He had a red pickup when I met him which I swear to God is half the reason I fell for him. And we drove together, all over the country, really, just daydreaming, and driving into and away from dreams. Tryin' 'em on for size.
We drove south through Wyoming, and there were rocks to either side as far as the eye could see, and I had just quit the best paying job I'd ever had, but I'd hated it--oh how I'd hated it--and I was so deeply fucking grateful to see the horizon over the stretch of rock in Wyoming right as the sun came up. It was like a prayer, exploding across the grey rock horizon. Or maybe the fountain of youth.
Another time we drove straight South: to Buffalo to Cleveland to Cincinnati and into Kentucky all in the pouring rain, sweeping thunderstorms the whole way, twelve hours or so of making bad time, cheap caffeine pit-stops, and keeping each other focused on the dark, gleaming road. Finally, we ate at a Waffle House, off the side of the highway, listening to the rain pound against the tin roof and then camped that night in a nearby state park with a swinging wooden bridge we didn't find until morning, setting up our tent together in the dark downpour.
We've gotten to know each other in the cabs of trucks, coffee racing through our veins while day turns to night and back again. Writing this, I think I finally remember why I told my sister that time, half-drunk on lack of sleep, three people and two cars crossing Canada at dawn, somewhere at a random rest stop, somewhere I told her we would have second careers as a truck driving team. She and I still laugh at that sometimes. It seems crazy most of the time, but when I remember that red pickup and the feel of truck stop styrofoam coffee cups in between my fingers and obscure, local radio and the bright, artificial, overhead lights of toll booths, sometimes it reminds me of why I might say something like that.
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