When The Saddle Is Loose

Back around 1982ish, I had this really cute boyfriend who lived just below town on the Ohio River.  He was short like me, but since he was a guy, his lack of height had more impact on his ego.  As a result, he was a risk taker, even maybe a daredevil.  If there was some kind of extreme sport, he was going to try it.

He pushed me out of my comfort zone, introducing me to all kinds of things I would have never attempted without someone making me.

When we weren't breaking every Catholic rule in the backseat of his fabulous Chevelle, we were riding horses or water skiing or snow skiing or crashed out watching Friday Night Videos.  This was the guy who encouraged me to jump off the bridge from 33 feet up.  He was also the one with whom I got two vehicles stuck in the mud because we were horny teenage idiots.

Thank goodness we came from a place where friends with 4 wheel drive trucks were common.

But this post isn't about wild, teenage sex.  It's not even about clumsy teenage sex.  Not really.

One afternoon we were riding horses up the hill behind his house.  Who knows what kind of stupid thing I was doing at the time - checking my lip gloss or making sure I was sucking in my tummy, but in a flash, I was in the gravel and watching the back end of my horse trot away.

"Are you okay?"  Cute boyfriend climbed off his horse and extended a hand to help me up.

"Yes, just my pride is hurt."  I tried to play it off while I rubbed my sore left butt cheek that took the brunt of the fall.

"Well, this is your chance to show what you're made of.  You getting back on the horse or not?"  He wasn't impatient.  It was a simple statement of fact, a practical matter.  Were we going on with our ride or walking back to the barn?

I looked at my horse. He'd stopped and looked back at us over his flank. "Let's go.  I want to see that meadow."

The meadow was just as he'd described it. It was a flat on top of the ridge, ringed by maples and oaks.  Wildflowers waved among the tall grasses.  We tied the horses to a tree and  Cute Boyfriend spread out a blanket he'd brought along.

Getting back on the horse was its own reward. I'm not afraid.  I can do this.  I won't be beaten so easily. Reaching the meadow was a different kind of sweet.  I liked to see this more sensitive side to Cute Boyfriend.  He'd found a thing of beauty and he wanted to share it with me.   Later, as I looked over his shoulder at the blue sky with high, wispy clouds and twined my fingers into his honey brown hair, I took a mental snapshot.

That night, I wrote something uncharacteristically wise and thoughtful in my journal.  "Remember this day.  Remember the lesson of this day.  Get back on the horse." 


Do you detect a theme here?  Are you good at getting back on the metaphorical horse?  Who took my funny and replaced it with this cliche? 

Avec Gratitude

Dinner courtesy of some wonderful people.

Before we had dinner, I suggested to the family that we go around the table and state for the record what we are thankful for.  They glanced at each other over the rims of their root beer mugs and waited for my temporary insanity to pass.

You'd think we'd be more talkative around here, wouldn't you?  Well, we're not really that expressive when it comes to the positive stuff.  We're aces at pulling each other apart, at dissecting the foibles and tics and pointing and laughing when one of us stumbles.  I should be ashamed, but I'm not.

That's something to be thankful for.  We may not be soft and snuggly and Hallmark Channel fuzzy wuzzies, but I don't think there's a single person in this house who doesn't feel loved.  Right down to the last wretched cat. Hang on a second.  Let me see...

Okay, I just checked.  I asked each of them (the humans, not the cats) if they felt loved.  Here's how that went:

MathMan:  Yeah, who said I didn't?
Nate:  Yeah (with accompanying eyebrow raise)
Sophie:  I don't know.  Can I have a hug first?
Chloe:  Um....yes?

So there we are.  Love.  It is probably the greatest thing ever.  And we have it in spades.

And for that we truly are grateful.  Whether some of us are able to express it or not without a gun to our heads.

Here are some other things I'm thankful for:

RennRatt and her wonderful family who provided us with an authentic and delicious Thanksgiving dinner - Friends near and far - Family near and far - Laughter - Music - The moment right after I take off my bra - Good health - Shared memories - The gorgeous weather we're having - MathMan's job which pays the bills and gives him the chance to save the world - Books - Words - A hot shower - Remembering - Forgetting - Working out - Quiet - My trusty old laptop circa 2007 - The fact that Nate really loves going to school now - My digital camera that allows me to capture life as it happens - The silly cats - Movies that make me laugh or think or cry (as long as I'm alone) - The light and color at sundown when the trees are shadows against the palette of pinks, mauves, purples and blues - Hollyhocks on their tall stems - Art Deco Architecture - Still being able to recite Goodnight Moon - Chloe's happiness at school - The entire Art Nouveau movement - Edward Gorey - Anthony K. and his sock - My active imagination - Catching sight of a hawk on a wire or post alongside the road - When the car starts - The roof over our heads - Dry pavement - The cartoons and reruns I watched as a kid - Comfortable clothes - Major appliances that work - PBS - Agatha Christie and her memorable characters - High count cotton sheets - Lotion - Skype - My wooden back scratcher - The internet - Homemade fabric softener - Ibuprofin - Red wine - Billy Nye the Science Guy - British TV - Edward Hopper's art - Time - Sugar - How Sophie enjoys playing her clarinet - Dogwoods announcing the spring - When we get a little snow - Chocolate - Art created by my friends - A whole mess of other stuff - And you.  I'm grateful for you.

I hope you've had a good day wherever you are.  Tomorrow we'll get back to the pointing and the laughing.

Was No More

I've finished attacking the word was and completed (for now) the Ethan story.  That project proved to be a great writing exercise.


To be sure, the story goes on.  Ethan remains one of my best friends.  When we reconnected a year or so ago after having not been in touch since the mid-1990s, it seemed as if no time had passed.  But of course it had and we've had all kinds of fun catching up and creating new stories.  For now, the story of our shared youth is captured here on its own page.  Whether he likes it or not.

Thank you, Ethan.

Little Love Stories. Part One. Ethan.

(Not part of the manuscript.)

I've Been Waiting for a Girl Like You

December 1984

All the girls were ready to go. Now it was the waiting time. We crowded into the dorm’s common area and fidgeted and primped, using one another’s faces as mirrors. The unasked question – Do I look all right? No.  Do I look good? That was what we all wanted to know, but were afraid to ask.

Thursday night Must See T.V. provided the background to all the nervous activity. Cosby, Family Ties, Cheers….After Cheers ended, we would shift, anxious and anticipating, toward the door. It was almost time for the Thursday Night Club.

As a college freshman, I was being introduced to all kinds of new social activities. This was no longer my small hometown where I had to forever worry about getting caught by someone who would tell my parents. Caught doing what? Anything. Everything.

I sat, a little distracted, facing the television. Through the slotted wall behind the t.v., I saw the door open and in he walked. Ethan. I'd been watching for him.

I can’t remember now if we made eye contact and, damn it, I can’t find any journals from that time (I think I’d briefly stopped writing), but the minute he walked through that door, I felt electricity. I knew it was silly, this guy was just some kind of player, a lady’s man. When he sang Foreigner’s I’ve Been Waiting (for a Girl Like You) to me the night before in this very room, he was just goofing around, right?

I sensed him somewhere behind us. I peeked over my shoulder and saw him standing behind the row of seats, his eyes on the television. He glanced my way and snapped a grin. He may have wiggled his eyebrows. I’ll never know for sure because I whipped my head around to face the t.v., my face burning with embarrassment. Caught looking!

The show ended and we stood and stretched and collected our coats from the table where we’d stacked them. Ethan joined our little group and asked what we were doing next. Someone mentioned the Thursday Night Club. Did he want to go with us? I think it was Melinda who asked.

He said sure.  My breath caught in my throat, but I still was not going to let myself hope. What was the point?  Our gaggle of coeds included Melinda with her long legs and auburn hair. Deirdre with her China doll face, blond hair and perfect breasts and Cat with her exotic Asian beauty. This guy who would have had his pick wasn’t interested in me.

********

I’m that girl. You know the one. Cute, not pretty or stunning or unique in looks. Easygoing until you scratched beneath the surface and found a basketful of barely-controlled compulsions. Humorous as a defense more than anything. Accommodating. Too much so. Nice.  As if it isn’t enough to be a middle child, I’m a Libra, too. I’m the Rodney King of birth order and astrological signs. The world can be crashing down around us and I’m wondering aloud if we can’t all just get along.

I’m just nice to be around, but I'm not going to make your heart beat out a symphony, I'm not going to inspire poetry or wild flourishes of affection. I’m nonthreatening and non-confrontational. I don’t make sport of contradicting people.  I'm neither ornamental nor darkly compelling.  I'm the classic girl next door.  You'd do her, but you wouldn't die for her.

Someone once described me as the best girlfriend ever. In fact, that someone was Ethan, but he used the description about twenty-three years and five months after....., but now I’m getting ahead of myself, aren’t I?

Anyway, I was that girl. Never the drop dead gorgeous one, never the unattainable ice queen. I was never the Queen Bee for that matter. I wasn’t exactly the side kick either. I was usually the third girl from the left with chestnut hair, friendly smile and large tits (not necessarily noticed in that order by the opposite sex). I just looked…nice. And maybe easy.  None of this mattered because I was convinced that I was not the reason Ethan was joining us.

I repeated this to myself during the frigid walk to the house where the Club was in full swing. I thought it over and over as I flowed in and out of little knots of students talking, played drinking games in the breakfast nook, smoked weed from a one-hitter in the basement, and danced to the Psychedelic Furs, if you can call it dancing.  It was more like dreamy swaying at that point.   

This guy Ethan - tall, handsome, charming Ethan – was not interested in me. And then we were standing together making small talk while we waited for our turn at the keg.  He smiled right before he leaned down and kissed me.

********

I awoke facing Ethan and was engrossed in memorizing his face when his dark eyes flew open startling me.

“What are you doing?”

I acted coy. “Nothing.”

"What were you doing?”

“Nothing.”

I watched his perfectly formed eyebrows knit together as he schemed to get me to tell him the truth. His skin was pale, his eyelashes framed his brown eyes giving them a wide-eyed appearance. “You were staring at me.”

I pulled back so I get a better look at him. His almost black hair was cut short and preppy, he had a long, straight nose and a strong chin that reminded me of Cary Grant’s with its subtle cleft. Without thinking I put my fingertip onto the cleft in his chin. “So what if I was. You’re not bad looking, you know.”

He tickled me until I squealed and then we settled down remembering that females weren’t supposed to spend the night in that wing of dorms.

“I’ve only been here a couple of weeks. You’re going to get me kicked out of here.”

I turned my back to him and curled into a fetal position. “Oh, well, I’ve had my fun with you….”

He tickled me again and then pulled me close.

We fell asleep again.  A little later, I lay with my eyes closed and felt his warm breath on my neck as we spooned together.  I became curious about the sounds outside and rose up on one elbow to look out the window. Moving the curtain aside, I squinted in the morning light and wondered what time it was. The snow that had been on the ground for a few days was shrinking back, giving way to the dead grass and mud of the worn paths around the dorm.

“The whole world is melting.”

I could feel his weight shift. “Mmmmmm. That is the cutest thing I’ve ever heard anyone say.”

I let the curtain drop back in place and turned to him.