Don't do nothing...Kiss the girl

A friend of mine died the other day...not a real friend, but not quite fake either.  A blog writer five years younger...who wrote excruciatingly biting articles about his life, his loves...just was suddenly gone.

It didn't cause some sort of existential crisis in me...rather, I am quite thankful for all I have done.  But man...is there so much left undone.

I remember driving Interstate 5 in California, south from LA to San Diego, with Camp Pendleton and its brown green hills hiding all those training marines...while to the West was the largest, bluest view you will ever see from land.  An immense Pacific, so wide it cannot be seen from north to south but rather in passing you realize how tremendously small you are.  I remember the windows were down, the typical southern California wind scented slightly with ocean tumbling in, and the music was from a long time ago.

Doesn't mean I need to go back though...but it is something I wouldn't mind sharing the ride with a companion.   Somebody who hasn't been there, seeing it for the first time...with child-like eyes.

Don't do nothing...kiss the girl.  Kiss her on the lips at Dana Point, the outcrop of land that points out to the ocean...do it at sunrise, the opposite of the lighting, with the sun poking up out East while the Pacific churns black behind you, still dark there.

I want to spend a wanton evening in Vegas, dressed to the nines...a braless dress for her, daring and flaunting at the same time...car service and room service...music and lights.  Don't do nothing...kiss the girl, feel her like the first bite into a peach.  Be strangers in a city filled with them.  Explore...explore her.  Explore her mind and ask her hard questions in a hot tub.  Wake up with the sun piercing through the windows with a succulent hangover, feel her beside you, dress on the floor, make up smudged...more beautiful than ever seen.

A restaurant in France, where my best friend tells me is the most romantic place in the world...a darkened street in Italy where music and pasta combine in a sensuous bond.  I want to travel with her...

I want to simply fly with her...dual upgrades...drinks and slight conversations hurtling at 35,000 feet.  Slight hand touches, and of course more champagne...a soft clink to a whispered toast.  A very chaste kiss in a cabin of strangers.  Reading quietly...magazines we never had time for...topics we never discussed.   Destinations really less important than the getting there...don't do nothing, kiss the girl.

A cold cabin in the woods, a huge fireplace and seasoned wood...layers of bedding and down comforters...long pajamas of wool that tangle when together.  Snow in the morning, cold feet hustling to make coffee and stoke the fire before returning to her laughter in bed.  Bed head...restoration.

Don't do nothing...kiss the girl.  Kiss her beneath the sheets, pillows strewn about, coffee-breath and who cares in a clutch.  Shower together and scrub the day fresh with newly appointed skin.  Read by the fire, a long book aloud...poetry, light and refreshing like a plump afternoon in late spring, while a tempest plays outdoor with fresh snow and ice.

A sunset in Savannah, GA, from atop the Bohemian hotel.  Drinks at the W New York Times Square. A stay on the 49th floor at the Westin on 8th Ave.

Daily...daily the routine is just that...plundering forward, staying in the same lane.  Walking through it all with a fixed grin...staying focused, becoming professionally successful.  Buying things...breaking things.  Steak starts to taste the same...the palette is becoming quite predictable.

Don't do nothing...kiss the girl.

It is that thought that reminds me...and like a fine sliver of light, like hallway light beneath the door of a darkened room, I find myself deliciously lured.