i understand now why my two best friends are so skeptical every time i meet a boy. and every time i swear it's different. i swear until i am blue in the face. i swear because i need to convince myself as well. i swear because i know it's all bullshit. i swear because they are never good enough for me in the end, no matter how badly i want them to be. even hot rock star boys who buy me drinks and fuck me rotten... still not good enough.
so, this time, i am not going to try and convince anyone. i will simply say, this time he's good enough. this time, i wonder if i am.
with that - i leave us hanging. first - SCOTLAND.
all of the postcards that i sent from edinburgh said something to this effect: "to hell with england." if you know me well, you know that that is a BOLD statement. i have been obsessed with nothing else for years and then some... but now i can honestly say that london means little to me compared to the beauty of edinburgh. a piece of my heart will always belong to salisbury, but the highlands of scotland have stolen what remains. so much beauty so unspoiled...
things got off to a rocky start when ang and i had our flight to DC (where we were to connect to london) cancelled after sitting in the airport for some ungodly amount of time. they tried to suggest that we take a flight to san fran and connect from there (wtf?????), but ang wisely declined the offer in lieu of a trip to chicago the next afternoon. seems we would lose about the same amount of time either way... i can't believe anyone thought that would be a good idea...
here's a good place to add (for pure comic relief) a sidebar about the huge friggin' hickey sam left on angie's whole right side of her neck and the awkward sideways glances i was getting as her traveling companion as a result.... just picture that for a moment. the security guard made some comment about an awfully huge mosquito and then raised his eyebrows at me.... i should have raised them right back. sure it would have given him a thrill.
so we finally got the trip underway the following afternoon... two hours in the air, four waiting, eight more in the air, two traipsing around london to get to the King's Cross station that our friend Harry Potter made so famous, five more on a train in the damned smoking car (a mistake we did not make twice) and FINALLY we set our feet on scottish soil. we celebrated with a beer and some scampi and chips, a shower, and a a nice crash on the hostel bunks... the next morning we would begin our 3-day trek through the highlands.
ang was, might i add, one of the best traveling partners i have ever had. completely laid back like me... she perhaps let me spend more money than i should, but alas, everyone should really own a hairy coo hand puppet. they really should. no really.
not to bore you with details that could never do the country any justice.... let it suffice to say that the beauty of the highlands nearly moved me to tears. (tears of laughter in the case of the german guy from our tour who stripped naked and jumped in loch ness in below 40 weather). earth basically untouched, mountain peaks i couldn't have imagined, the purest sky i have ever seen. walking around in glencoe was - no kidding - like walking around inside a painting. there is nothing in this country that compares to that kind of beauty. i was terrified i was gonna step on a pixie as i walked across the heather-covered floors of the valleys and the crags of creeks and water falls. the lochs all have pebble beaches and the peaks of the bens are all still covered in snow... untouched and the most splendid sight my eyes have seen.
8 days in the UK and we never got rained on! can you believe that. our last day of the tour, just after the hairy coo safari (highland cows - look like oversized sheepdogs), it drizzled a little on our way to the town of stirling. but only for a few moments, stopped by the time we arrived at the william wallace memorial and the statue of mel gibson (too ridiculous...). here we learned how horribly historically inaccurate "Braveheart" was - Braveheart wasn't even a name given to William Wallace - it was given to King Robert the Bruce (a mere supporting character in the film - bah) -after his death. too fun...
after this, we returned to edinburgh where i spent too much money on silly souvenirs - i bought a kilt for my beloved casey dryden as soon as i pictured him in it with a white tshirt and docs.... too sexy.... we went crazy in the woolen mill buying scarves for everyone we knew and loved with no regard for the fact that it would be 75 degrees when we arrived home...
and then a night in glasgow to see the one and only Travis play their hometown. ang's christmas present since we both love them so. i don't care if that completely destroys my britpop cred - TRAVIS are amazing, especially live. a band called keane who perform with just a vocalist, a piano, and drums opened and stole our hearts. we would spend the next day in edinburgh hitting every record store on princes street until we found the single (the album is not yet released)... the lead singer is a thing of loveliness who sounds like he's channeling freddy mercury...
travis busted out with one of my favorite songs off the new album (Happy to Hang Around) and continued for some 2 and half hours playing any and every song we could have wanted to hear. that's how concerts should be. and they love their home audience and it shows. so emotional... sounds silly i know - like the whole trip i just had my hormones out of whack or something... but if any of you have seen this country, you know i am not full of it.
wait - i have forgotten something very important. koo koo ka choo, ms. robinson (blackwell).... how dare i forget about dylan? no - he's not the boy from the beginning of the entry - we'll get there...
there is this amazing club around the corner from our hostel in edin called the liquid room. hybrid were doing a live show there that i wouldn't have missed for anything. if only because dryden would have beaten me senseless if he knew i missed it. he took me to see them the first time and i was so taken with them. well, ang is NOT a clubber, so i went alone - sort of. i met a girl in the hostel who was insane but wonderful, and she joined me with every intention of staying there with me and watching out for me while i indulged a bit. she couldn't keep up with me and i eventually sent her back home swearing i would be ok by myself... it never ceased to amaze me how safe i felt in that city - even walking back on my own at near sunrise to the hostel....
hybrid were their usual magnificent selves and i spotted yet another thing of beauty (did i mention i got kissed by a scottish boy with pretty blue eyes as soon as i walked in the door - amazing! that never happens here!) as i was taking it all in. i couldn't tell if he was shy or uninterested, but as the night went on and the indulgences took effect, i resolved i would not leave until i expressed my appreciation of his loveliness to this purple-haired angel.
i hunted high and low and once convinced he was long gone, my discouragement was lifted as i saw him walk to the bar and grab what must have been a guinness... that's what it tasted like on his lips anyway - oops. getting ahead of myself.
i stood near enough to see him, but was still gathering up the nerve to approach him when someone said in my ear (insert ewan-bremnar-spudlike scottish accent here) "You look awf'ly lonely standing here all by y'self..." and in my peripheral i see the tips of violet locks.... he had caught me looking.
dylan, not from edinburgh and unable to distinguish me as american as i yelled into his ear. dylan, sweet as can be and one of the best kissers i have ever known as i would find out moments later. dylan.... 18.
i couldn't have known. i couldn't. he looked at least 22. he asked if i was embarrassed after this information made me blush and drop my head into my hands. "just please tell me i am not the oldest woman you have ever kissed...." apparently not. she was 32. i felt better and let him kiss me some more. until the club closed and they had to ask us to stop and please exit. oh, sweet dylan. sweet, sweet dylan. do you share this story with your friends?
so - sometime in beautiful edinburgh (with a slight hangover) shopping, castle-romping, and some of the best shepherd's pie and tandoori i have ever tasted and then time to get ready to go home. one night in london where i screwed up the reservation and we ended up sleeping in what was basically a closet - me on a pallet on the floor - eating a picnic dinner (sandwiches purchased at the petrol station with crisps and juice) on the bed and watching "Species" (wow - what an awful movie), giggling furiously throughout... we had just come from a show at the national theatre with jim broadbent in it. I LOVE THAT MAN. he was fantastic, of course. the plot had some issues, but the acting was SPOT ON.
and then home. home where it was 35 degrees warmer. home where angie could return to her sam (she missed him, but totally did not drive me crazy - i was so proud of her). home where i could return to my new roommate, megan, who i adore and the pooch who came with her. home where i found the nerve to write back this lovely boy who wrote to me ages ago when nick was still in the picture, though i had long wanted him out of it. boy am i glad i did.
i had a couple of other dates the week i came back. the scottish boys really seemed to like me and it totally boosted my ego. so i came home with a vengeance... a date with the rock star boy involving lots of good sex and a bootleg copy of starsky and hutch. but the next morning i decided maybe this wasn't quite what i was looking for... then a random date with someone i had been talking to. that went ok. but then a response from the one i thought i let slip through my fingers. and a date fro drinks on friday night.
i hadn't been that nervous in a while and i wasn't sure why. i guess i just knew something was different. the first time i saw him in person, my heart dropped. i got all nervous all over again. i needed a drink immediately. a few vodka cranberries later i found myself deep in comfortable conversation, feeling like i was with an old friend. there were hands brushing each other across the table and you could visibly see us both try to hide the shivers that ensued. as we talked, i just kept thinking that he was one of the gentlest souls i had ever met. goodness eminates from him. i might have fallen for him right there, thirty minutes after meeting him.
we left hours and drinks later, walked to the car with no destination in mind, but an intended destination nonetheless. whatever it was though, we never made it. we stood at his car and talked. he leaned in to kiss me. it was about 130 am. it was 630 am when we stopped kissing. kissing. just kissing. we had made it to my apartment by then, of course. nevertheless. kissing. he lay in bed with me for hours and never tried anything more than touching my breast. we just kissed until 630 in the morning when we drove back to my car and i saw him off to work. what an amazing kisser. maybe the best kisser i have known. there is an irishman out there (not the rock star) who was once on top. he has been DETHRONED.
in the last ten days i have spent two nights away from him. i want nothing else. the way he looks at me turns me to total jelly. the way he kisses me drives me into throws of passion. we finally made love and it was like nothing i had ever known. i know you have all probably heard all this before. i don't care. there is nothing i can say about simon that will ever do him any justice, so this is my best. i am certain he is good enough. absolutely certain. i wonder if i am. he assures me i am. and then tells me i am beautiful.
beautiful, intelligent, kind, funny, passionate, ambitious about his passions, gentle... he's all the things that justin was and all of the things he was missing. my god, the boy has a personality. jerry, i know you're proud. i know it's still early, but i think i am done. i really think i am done.
we won't rush things. we'll just enjoy each other until it reaches a breaking point and go from there... but i know this time something is going to happen. and i couldn't be more elated.
ok - this thing is a novel.
posted by trixievw @ 12:05 PM
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