This Is Rob

Thumbnail: Me and Rob laughing

Rob and Chris took off their coats. Not that it was par­tic­u­lar­ly hot, but the Prince Charlie jack­et does­n’t allow much flex­i­bil­i­ty of move­ment when work­ing uten­sils at a table.

I tugged on mine, but the but­tons on my vest held me back. I had the youth size, you see, a word I like to use more than “chil­dren’s”, where the vest is an illu­sion cre­at­ed by sewing two pan­els to the jack­et. I would have been naked had I had tak­en off my coat as the vest is a mod­ern cuirass, offer­ing a form of psy­cho­log­i­cal pro­tec­tion, and I was left with the option of all or noth­ing.

I made a com­ment about it in pass­ing, and Rob start­ed to unbut­ton his vest, then adamant­ly told Chris to take his off. I had to con­vince them that I was jok­ing before they stopped.

This has come to define Rob to me. A guy who’s will­ing to embar­rass him­self so that oth­ers will feel more com­fort­able. It remind­ed me of Adam Sandler in Billy Madison, pre­tend­ing that he peed his pants by splash­ing water on his crotch so Ernie did­n’t feel so bad about doing it him­self. Sometimes Rob goes out of his way to help you and ends up embar­rass­ing you even more, but his inten­tions make it easy to for­give him. His heart is in the right place, and that’s more than you can say for most peo­ple nowa­days.

Beneath his tough-guy, rough-edged per­sona is the ted­dy bear.

It’s the same way with his intel­li­gence. He wraps his thoughts in humour, per­haps as a way of hid­ing his per­spicu­ity to put oth­ers at ease1. Unfortunately, some peo­ple can’t see beneath this veneer and mis­in­ter­pret it as typ­i­cal male obnox­ious­ness. It did­n’t fool Pat though, who described him as diverse, a per­son with some­thing insight­ful to say about any sub­ject. It was only after Pat used that word that I real­ized Rob is a cos­mopoli­tan who feels at home any­where doing any­thing.

Rob is also one of the few peo­ple who can tease me and get away with it, because he’s just as self-dep­re­cat­ing. I’ll make fun of his size, and he’ll make fun of mine. And while he’s a man’s man, he has no prob­lem admit­ting that he has he vis­its craft stores for his daugh­ter, that he watch­es cook­ing shows with his wife, and that he loves his broth­ers.

That’s the great thing about Rob. He’s filled with con­fi­dence and he has no prob­lem speak­ing his mind, instead of pussy-foot­ing around sen­si­tive sub­jects2. He’s the gen­uine arti­cle. What you see is what you get, and if you have a prob­lem with him, it’s your fault, not his.

That’s Rob.

  1. I think many are intim­i­dat­ed by some­one who can ana­lyze things []
  2. I hate it when some­one does­n’t speak up because they’re scared that some­one may not like their opin­ion []

8 comments

  1. Jeff man I’m com­plete­ly touched by you words i espe­cial­ly liked the mans man part lol i red that over about 5 times with a big shit eat­ing grin on my face i con­sid­er u a true broth­er and as such I’m always will­ing to go to hell and back 4 fam­i­ly so a lil embar­rass­ing is noth­ing if it makes ur life all the bet­ter wish i coul­da seen u at the bbq but short notice il see u soon enough man tnx 4 the kind words ;)

    rob

    P.S you and pat have amaz­ing taste lol

  2. Words aren’t enough man. Mine aren’t worth much. Pat’s, though, are worth gold. If you have his com­pli­ments, then you know it means some­thing.

    And yes, we have excel­lent taste in peo­ple. :)

  3. Jeff,

    Rob sent me this to read and I have to say it is a per­fect descrip­tion of Rob; exact­ly the guy I mar­ried. :) I could­n’t have put it bet­ter myself…though I might have added a few more “per­son­al” details…LOL I know Rob was very touched by what you said, and I must say it’s nice to have some­one else see what I see, as opposed to just, what did you call it, “male obnox­ious­ness!” I may have to steal a quote or two next time I refer to my hus­band to some­one else! :)

    And you know, I nev­er got to say, thanks for the dance at Aaron’s wed­ding! Although nei­ther of us knew what we were doing, it was still fun. :)

  4. You can tell a lot about some­one from who they date or mar­ry, and even though I haven’t got­ten to know you very well yet, you get instant respect points for mar­ry­ing Rob. :)

    And thank YOU for the dance. I’m sure it would­n’t have been as fun if we did know what we were doing. :)

  5. Well, I guar­an­tee you I’m more than just “the girl who cooks at super­bowl par­ties!” LOL ;)

  6. uuum ya u also bring us a bevrage ur half food serv­er half bar­tender

  7. Hahahaha…don’t for­get half babysit­ter.

  8. man she wathes ally and me thats full time bro ;)

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