A Road Called Whiskey

The dust is flying in the rear view mirror, tires spinning and music blaring down the trail as we hit the summer tree line. Knowing where we’re headed, I haven’t told her yet to keep the anticipation going. Trying to drive has a whole new challenge to it being surrounded by beauty, yet finding myself brought more breathless by her than any surrounding. I can’t seem to stop glancing over in an attempt just to catch a hint of the sparkle in her eyes. Knowing nothing I could say would make a grain of sense being lost in the beauty sitting next to me; I can only offer a sheepish smile when she demands to know what I’m staring at. Finally by the time we make it a few miles up the mountain, she gives in and retreats to counting out all the types of wildlife we encounter on the way. Her way of refusing to make eye contact being obvious, I’m hoping she has realized that even if she asked again, I completely lack the capacity of any words that explain what I see when I look at her.

Coming up over the crest of the first peak, the trail levels out and the truck is filled with silence at what has suddenly come into view. I feel a smile forming at the corner of my mouth, in the anticipation of the first thing she will say when she speaks again. “It’s beautiful”, she whispers, when she finally decides to grace my ears with the sweet sound of her voice. “Still not comparable, but I’m glad you at least looked in the mirror today.” I shot my reply back without even a thought hoping she understood. Yet knowing unless she saw herself through my eyes, it was only a pipe dream. “Besides, we’re only halfway to Heaven anyway.” I had to say it not only because it counted as truth, but because I also knew it would heighten her impatience as to getting where we’re going. Even thought we can see six peaks distance in any direction, she’s still pushing me to drive faster not wanting to lose daylight before we get there.

After a couple more corners in we hit the biggest clearing on the journey, and I suddenly realize how much of a surprise anticipation becomes. Especially when you’re not warned of the clearing being on the side of a mountain, barely wide enough for one car, with a nine hundred foot drop on one side. “You couldn’t have warned me about this part” she said, rolling her eyes at me. “Nope”, I laughed “it was part of the surprise.” She glares at me with a quick, “oh really…..” Knowing that’s definitely not a question, I try to recover by reassuring her that this clearing is what keeps the city folk out. I ask her to get a camera ready to get her shuffling around the floorboard, just so she won’t look up ahead and spoil the first rest. As the truck rolls to a stop, I get out hurry to her side, and grab the camera as she slides from the seat. Gesturing toward a break in the trees I whisper, “Knock yourself out”, and follow her over with the camera at the ready. When she reached the edge, stopping dead in her tracks with a far away awed look filling her eyes at what the distance holds. A few feet away I’m snapping pictures of her lost in that moment, knowing right then she feels a fraction of what fills my soul every time I look at her. The view consisting of mountain sides all around, flowing down to treed shores and miles of water out on the lake. A deep blue, green reservoir fading into the distance littered with sailboats here and there, surrounded by valleys of rock and sand dipping to the depths of blackness. She leaned up against the nearest tree, apparently catching her breath from the sight of a new angle to this world she hadn’t seen before. As she leans there propped by the tree, I glide to the right angle to get our view as a backdrop behind her. A feat not as hard as it seems, with the natural beauty that radiates from her, to me she is and will always be, the whole picture. I had to stop and bask in that moment, when she noticed me snapping away, her hair draped so softly and naturally to the right side of her face. An almost overpowering glow radiating from her, and her eyes reflected a bigger sparkle than I had seen at any other time. The mid-day sun casting soft light across her cheeks to the corner of her lips, what I’m seeing is in every sense of the word, complete perfection, and I only got one chance to capture it.

“We’ve still got more to see, and stops to make.” I told her while overtaken by a smile that shouldn’t have fit on my face. So off we were again, faster pace now since I knew the next stop wasn’t going to be a quick one. We sped off into the valley, making way to dense forest and seasonal creek beds while the road seemed to level out making for better time to our destination. Fifty yards from our turn off I ordered her, “Now you’ll have to close your eyes for this one, no peeking till I say you can!” So she covers them up with her hands and follows it with a labored, “ugh, fine!” and impatiently waits for the OK. As I slid the truck to a stop, she started scooting out of her seat without me, eyes still covered as if she memorized her course long ago. I walked her ten feet until she stopped me abruptly, and plainly stated, “I feel sand for some reason.” At that I removed her hands from her face, but wasn’t exactly prepared for what followed. Her breathing stopped, and all matter of movement and time ceased. The only sign of life from her was the soft slow heartbeat of an angel drifting through the breeze toward the whispering pines. The overbearing silence I broke with the sound of a clicking picture, and she seemed to snap back to reality. Looking over at me with the smile I only see in my dreams, she just straight up told me, “We’re making time to put my feet in the water!” Not being in any hurry, I simply came back with, “we’ve got all the time you need Gorgeous.”

She hadn’t even finished kicking her boots off and her toes were already in the water, she hadn’t even paid mind to her jeans and in short time was up to her waist digging her toes into the sand of the lake bottom. This was the words of legend, true beauty, a goddess surrounded by God’s amazing creation, standing in the sunlight that she shines brighter than, just easing out into the best canvas any artist couldn’t paint. Looking back at me, with her head slightly cocked to the side, hair flowing around her neck slightly in the warm breeze, she gave me that, ‘why aren’t you out here’ smile as I took one last picture before wading out next to her. She had the biggest eye roll I have ever seen, when I pulled up a bottle of Fireball and twisted the lid off. “I’m guessing there’s a reason for that.” She said with a slight groan. “Yes, there is.” I replied, about to school her in my attempt to show more than I ever could before. “I’m sharing this place that no one else has seen, with a woman that no words of even the heaviest depth of beauty can even begin to describe. Waiting on a show that only we get to see, and I can’t imagine anything better. This right here is a moment I will only get once in my life.” She seemed satisfied with this explanation and at that, she pursed her lips and raised the bottle for one big swig before twisting the lid back on and nudging the bottle back to shore. I sadly watched the bottle float away, and hadn’t even taken a full breath when she grabbed my shoulders and pulled me down towards her. Surprised by the action I leaned to look at her, only to find one of the sweetest flavors I have ever experienced in life. How it felt to follow that whiskey soaked cinnamon wash over every ridge of her lips, and to the corners of her mouth. I can’t even begin to describe that cinnamon didn’t even live up to the heat I felt when touching her skin, like when a light bulb burns out and the circuit breaks. Everything else stopped, and amazement swept over me with the strength of a flash flood. I was no longer in the water with her, but at fifty thousand feet soaring through the air with her wrapped in my arms.

Though her lips had left mine, I was still lost in another world, just basking in the disbelief of how perfect it all was. She brought me back to reality with a smile, and that cute innocent giggle I had heard so many times before. Probably brought on by that far away awed look she herself had earlier in the day. “The show didn’t start without us”, I whispered, nodding towards the horizon. Miles away the sun was beginning to sink in the sky, and at the edges of the beach an abundance of elk and deer were beginning to close in on the water for their evening drink. Miles out to the horizon, the silhouettes of the sail boats where making their way to the docks on the other side of the lake. She sat counting as a plethora of fish began circling our legs in the shallows, and I watched as she took the time to absorb it all. Time closing in on dinner, we slowly drug ourselves out of the water and toward the truck. She stopped short to take one last look over the landscape, and took a deep breath while painting the picture in her mind. I couldn’t help but hold on to that last moment, knowing that memory doesn’t always live up to actually being there.

We made our way back to civilization the long way, as I had dinner pre-planned as well. When we pulled in, another perfect smile graced her lips at the sight of an over sized log cabin floating on the river. We ordered dinner, and I picked a table out on the back patio because of the view for miles. Not much talk was needed, as I could see that she was mulling over the events of the day and there was no needed interruption. As we took one last look over the river before heading out, she put her arm around me and somberly said, “So these will all just be little moments that we will never have again.” As she looked up at me with a bit of disappointment, I said, “Well that depends on if you’d ever feel the need to go on the next adventure, but for me, I get to dream of this day for the rest of my life.” I’m still left wondering what that last smile meant as she climbed into the cab of the truck and turned the key from the passenger seat, with that determined look in her eye, but that’s a question for another day. Making our way toward the blacktop, her head found its way to my shoulder as she scrolled through the pictures from the day. “This really is a beautiful place.” She sighed scanning each one. “I’m glad you didn’t use my word, and yes it really is, but it still doesn’t compare,” I said with a grin. She looked at me frazzled, and in waiting for my response laid her head on my shoulder. I finished my point with something that Shakespeare himself couldn’t have written. “Today was a glimpse into what I lay my eyes on every time I look at you, who you are inside, what is seen outside, every time I look in your eyes, the light burning in your soul, there are a hundred words to describe beauty in mans understanding, but none of them even come close to what could possibly be said of yours. There is one word, the only word that holds a light brighter than any others yet still pales in meaning to the one sitting next to me.”

At this she seemed to mold into my arm and the seat, and as her breathing seemed to slow she slipped into a different world all her own. Feeling the relaxation flow over her, the rhythm, of her flawless heartbeat traveled through my shoulder and across my chest. I couldn’t help but be at peace, followed by a smile creeping over my face as I drove toward the ending sunset. I took one more look at her through the tilted rear view mirror, and whispered that one word. “Gorgeous.”