SO....... I was riding along Route 1, the one and only road into the Florida Keys. It had been raining, and I had spent the better part of today sneezing and blowing my nose, for reasons only my nose knows. I slept on and off with the passenger seat of my cousin's Honda CRV fully reclined. From time to time I would raise my head to see where we were, or to see if I COULD sit up and not sneeze or cough.
It was in one of those moments,when, off to the right, a sign caught my eye "BOAT RAMP $20." Twenty Bucks! Oh crap, my cousin would NEVER understand why, if I didn't feel so crappy, I would have begun the litany: "So, we had a pack a cigarettes, some Smarties, candy, beer, we had beer.... "
But this cousin would..."Katie, how much?"
"TWENTY BUCKS!!"
Amazing what one can buy for twenty bucks! Too bad, an unstuffy nose, or a mended heart isn't one of them.
I kept my feelings in, because the mask I have worn for so many years was a mask of anger. It was safer to be angry, at least I could be heard.
Yet, in the final analysis, I am broken hearted.
These years, which should have been for the two of us, are not. These years, earned by the sweat of our brow and the sticky notes of time are no longer. The history that I so looked forward to sharing stops.
Was it ever real? Was there ever love? Or did I just wake up in an alien land? Were we only characters in a musical comedy?
