Girl Of My Dreams

The girl was young and beautiful. She had seen so little of the world, but it was still hers for the taking. I met her in the mall at the cellular store where I worked, and I fixed a pager that she had dropped and broken the day before. When we talked my eyes met hers and I was full of confidence as I rattled on about nothing important. She left when I ran out of things to say about pagers, and a "what might have been" moment passed.

Fate, luck, or inevitable love caused our paths to cross again a few days later. This time I was determined to make sure the browned eyed girl in blue jeans became my friend. She remembered me and conversations flowed naturally all night as I impressed her with stories of my previous adventures and my plans for future ones. That encounter turned into another and another and we began to date and soon began to experience all the energy and excitement that is common in a new romance.

A month passed and we became the best of friends and my interest in her grew, but I kept it all under control since I would soon be leaving for a cross country trip. I had dropped many women in the past and thought that leaving this one would be just as easy. My plans were to leave on my new motorcycle, while carrying only minimal gear, and drive to some place like Wyoming and find work. I told people I probably would be back in a few months when summer was over, but I really didn't know when I would return. The year before I had driven thousands of miles to the Arctic Circle in the North West Territory and hiked in an environment that almost killed me. This time I wanted to do it differently and to go places that few ever go. The girl was wonderful, but I knew our time was limited. The world was waiting for me somewhere out there, and I had to go find it.

Late May came and I strapped my tent to my bike, and filled my Eddie Bauer pack with a change of clothes, a journal, and a small radio. It was time to leave my new friend. The college freshman girl with so much left to do told me she would wait for me. I pulled her close to me and laid her head against my chest and leaned in to smell her hair for the last time. I held her body against me and softly touched the back of her neck with the ends of my fingers, and then let my hand slip down the side of her arm and into her hand. I didn't know if I would ever really see her again so I made sure that her body filled my senses. The road is lonely and I would need the memory of this tender girl to keep me going.

On the road again and alone my mind found its way back to thoughts of the angel I had left behind. With each mile I drove away from her the more I thought of her smile. Fighting the pain of solitude is something I had dealt with before, but this time the battle was so much harder to win. The first nights were the worst, but I expected them to get better as the trip progressed. My expectations were wrong.

After spending a day in a small Cajun town deep in Louisiana I followed a road that was bordered on both sides by bayou until I found a dirt road leading into the swamps. I took my bike down the road a couple of miles and then pulled off into the woods beside the water and set up camp for the night. Light disappeared and night surrounded and entangled the me in the woods. The bayou's chorus began with the crickets dominating the natural music. I escaped from the mosquitoes to the tent and rested on my old sleeping bag while thoughts drifted again to the girl waiting for me somewhere hundreds of miles away.

My thoughts would turn to dreams and then the swamp would wake me with a splash or a screech and then my half awake mind would think of her again. Each time the thoughts of her would return to dreams of her. I would dream of how wonderful it felt to place my cheek against her face and to feel the softness of her pure skin. Then I would be awake and think of my short time with her and how she filled my soul. While asleep I was with her, while awake I longed for her. The morning finally arrived and I packed up again and headed west as every young man should.

A few days later I reached the plains of Colorado, but the area seemed much more like a desert. I had come up from Texas and over the panhandle of Oklahoma. My body stunk of sweat and road grime. Days on the motorcycle and nights in swamps and woods changed my appearance and my demeanor. I was close to the mountains I loved, but first needed to spend a few days thinking. I took my bike far down a long and straight road and then made a sharp right into the unpaved vastness of this treeless nature. Once far from distractions I began a three day and night fast.

The days and nights again were haunted by visions like the ones I viewed in the bayou. Hunger and thirst came and went, but the girl's presence never left. Three long days and long nights I spent in feverish contemplation of my future, past, and present. The mountains that I loved so much moved farther away from my cores attention and my heart's desire was replaced with something greater. The girl, the angel, my future had taken control of all I was and all I would become. I had fallen in love with a beautiful college freshman with big brown eyes. I had fallen in love with my future wife in a Louisiana bayou and in a desert in Colorado.

My trip was over now, and I made the long journey home back to the love of my life. I returned to the girl of my dreams. The beautiful girl grew to become a beautiful woman, and every day we spent together was better than the day before. I grew to become a better person and learned to love like I never loved before. I set out on a trip to find the world, but everything I really needed found me. I later married Rhonda and now we share all of life's adventures together.

© 2001