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from Unauthorized Waylon Jennings

16 August 2008

Excerpt from Unauthorized Biography of Waylon Jennings

When Jessi and Waylon decided to retake wedding vows, they decided to add a few phrases to the traditional vows, “in sickness and in health, for better or worse.” They considered adding a line about marital infidelities. Jessi wanted to add the phrase. ‘at home or on the road.’ Waylon wanted to change it to, “in tour bus or at home.’ Or ‘studio.’ Both decided this would be frivolous, and make a mockery of their love, when the whole point of getting married a second time was to ground it on a firmer understanding than it was the first time. Yet, Jessi still believed she could change Waylon’s drinking habits, so when Waylon proposed that they add “whether sober or drunk,’ she hesitated. Waylon smiled and said, ‘honey, that’s kinda implied anyway in ‘in sickness and in health, just like the right to own a gun is implied by the right to privacy.’
Jessi said, ‘how bout we add that line, ‘when sober, but not drunk?’

So, they decided they’d make no mention of drinking, but Waylon, ever conscious of his weight and growing waste, thought that maybe they could put a line in, ‘in fitness and in fatness.’ According to Willie, they got into one of those huge arguments that couples who dearly love each other get into where Jessi started getting defensive at the mere mention of Waylon bringing up his being too fat, as if it was an indirect way of saying that she, Jessi, was too fat. And all her feelings of how narcissistic Waylon could get, and how annoying and hurtful it was to her came to the fore, though many of them were not expressed in words, but in her slamming doors, throwing dishes around, or going into her own room and plugging in her electric, LOUD. At first, Waylon felt misunderstood, unappreciated, since he often felt his narcissism was simply an ‘occupational hazard,’ a uniform he decided to wear as much as possible, especially after Buddy died in that plane crash. Then, he, too, found that room on the other side of the house, far enough away from Jessi, and thought he’d call up a few other buddies (since Jessi was now playing with Waylon’s regular band…)

About 5 hours later, around 930PM, they met in the kitchen, and Jessi was making tunafish sandwiches, and they decided to insert the phrase into their vows, ‘in thinness, but not in fatness.’ It was a friendly joke, one could call it a gentleman’s agreement, if a husband and wife may be said to make gentleman’s agreements. But, now, Waylon was really regretting it. He had been on the road for 2 months, and returning more in love with Jessi than ever. Lisa was nothing. And the second he arrives him, like wandering Ulysses, Jessi takes a cold look, and gets him on the scale. And says now honey I don’t mind that you’ve been cheating, but honey it looks like you’ve been eating. Undaunted by this, thinking he still has a chance to get some, it’s no big deal. He knows deep down she really wants it, the new vows, their firm foundation, and, hell, just look at the size of that bacon—he’s bringing it, all, back home to her. And he’s laying in the bed, fully clothed, and she’s walking around the bedroom pulling up the shades, fussing with her hair, and the lights, and her clothes. And now she’s naked, and not letting him touch. It will take him a three day fast—no food, nada—to get her back quickly. And now she’s sitting there naked, having kept her side of the vow, eating icec ream, and pizza, and hamburgers, so that even if he does lose enough weight in the next three days, she will have violated their vows as well. It’s gastly Shakespearean, or Aristophanean (though I don’t know if Waylon used that word). And that’s how Waylon came to write________________________________________________

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