Dancing At The Truckstop

It was a wild day. A wacky day.
A wonderful day.

It was Lindsay's first birthday party.  Epiphany, extraordinary blogger and thrower of mega parties, hosted the event at her lovely chateau on Saturday. I stepped into a living room full of balloons and birthday cake to find real live bloggers!
"Aren't you....?" I asked an attractive blond woman standing at the dining room table.
"Yes! And you're Mimi," she smiled. How surreal, I thought. And then she remarked, "But I'm really disappointed that you're not wearing a pencil skirt."

Gosh, people really do read my stories.

As nice as it was to meet the other bloggers, I must admit that the best part of my day was meeting my boyfriend's daughter, Heather. I've been reading her savvy blog forever. Watching her come to life off the blog page was the highlight of my day. We first "met" months ago when she competed against her dad in my Saturday Comeback Challenge - and took home the winning badge three times. I've always enjoyed her wit and intelligence, especially the candid heart-to-hearts she has with her four-year-old daughter, Lauren.
Then came the relatives.

One daughter, son-in-law, son, daughter-in-law, two grandchildren, one great-grandmother, three grandmothers, one step-grandmother, two grandpas, one absent step-grandpa (awol), an uncle and and a step-uncle, one great step-aunt and her husband (genealogy unidentifiable), a few friends of cousins' friends, three bloggers in person, children of person-bloggers, another queen, a woman who calls herself "Mimi" who is not a queen, a Queen who calls herself queen of all and that's reason enough I suppose, a few Barbie dolls, a plaid sheep, one of boyfriend's assorted ex-wives and a partridge in a pear tree - all in the span of three hours.
It was more than a little surreal.

It was lovely to meet his son and daughter-in-law.  He is the owner of the autographed baseball that his dad blogged about not long ago.  It is their first wedding anniversary today as well.
They are a happy, happy couple. What a treat to finally get to meet them.

We ate monster burgers, we ate strawberries and fruit, we sang songs. The adults passed birthday Lindsay around, we made lots of pictures and everyone left happy, full of 5-lb. hamburgers and chocolate cake. Heather wrote a beautiful post this morning about her daughter. Lindsay will not remember the details of this day but I'm not likely to forget her first birthday for a variety of reasons.

Boyfriend was not feeling totally up to par and so I volunteered to drive a six-hour round-trip day from Connecticut to New Jersey.
Now, if you'll recall, the last time I attempted to cross the George Washington Bridge I made it in a world record sprint of seventeen hours. And now I'm responsible for getting him safely to a family function on time. What was I thinking??!

We were going to a child's birthday party.
I was not wearing my pencil skirt, my friends.
Therein lies the problem.

You see, the skirt has a certain ambiance that tends to land me in trouble.
And at times, get me out of trouble - like a magic carpet worn about my bloglife that affects most everything I write. Today, I was skirtless. And I was in deep trouble. Meeting ex-wives is one thing - odd, but not particularly troublesome. I'd eaten enough poppyseed rolls at the buffet table to take care of that. She was nice. Really. I survived.
But getting boyfriend to his granddaughter's birthday party via the Jersey Turnpike and driving us back home in the rain and dark was no small feat for a woman without her magic skirt.

Then another hero showed up to lighten the mood.

Enter Lenny Kravitz.

Ever since we started dating we've shared a certain Kravitz tune that has become "our song." It shall remain nameless here, because, well........it wouldn't be "our song" if the whole world knew about it, now would it?

I was tired and punchy. We were stuck in the Holland Tunnel for an eternity. Boyfriend had mercifully dozed off so I passed the time by playing Name That Honk. New Yorkers have no sense of humor, I tell ya. And neither did he when he awoke to a rousing rendition of "Dixie" playing on the steering wheel, but by that time we were almost ready to crawl through the lower level of the George Washington Bridge at a snail's pace. In fact, we could have gotten out and literally crawled faster than the traffic was moving.

I tried to get romantic in the tunnel.
"Mimi, keep your eyes on the road."

"But I'd rather make good use of useless time and kiss you," I said. "No one will notice. It's dark in here."

"I don't care if people notice. I just don't want to die."

(See what I mean??! No pencil skirt. No kiss in the tunnel.)

I sulked and we finally made it across the bridge just as the sun was setting. People in New York drive like bats out of hell. It doesn’t matter if you’re in a four-foot tunnel, on a mile-high bridge or in a parking lot. He kept telling me to stay OUT of the right lane unless I wanted to exit somewhere. I knew he was right, but what he didn’t know about was Plan B.

The city lights were beautiful over the water. It was a tad foggy which cast a mysteriously romantic hue over the entire scene. “Mimi, why are you in the right lane again?”
“Because I want to see the water.”
“ OK. But you might want to stay out of this lane because later on up the…..”
“I know, I know! Somebody MIGHT decide to exit. I get it.”
“Good Mimi. Glad to see you understand….
Uh….sweetcakes?”
“Yes, sweetie?”
"I don’t think anyone’s going to want to exit off the bridge.”

Imagine severe rolling of the eyeballs.

You don’t want to know what I think I heard under his breath.
It’s unbloggable.

I edged closer to the side of the bridge and lost track of the speed limit and my lipstick tube at the same time.

“Mimi, why are you slowing down? What are you doing??!”

"Just looking for the camera. It’s so romantic. Just look to your right.

Let’s make a memory.”

"Pull OVER," said the sweaty-palmed man at my side. Yes!
He does want to kiss me.

"On the bridge? NOW? I don’t want to stop, I just want to take a picture of us kissing in the moonlight on the bridge. Here, you hold this and…………..”

This is a PG blog.

I can't repeat it.

What is wrong with him tonight?
Then it hit me. I’m not wearing my pencil skirt. See what I mean??!
We drove onto I-95 and our moment was lost. It was getting late and time to stop for a romantic dinner. Right?
Wrong.

We rolled into Texas Pete's truckstop an hour later.
Cheese quesadillas for me and pizza for wide-eyed passenger.  It was much too late for a proper dinner. We were both exhausted and one of us was traumatized.
Relationship Test #225: Romance on the run aka getting frisky on the highway doesn't work when one is not properly attired. What was I thinking??!

We finished our food and got ready to hit the highway for the last leg home. Boyfriend was feeling better but still not well enough to drive. He stood up. And froze in his tracks.

"What's wrong?"

"Listen," he said.

"I know. I know. I was so silly in the tunnel tonight. I shouldn't have been thinking about such nonsense while trying to drive and the bridge...well...that was just stupid."

"No, Mims. I mean listen...."

He smiled.
I smiled.

Lenny Kravitz was singing our song right there in the tacky Texas traveler's terminal. I froze.

And before I could say George Washington Bridge he had wrapped his arms around me and forgotten about the dripping cheese that had been heading for the trash can before Lenny intervened.

"Dance with me?" I asked. I dare you."

We did.

Who needs to make a memory in New York at sunset? What was I thinking??!

And I wasn't even wearing my pencil skirt.

P.S. Something tells me he had another take on the day's events. I'm going right over to his blog now and read it before he gets home from work.