December 04, 2008
Hey! You � yes you � you and me, let�s go get lost.Dammit.
We can knock over all the buckets full of winter and laugh as we tear down the road leaving it all behind for everyone else to shovel away (please have this task completed before our return, right?).
We�ll stop first to have a drink � somewhere that�s not too loud but not so quiet as to make us feel like the only voices in the place � and we�ll celebrate the insanity of our unlikely assemblage by smiling nervously at each other, laughing loudly over nothing and turning the seconds into hours with the stories of our absence in each other�s world. We�ll make more than one toast to the light we�ve provoked in each other�s eyes and fidget over the enormity of it all.
Us. Here. Together. Who would of thought?
We�ll spend half our money on music for the jukebox and the other half on bets at the pool table and hardly care for the coin that�s lost for the fun of sinking another ball into a pocket while twisting the cue to another good tune. During our respective shots we�ll eye each other up and down and note the changes with less disappointment than we would have originally supposed, perhaps caught off guard with a whiff of the person we once knew so well by scent despite the detail-jerking years and, in the brief intervals of silence that might follow, allow the specifications to slowly prevail over what we have forgotten. The spring of your step, the surprise of my laughter, the nervous catch of your words � the way we both looked at the other head on as though we wanted our souls to be read out loud.
We�ll make the mistake of staying too late and resign ourselves to sobering up in the not-yet-warm, small space of a vehicle with dashboard lights and long-ago nights reflecting in our eyes. You�ll make the mistake of offering to override my chattering teeth and warm up my hands with your own and I�ll make the mistake of accepting � the innocent contact enough to send us both reeling into a spiral of silence, the boundary crossed, the flame lit, the vastness of such a small gesture, the undeniable magnitude of what we are together!
We�ll concede to the impulse and pretend the Order of Things won�t miss our absence. Finding ourselves on the next flight to Somewhere Other Than Here, we�ll cross the sea and forgive ourselves the recklessness for the perfection of the open, undemanding road. Our only responsibilities from here on out are to find rental bikes and off-road helmets, sea-side service and sunscreen, a quiet intermission and the funding to get it all done. We�ll race in white and black and you�ll let me win and I�ll let you lead and we�ll never again allow the doubts of everyone else get in our way of irrefutable excellence.
Dammit.