Joe had gotten me, for the twentieth time, in a bear hug with his head snuggled on my shoulder. A blissful smile on his face as he lovingly squeezed me. For some reason that I can never fathom, this was uproariously funny to the rest of my college choir. I thought that the gag would get old, but instead it got funnier and funnier the more times Joe hugged me for some odd reason.
I scooted my chair over a foot or two away from Joe --- right into the waiting arms of Adam, who rests his head lovingly on my other shoulder as he gave me a bear hug from the other side. I'm trapped. Joe closes the distance and now I'm caught, unwillingly, in a three-person group hug. The rest of the heathens in choir find this hilariously funny instead of feeling my pain of having my personal bubble blatantly violated. To make matters even worse, from behind me, Seth reaches around my neck in a two-armed squeeze. After that, I became the unwilling participant of dozens of hugs every day. It was a brutal four years, and I believe I'm forever scarred from the memory.
I never have liked being touched. I just seem to have a larger personal space bubble than most people. My close friend, Darrell, caught on to this very early on in our friendship.
"Does ums' needs a hug?" he would say, his bottom lip jutting out in a pout, arms out in the universal sign of a hug. Oftentimes, this would be in front of a large group of friends, but he wasn't against trying it out on total strangers in a crowded elevator. As far as I can remember, this always generated a laugh. Heathens.
I love hugging my wife, but she cannot keep from tickling me whenever she hugs me. Whenever she tickles me and I voice my displeasure (she calls it squealing like a little girl) the only one that comes to my aid is the dog. In fact, only the dog seems to understand my pain. Everyone else seems to find amusement in my moments of pain.
Once, I was shopping at Wal-Mart with my wife. I had stepped around an aisle and was looking at something when a girl from the theater department came up behind me and gave me a big bear hug. I'm sure I had a sheepish look on my face when my wife came walking around the corner to see me getting mauled. In Ricky Ricardo's words, I "had some 'splaining to do".
The odd thing is that even strangers will hug me. Why? What is it that makes people think that I would like nothing better than a hug? What's wrong with shaking hands? Perhaps a light punch to the shoulder?
I think Joe got me best in Ecuador when our college choir traveled there on tour. We were both sitting on a park bench talking about something when he reached around me to give me a hug, laying his head lovingly on my shoulder.
"Joe!" I yelled "knock it off!"
He released me from his bear hug and quickly jumped out of my reach as I went to smack him, him laughing the entire time.
An elderly lady found the whole thing amusing, her laughter rang out along with the handful of choir students who were watching. She hobbled over to the recently vacated spot on my bench and sat several feet away still chuckling. She took out some sewing material and contented herself with some project, occasionally chuckling.
I went back to reading a book and it was quiet for a couple of minutes.
I looked up when I heard some stifled chuckling from the handful of choir students. They were all looking at something to my right. I looked to my right and saw the that elderly lady had scooted over right next to me. When she saw that I had discovered her, she wrapped an arm around my arm and started to stroke my beard with her other hand, and laid her head lovingly on my shoulder just like Joe had done.
Naturally, the heathens found this amusing.
