Yes, We’re There Yet

I don’t know where Idaho is. I don’t understand how mercury works. I don’t know what a split infinitive is. I am afraid of spiders. Shy awkward weird in general. I have been wearing the same black shirt since Christmas.

But I know all about Watergate because in 1972 I went on a road trip to Myrtle Beach with my forever friend Nancy, and her parents miles away in the front seat always had the news on, so it got into my head without trying.

That was so many decades ago but it’s like the years are false anyway, like all time is false today. I don’t even have to try and I can hear the surf from the balcony and I can practically taste the air, you know, and the two boys we met the day before borrowing our pool from the lesser hotel across the street waiting for us.

But this story isn’t about them. 

Nancy died yesterday and her sister asked me to send a picture of us for the service and without even looking I found the one photograph from that trip, of me and Nancy on the beach, the waves on our shoulders, the life in our eyes, and the secrets.

I’ve written so many stories with wishful thinking and happy endings so quite naturally there we were, for a quick February moment at least, still on the beach, our secrets and everything else perfectly safe.