I grew up in an idyllic, Norman Rockwell worthy, bit of countryside my generation refers to as "the bubble." So named because of its blissful separateness from the rest of the world.
My childhood was full of community picnics, pool parties, campfire gatherings and Christmas celebrations marked by fond memories and general generosity. As Jack Nicholson puts it in "As Good as it Gets" — "Some of us have great stories, pretty stories that take place at lakes with boats and friends and noodle salad. Just no one in this car. But, a lot of people, that's their story. Good times, noodle salad."
This kind of story would not be complete without a best friend. Someone just down the road to ride bikes and traverse creeks with on long hot summer days. Someone to spend hours with in fabulous imaginary places full of adventure. Someone to brave storms and hide from monsters with. Mine was Stacy Marie.
She was with me from the age of 5 or 6 right through into adulthood. Together we share the most intimate parts of friendship — from happy memories to broken hearts.
To say Stacy is a quiet person is a bit of an understatement. She didn't start speaking to my parents until we were teenagers, and even then it was tenuous at best.
Which makes the moment at my wedding, when she stood up and gave a speech on our childhood, all the more special. While there were many memories worth noting, among them were the short cuts.
There isn't much to do in a small town, and even less to do out in the boonies. Physical activity is a survival necessity to stave off boredom.
Stacy's talent was for short cuts.
Every summer she and I would take a bike trek to the village (roughly six miles). When riding we had a rule: Ride down the hills, walk up the hills. This allowed not only for a leisurely trip but also for chatting along the way. It also added a travel time vs. distance conundrum. While it typically took us only half an hour to get to our destinations, it took us a whopping hour and a half to get home. Answer? Dramatic downhill trajectory into the village.
For a few years, we took the same route, which landed us close to the McDonalds with a minimal amount of difficulty. One year, as we began our departure, Stacy asked, why not go right instead of left? As our destination lay toward the right, this seemed a perfectly logical route – a short cut.
Over an hour later, we were exhausted, leaning on our bicycles, and only halfway home.
While in a car the chosen route might be the same (or, in actuality .2 miles longer according to google maps) on foot the dramatic increase of the angles of the hills presented a definite problem. Oh yeah, and it had started to rain.
Shortly after that, my father drove up. It seems the fact that we were late getting home had caused some concern so he had come out looking for us. Once he confirmed we were OK, he smiled, waved, and drove off. Thanks dad.
Over two hours into the journey and about a mile from home, dad reappeared with the pickup truck. Apparently he had taken pity on us, all be a only a little, and he gave us and our trusty cycles a lift the rest of the way home.
You may look at this and think "aw, what a cute learning experience." But that journey isn't over yet.
Later on in our wanderings, Stacy suggested another short cut. We were walking along the road to catch up on the latest high school gossip and were turning to head home when she indicated a neighbors field as a viable and possibly more enjoyable detour. We weren't far from home, not even half a mile, and the path she suggested seemed parallel to our typical route, so I agreed. What could possibly go wrong?
About half an hour later we emerged from the woods on the back end of her parents' field. Meaning I would have to first get to her house, then back-track down a road and up a hill to get home.
These are only two of many stories with similar endings. Granted they are the two most dramatic examples, but still, the fact remains that no learning curve seemed to exist to prevent such misadventures. So why did I follow her? Why didn't I once say "no, I don't think so" or "that's not a good idea"?
To this day I'm not entirely sure why. It could be a prerequisite of best friendship that we go out of our way — even miles and hours out of the way — unquestioningly for said friend. Like Anne Shirley and Diana Barry fighting ghosts of their own making, we traversed the woods confident in our friendship to get us out in one piece. We dreamed of a world much bigger than our own, with bright lights and wonderful adventures, when all the while we had it made. We had the bubble.
As adults we dream of recapturing it. We go back and visit our old haunts and say "remember when we..." and laugh for hours over the retrospection. We long for things to be that simple again, and know in our hearts they never can be, not really.
Maybe we can get back that life for our children someday — that beautiful idyllic place between reality and dream, that for a brief moment in time, was ours.
