All Comments on 'Leaving a Mark'

by jake60

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  • 29 Comments
AnonymousAnonymousabout 14 years ago
Very Sad

I assume he is dying after wasting his life, see them around every day. If he ran out on his wife and didn't come back once, he would have done it again. His ex and the son were lucky to find a real husband and father not a broken guy who ran off. Thanks.

AnonymousAnonymousabout 14 years ago
Sad but so well written.

How many variations of this take place every day? It would be nice if he had a 12 step program and somehow his amends brought him to to his son through his former wife.

lancewmlancewmabout 14 years ago
Extremely sad

And a well written slice of life...

bruce22bruce22about 14 years ago
Very Fine and Interesting Story

Fascinating piece of work. There seems to more info between the lines than in the words. Which means that a lot of people may have trouble with the details. I see that one anon did not notice that he walked away from his girlfriend and not from his wife. The argument essentially cost him his whole life but he still has enough personality to think about the pun in the title and know that he can gain nothing my ruining the happy equilibrium of his Mark and the boy's mother. By the way, if he was two years, 7 monthes and 12 days without drinking he has done the equivalent of the AA. His drinking came after finding out that his love had irreparably given herself to another and was not the cause of the break up and so his drinking did not inflict any harm on his son and his mother.

AnonymousAnonymousabout 14 years ago
well done

A lot left to the imagination of the reader, but it got to me. Very sad.

jiminabjiminabalmost 14 years ago
Thanks Jake

Very well done. Jim

RonRWoodRonRWoodalmost 13 years ago
Surreal

I guess that this is one good reason I never ran away from problems in my marriage. I did not want to be a lonely old man without a family. One sucks it up when there are difficulties in life and relationships. I have often wondered why I dedicated myself to working and accumulating material things for my two families when they eventually leave you and go on with their own lives.

Humans need each other or what is the purpose of life? I have known lots of homeless and lots of them say they live a life of freedom without responsibility. I think that is a copout for never taking any.

Others are alcoholics, druggies or mentals. Young people are fleeing something or looking for something. This man sounds like he was just immature and made a childish mistake by leaving. Then he was too immature to immediately go back.

My first wife left me three times, threatening divorce, but always came back within a couple of weeks saying she was sorry. I eventually divorced her and moved on after 15 years.

I got the idea after those 3 experiences that she wasn't completely happy with me nor I her. I ran away to take another wife who was an alcolic though beautiful. We had children in my early forties and I couldn't run away again.

Now I am in my late 60s and I wonder what it was all about. I can only come up with I didn't want to be homeless and feel worthless like this guy. So like Peggy Lee once sang, "Is that all there is?" A smart man once told me, "You are where you are in life because that was the choices you made." He also said, "Events mean nothing, it's how you respond to them."

bigguy323bigguy323over 11 years ago
You can't fix stupid.

x

kakashi524kakashi524about 11 years ago
bigguy323...

...is right.

chytownchytownover 10 years ago
You Said*****

More with this short story to me than many writers on this site. Thanks for sharing.

TavadelphinTavadelphinover 9 years ago
I have said it before -

I will say it again - THINK first - then act once you are sure you are willing to pay the price -

She was pregnant with his son and he never knew he had one.

Too stupid - even if the two of them did decide not to stay together he fucked up - no matter who else did too.

RhomanovRhomanovabout 9 years ago
Well written but so one sided

No effort to let him know he was a dad?

AnonymousAnonymousabout 9 years ago
Good story

Should have used my name, it could have been about me. I caught my girlfriend kissing another guy and left her. I just went to my car and drove away. Why not, that kiss wasn't just any kiss, it was THE kiss and hadn't ended when I turned to leave.

I found out about 25 years later, she was pregnant with our daughter. With no way to contact me to apologize, she married someone else a few years later and went on to have 3 more kids. I've been in and out of rehab centers, whiskey seems to be my drug of choice. I've seen her and my girl, but I've never introduced myself. They obviously have a good life so I keep to myself.

Freddog6601Freddog6601about 8 years ago
Nice story

Poignant story of life's choices.

AnonymousAnonymousover 6 years ago
something off

They have fight. She finds out she is pregnant and hurriedly snares husband in all of three months apart. So he becomes homeless bum

Chances are she thought kid was her lover Dave's child

Tough to believe this is jake60 story

0zed0zedover 5 years ago
Incomplete

Finish The Damn Story

GrimmerGrimmerabout 5 years ago
Kind of incomplete

Nice start, good middle, lacking a conclusion

AnonymousAnonymousabout 5 years ago
Good Story

It's fine the way it ends. Good writing.

GPa

Avidreader3142Avidreader3142about 5 years ago
Use....

Use your imagination, for crying out loud....

jake60, thanks for the story

Paul

AnonymousAnonymousabout 5 years ago
Powerfull story...

...perfect setup for another chapter. Great job. 5 stars. Thanx!

Loklie

Davidj001Davidj001almost 5 years ago

Kind of a heartbreaker

AnonymousAnonymousover 4 years ago
Fool

As loggins and messina said, “what a fool believes he sees no wish man has the power to reason away”.

ojalalalaojalalalaover 4 years ago
Beautifully written...

Despite his choice to sacrifice by not intruding on his son's life, I wish there were a way for him to interact with his younger namesake. I envision him seated with his dark glasses and faked white stick when he again sees Lenora and this time a little girl breaks away from her by the shoe shop and crosses the floor - still under her watchful eye - to put $ in his cap.

Maybe he picks up the money and calls to her something about having dropped his hat, fakes noticing more $ in it and says that someone else must have thought the same as she. Lenora is on the alert and steps toward the girl as he returns the money. He remains seated and removes his glasses while complimenting the girl on her kind act and says that, if he'd ever had children, he'd want them to be like her, adding, “If I had, I'd know that I left a good mark on this life.”

She starts to turn away as he picks up his hat and they smile at one another when he says "bye now" and prepares to leave. She keeps looking at him a moment more, says goodbye and starts to return to Lenora, who now is being approached by both husband and son. The girl greets the men, and she and Lenora take the hand of Lenora's son and husband, respectively, but then the girl stops again and turns around look toward where the man had been. Seeing the child's quizzical expression, simultaneously Lenora asks whether something is the matter and her son asks who the man was.

Lenora replies her son's question, and the girl then shares how the man complimented to her, all the adults smile and nod until she gets to what he added about “a good mark on life.” Lenora goes a bit pale (she grew up hearing a certain someone complain and worry about not measuring up to expectations) and then, as those last words leave her lips, the girl exclaims ,“That man has eyes just like yours, Daddy!”

I like this but for its leaving open undeserved regret if no one connects with the elder Mark, who still had no plan to intrude on the life of any of them. If in my envisioning they sort of know who he might be but elect to do nothing, then see his name in the obituaries,... Maybe the eyes of husband and wife meet, and the two nod to one another. While Lenora asks the girl whether she sees where the man went, her husband tells young Mark to go with his daughter, tells him, “You maybe should go meet him. He may be a relative, or this may be the chance we all hoped you'd have one day to connect with your third side, son. You two or you three if he will, come join your mother and me later, or we can all meet [wherever]. (This reminds me now of a television series in which birth father and son meet shortly before the father dies, but they all do get to enjoy their various family relationships with him before his passing.)

I do like the author's ending. I got the impression that the Mark of the story was exceedingly immature (if not a bit of a jerk ) when he left Lenora and that, likely, had he returned, they wouldn't have lasted. She got a better life without him and with her husband. Maybe it's because of the holidays (not in the story) or because I'd love to have seen even a photo of someone in my paternal family – I was for generations the only one of my family who didn't know both sides of my face – I just wouldn't like for Mark to die alone.

jtwheelsjtwheelsalmost 4 years ago
I agree sad but beautifully written.

Only drawback what was argument about.

Did he get shit he deserved?

jimjam69jimjam69about 3 years ago

An old old lesson being given

AnonymousAnonymousalmost 2 years ago

And he still refuses to be the man his father wanted him to be. Skulking and hiding and feeling sorry for himself. Yes, it's time to die. You wrote a good quality story and presented it well.

AnonymousAnonymousabout 1 year ago

either im missing the point of the story(have been known to be dense when not stupid)so i missed the point or the story isnt complete? rk

AnonymousAnonymous9 months ago

It’s book wormes approach to critize. They only live in their head.

LOVE slap-hapy-papy #9

AnonymousAnonymous4 months ago

Beautifully written and, because of that heart breaking.

His entire life came to nothing at the end. All he had left was tge bittersweet knowledge of the son he left behind. God, this man's fate just breaks my heart

Anonymous
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