

  “Not exactly true, but my name certainly doesn’t.”

  “Look at your poor mother. I bet that Elaine wasn’t happy about exchanging Lowen for Goldrosen either, but when she and your dad got married nobody kept their own names.”

  “Don’t be silly. I’ve never heard my mother complain about our last name. I’m sure she loves it. But if you want to ask her yourself,” he went on in a reasonable tone, “let’s call. They’re probably still up.”

  “Go ahead, George, call her. But even in the unlikely event that she says she does love the name Goldrosen, I’m not going to change the way I feel about not wanting it for my last name. I’m serious. This is serious. What would you think about shortening it to Gold? Or Rosen? I could live with either one. It’s just the two parts together that I don’t want.”

  “What do I think? I think it’s not going to happen. I can’t even imagine what Grandma and Pop would say about it—nothing good, I’m sure—but I know how hurt they’d be. The only two options I see that you have are staying a Bultmann or becoming a Goldrosen.”

  Lizzie shook her head sadly. “Now I know what people mean by saying they’re between a rock and a hard place.”

  “Or the devil and the deep blue sea,” George agreed, somewhat coldly.

  “Or between Scylla and Charybdis,” Lizzie said, somewhat more coldly. “Don’t be so ridiculously defensive. It’s just a name that happens to be yours.”

  “Exactly, it’s just a name. That happens to be mine. Soon to be yours. Maybe you should remember that. Elizabeth Goldrosen. I think it sounds great.”

  “Maybe that doesn’t sound too bad,” Lizzie acknowledged, “but think about all the zzzz sounds in Lizzie Goldrosen. Even you can’t think that sounds good. Lizzzzzzzie Goldrozzzzzzzen. It’s awful.”

  George shook his head and went back to reading.

  Lizzie took the book out of his lap, closed it, and made one last try. “How about this? We could change our name to something neutral, like Austen, maybe. Or Bennet. Then I could be Lizzie Bennet. Elizabeth Bennet. That’d be pretty cool.”

  George reached for the book. “Get a grip, sweetie. It’s not going to happen. Bultmann or Goldrosen, your choice.”

  “Wait, don’t decide right away. Okay, no Bennet. But let’s think of other books. You liked A Wrinkle in Time, didn’t you? So did I. What if we became Murrys? Wasn’t that Meg’s last name? That sounds good, doesn’t it? George and Lizzie Murry. Or Ingalls? I’d like that. But if you liked Wilder better, that’d be fine with me,” she offered generously. “Or even Darling. George Darling. Lizzie Darling. That might be really fun.”

  “Wait a second, stop, listen to this idea,” George said. “What about if we became the Littles? We could name our son Stuart. Or Seuss—then I could be Dr. Seuss. The kids in my practice would love that, I bet. Or wait, even better, let’s change our last name to Of Oz. That would be cool. George and Elizabeth Of Oz. We could name a daughter Ozma. That was always my favorite book in the series.”

  That George could reliably make her laugh mattered a lot to Lizzie. She sometimes thought that it was what kept her from running away and spending some serious time searching for Jack.

  “Dearest Lizzie, listen, we’re absolutely not changing our soon-to-be joint last name to anything else. We’re getting married and I’d be very happy if you chose to become a Goldrosen, but I’ll certainly understand if you want to remain a Bultmann. I’m sure your parents would be thrilled.”

  “Jeez, George, you have never understood my parents and you never will. And I don’t think you understand me either.”

  Well. What could George do but assure her that he did understand her parents and, even more importantly, he understood her. Which Lizzie never believed. All the evidence, she felt, was against it.

  * The Worst Thing George Ever Said to Lizzie * That Was Actually True

  Finally driven to extremes during a particularly long and frustrating Difficult Conversation early in their marriage, George told Lizzie that she had the emotional age of a three-year-old.

  In her heart of hearts Lizzie realized that not only had it been true when George said it, but it was probably still an accurate description years later.

  * Why Lizzie Decided to Marry George *

  Lizzie found that it wasn’t so bad being engaged because it changed very little in her relationship with George. She began to grow very fond of her ring, although when she was in class she tended to turn it around so that the stone was hidden and all people could see (if they chose to look) was a plain platinum band. But marriage was something else entirely. If Jack should show up in Ann Arbor to see her, breaking an engagement was one thing. But what if he came after she and George got married? That would make everything much more complicated.

  Marla didn’t think she should marry George right away. “It’s different for me and James,” she said. “We planned to get married practically from the moment we met in junior high. But you, you can just go on being engaged for as long as you need to until you finally accept that Jack isn’t coming back for you, ever.”

  “I just can’t believe that I’ll never see him again. That’s just not possible, is it?”

  “Listen, Lizzie, here are a few hard truths you have to hear. You and Jack dated for one quarter, call it three months. That’s all. Yeah, I know you said the sex was terrific and you shared all that poetry, but you only knew him for about ninety days. And you’re going to hang on to that long past its expiration date? You have a wonderful boyfriend who wants to spend his life with you, and you’re going to mourn the rest of your natural life for some jerk who ditched you?”

  “I never should have told him that was me in the article. That’s why he left. The Great Game. That was my big mistake.”

  “If that’s really why he left, which I don’t know if I believe, then he’s even more of a jerk.”

  “It was my fault that he left,” Lizzie said stubbornly. “Nobody would want to stay with someone who did such a stupid thing.”

  Marla sighed and reluctantly dropped the subject.

  But after Marla and James’s wedding, Lizzie acceded to George’s desire to get married sooner rather than later. The reasons she gave herself were these:

  1. She liked George well enough.

  2. She loved his parents, particularly his mother.

  3. She had no idea what to do next if she didn’t marry George, except to continue her sear
ch for Jack. She had no interest whatsoever in grad school. Lizzie knew that she was smart, but there wasn’t anything that she particularly wanted to study. She still loved reading poetry, but she hated the way poems had been analyzed to death in her undergraduate English classes. Breaking down a poem like that took away the joy of reading it.

  4. Sex with George was fine. Occasionally and unexpectedly, it could be awfully nice. He was as generous and kind in bed as he was in everything else in his life.

  5. George had an expansive sense of humor. He had a wonderfully contagious laugh. Lizzie loved that every time he laughed, the lines around his eyes crinkled up. (Many years later, Lizzie would hear Lucinda Williams sing “The Lines Around Your Eyes,” a song that she always wanted to believe was written about George.) Lizzie egged him on in his addiction to puns and tried, unsuccessfully, to get him to stop laughing at his own jokes. Even after he got famous, George still laughed at his own jokes. His fans loved that about him. Plus, as George pointed out to Lizzie somewhat smugly, he inherited the tendency to do so from his mother, remember?

  6. As far as Lizzie could see, there weren’t a lot of reasons not to marry George. One, of course, was that he wasn’t Jack. But Lizzie knew the big reason not to marry George was that she probably didn’t love him nearly enough.

  * The Middle Linebacker *

  Some fans thought that if Joe Parsons chose to devote his life to football he could rival Dick Butkus at the middle linebacker position. Joe played hard (he was a vicious tackler) and had great instincts for what was going to happen next on the field. What Lizzie remembered best about him, though, was how polite he was—the only guy on the team who opened the car door for her when he drove her home after his Friday of the Great Game was done. Following a great career with the Vikings, Joe became a noted play-by-play announcer with ESPN. His cogent analyses were a big hit with George, and the fact that Lizzie went to high school with him made listening to him even more fun. Of course Lizzie couldn’t tell him that what she most associated Joe Parsons with was the Philip Larkin poem that began “They fuck you up, your mum and dad / They may not mean to, but they do,” which was what she recited to herself instead of paying attention to what was going on between Joe Parsons’s body and hers.