This weeks post is a digression of sorts, but it’s my blog damnit and I’ll digress if I want to. Please come back next week for more “ordinary” dandbhaarlem blogging fare.
“Who do we want to be today?”
A very short and convoluted story. For Beth.
It all started with what most thought was the foolhardy notion of cutting themselves loose from the daily grind and seemingly mundane existence that was slowly creeping its way into their lives. Sure, they had only been married for a year by then, and had endured living in the dark, cramped basement of a group house in Bethesda where they would come home in the evening to find their whacky roommates in their bed eating their food and drinking their wine. Things had somewhat improved when they moved into their own tiny apartment overlooking a lush green park on the edge of the city, but maybe it was just that improvement into more of an “adult” circumstance that had exposed the standard, unimaginative road laid out in front of them, beckoning them toward cookie cutter conformity. Marriage, work, kids, promotion, house-in-the burbs, 2 week vacation, grandkids, death. The signs were all neatly arraigned for them. All they had to do was follow them toward a perfect modern day Norman Rockwell life.
But they shared a nagging voice that held them back, a brief hesitation. Not because it scared them…this coming of age and becoming adults. Responsibility after the raucous college years. No, that wasn’t it at all. They were definitely ready to take a step deeper into life. But this step wasn’t the right one. It felt so, well….ordinary. Wasn’t there another option?
That hesitation, that simple question was the real beginning for them. They saved a little cash, sold off the few things that they had managed to acquire and packed up their little 2-door hatchback with a tent, a cooler, and a small propane stove and headed west to seek an answer. To discover what else America might have to offer. It felt like a Simon and Garfunkel song as they drove out of Pittsburgh and crossed the Ohio River on a 5000 mile journey that had no destination. Little did they know how the next three months would define the guiding spirit of the rest of their lives together.
Pitching their tent in the pouring rain, discovering the back roads of the Rocky Mountains, making a meal from the free mini-hotdogs and raw vegetables at a hotel happy hour. Laughing. It was all exhilarating. But the best part; the absolute best, was waking up each morning with a Pop Tart, a cup of coffee and a blank agenda for life – who do we want to be today?
All of those memories flooded back to him as he poured a glass of wine and watched her standing by the railing of the Pan Pacific Hotel. A hot breeze was swirling upward from the street 27 floors below and gently rustled in her dress and hair. The setting sun licked fiery orange across the glass canyon walls of the city as the last tropical rays burned through the thunderheads building over the South China Sea. Wet, sticky heat lingered even as the sun descended beyond the horizon - only the approaching storm offered a fleeting hope of relief. Even so, she held her foot through the railing, stretching her toes over the edge to try and capture as much of the breeze as she could, guiding it up her bare legs and under the folds of her dress. From where he stood, it looked as if she were playfully dipping her toes between the boats in Keppel Harbor, testing for coolness before shedding her clothes and jumping in to the dark, swirling waters.
He still loved watching her, and smiled to himself as he realized that after 16 years of marriage he was also still fantasizing about her swimming naked in a pond, as a hormonally overcharged teenager might do. Even after the hundreds of times sharing a bottle of wine, nude in the hot tub on the back deck of their house in Boise, gazing up on the shadowed foothills of sage, juniper and rabbit brush with a billion stars glittering over them in the crisp, clear, high mountain air. She still excited him.
They spent 10 years in Boise. Bought their first house. Joined their first activist group. Buried their first pet. It was life at its best, with all the ups and downs that keep life worth living. It certainly didn’t feel ordinary and they both grabbed a hold of every opportunity that presented itself, drinking in the essence of it. Those years in Boise had been wonderful, and would always hold a special place in their memory as the first step in this perpetual journey together. But it came as no surprise to either of them when almost like an alarm clock ringing in their heads, the lure of life, those eternal questions, again drew them away into uncharted territory. Who do we want to be today?
Everyone has a story about the devastating collapse of the global economy and America’s turbulent entry into war in those early years of the 21st century. In a lot of ways, their individual experiences were no different. But the compounding of events in their lives left a nexus of havoc through everything that they had worked so hard to achieve. And worst of all, it left them confused about who they were. The bottom was uncertain and crept toward them excruciatingly slowly.
But drawing upon the spirit kindled from that first journey so many years ago, they found their way forward. Others couldn’t understand how they were actually having fun navigating those turbulent years when the rest of the world seemed in utter chaos. They took every bit and piece that was offered and they played the ultimate flexibility card by moving 10 more times in the next 24 months. A brutal experience, but they regained momentum with each step. They were together and knew that the only difference between adversity and adventure was attitude. They chose adventure. Who did they want to be today?
It was clear that what they needed was balance. Perspective. The little piece of property that they bought 5 years earlier up in the mountains of Western Maryland somehow held the answer. Its rolling forested hills sat on the banks of the wild Youghiogheny river and offered the perfect place to regroup and rejuvenate their lives. They turned away from the world and inward toward each other, leaping into the project. They built a mile long driveway into the deepest heart of the property, constructing their house at the very end of it. No city lights. No neighbors. Just the two of them in the gentle quiet of owls.
The primal effort of that first winter, with its vicious 20 feet of snow brought the basics of vigor back into their lives. Daily struggles in chest deep powder cutting firewood to heat the house were tempered by long nights together in the hot tub, drinking wine and dreaming in each other by candlelight. It didn’t seem possible, but they grew yet closer. They spent two years in those mountains, learning more about the land, themselves, and each other and who they might want to be tomorrow. Two unforgettable years.
And now here they were one year later at age 40, two kids from the forgotten coal country of Pennsylvania, living in Holland and celebrating their 16th wedding anniversary at a hastily arranged rendezvous half way around the world in Singapore. Smiling with that thought, he walked over and folded his arms around her. She welcomed him with a purr and nuzzled her body firmly into him, adding more warmth to the already tropical heat. Her hair smelled of lavender and felt like silk against his face. He placed his lips gently on the nape of her neck and slowly kissed his way to her ear, nibbling softly on her lobe.
“I love you” he breathed. “Happy anniversary.”
