It wasn’t bullshit, but your initials were.
In the summer of 1985, we had a romance, a few weeks. You were a nursing student, I was a driver. We met on the bus.
For our first date, I came to your grandma’s (or maybe an aunt’s? ) house in the Vermont Hills. When you introduced us, she was shocked that I stood up to say hello. Maybe you weren’t used to guys with manners.
Later in the summer we went to The Dalles to meet your parents. Your dad took us for a ride in a vintage convertible. We sat in back, and the sunlight streamed through your hair. You looked remarkable. I was yours from then on.
I had a little house in Sellwood, and later I helped you look for a place in Northwest near Good Sam, just before school started. (Seems incredible now, doesn’t it, that those things were affordable then to us.)
Of course something happened;I don’t know what. You didn’t want to see me anymore. Those manners that so impressed your family apparently went missing, because I said a couple mean things. Sorry Brenda, I take it back.
I wouldn’t take a trip through the time tunnel. I got married, raised four kids, am reasonably healthly and content. I wouldn’t trade…but every year, this time of year, I think about you, that car ride, holding your hand. A life not lived.
I hope you got your RN degree. I hope you married and loved well, because you deserve it, even as much I was hoping then that it was me.
Your initials were BS, but you never were.