September 27, 2007 – 10:17 am |
We were on a train somewhere in France when I said it. I was desperate. I needed to say something, plead my case, convince him I was fabulous.
The walk to the train station had been long, and it was unseasonably warm for May. I had tipped my suitcase over at least twice, steered it quite obliviously over a few dainty European toes and inadvertently (and oh, so conveniently!) packed my passport at the bottom of it under socks and underwear.
Finally aboard the train, I now had a disagreeable and annoying chunk of hair that refused to stay in its pony tail or behind my ear despite my repeated efforts at securing it. I pushed the rebel hair back. It waited until my hands were otherwise occupied and then defiantly popped down in front of my eye again.
Dammit, I must look like a total moron, I thought. A disorganized, sweaty moron.
I really liked this guy, and instead of playing the prepared, sensible version of myself I displayed back at school, I’d taken on the role of some awkward, discombobulated klutz with rebel hair and, apparently, a propensity for sweating. It was not a pretty picture.
I stuck the chunk of hair behind my ear, tried to use the sweat from my forehead as a fastening agent, and struggled to squeeze my suitcase into a space half its size.
I remembered what my roommate Lisa had said the week before. We had determined that a guy I’d been dating, a guy whose full name I’d only recently clarified, would be on my Seminar Abroad. For over a month we’d be two of 25 college students wandering around Europe touring, cavorting, drinking and further sullying the European impression of American students, all under the pretext of studying famous historical trials. Lisa and I were discussing the pros and cons of dealing potential romantic hassles into an otherwise stress free trip.
“At least by the time you get home you’ll either be madly in love or hate each other,” she predicted. “Condensed time, you know.”
At the time she said it, I wasn’t sure I cared which direction that went. Now, though, my heart had started going down the path, and I was gripped with fear. I struggled with the suitcase. His brown eyes danced with amusement. “Here,” he said, grabbing it with a free, strong, tan, arm, lifting it over my head and settling it nicely in the empty space I had overlooked right behind me.
He nodded toward the seat next to him. I tripped on the way into the seat and dropped my still homeless passport – I’d been carrying since digging it out from the bottom of the suitcase. I reached down to grab it, and when I sat up, the rebel hair persuaded chunks on both sides to fight for the cause of freedom. My unruly hair clung to my sweaty face. He smiled. “Here,” he said again, looking much too amused, this time offering me his baseball cap. I captured the hair under the cap and settled in.
I needed to do some damage control, quickly, I decided. I needed to apologize for my frazzle and clarify that this was a fluke, of course, and not at all the real me.
And that’s when I said it.
“I don’t know what’s wrong with me,” I declared. “I’m usually so organized. I’ll be totally put together when we get back to the States.”
I’m sure I convinced one of us, although I no longer remember if he responded. At some point, though, he took out his Sony CD Walkman and stack of CD’s (traveling Europe looked different in the pre-digital age), put the headphones on my head and let me mooch his music for the remainder of the trip. (I, of course, had confidently left mine at home thinking that lugging a CD player and CDs around Europe would be cumbersome.) We spent the rest of that train ride, and the rest of the month, in the free fall Lisa had predicted.
Little did I know that not quite two years later this stoic boy would propose (in rhyming verse!), that not quite three years later we’d be married, and that a decade after that, on our tenth anniversary (last week!), I might come home from a run listening to his iPod, wearing his watch, his hat, and his T-Shirt. On this day, like any day in the ten years, I might find I’d blown a deadline, or forgotten the keys in the front door or overlooked an important date on the school calendar. He’d kiss me, pour me a glass of wine, and, with the same teasing sparkle in those damn brown eyes, repeat the line that has become an almost daily staple in our repertoire of marital banter.
“Don’t worry, you’ll be totally put together when we get back to the States.”