Night Drive

That night we just drove and drove. It was a cold night. Standing outside getting out my car keys I could see my breath. The air was dry, it felt like all the moisture in the air had frozen and fallen to the ground. It was cleansing and refreshing. With each deep breath I could feel the cold untainted air pour into my lungs. Every time I exhaled it felt as if the warm moist discharge of breath was cleansing my body of the pollution of stress and discontent. The warmth of the car was inviting, I felt like I was a little kid getting of of a swimming pool on a cool summer night and having my mother warp me in a warm towel. When I picked her up she got in the car and she knew she didn't have to say anything. She kissed me on the cheek and then snuggled against my arm as we drove off into the night. We took the back roads, roads with no lights and we hardly saw any other cars. The cd player softly played the mellow haunting melodies of Pink Floyd's Wish You Were Here album. That is my driving music. It calms restless thoughts. Some people don't like driving in the dark, they think it is scary. On the contrary I think that it is beautiful. The world is very different in the dark. Certainty extends only as far as the headlights. Everything looks familiar, but nothing is recognizable. It feels as though you are driving in circles, but if you really were driving in circles you would never know. In order to enjoy it you have to let go of your fears. If you are constantly worried that you don't know where you're going you will never get anywhere. You will start looking at every tree you pass, analyze every bump in the road. If you pay too much attention to the meaningless details you will never be able to pay attention to the road ahead of you. We drove on through the night, not speaking. The silence was comfortable, we were able to connect on a level deeper than we could with the awkwardness of language. Every now and then we would drive through fog. The fog made us feel that there was nothing else in the world, we were together and that was all that mattered. She would smile and kiss my arm as to say "yeah, me too". We drove until we happened upon a lake. The moon was nearly full and the reflection was more beautiful than anything we had ever seen. We kissed. This was the most passionate kiss I have ever experienced. We continued to kiss till it led to something more and we made love. We connected on such a deep level, it was much more than just sex. Afterwards as I held her in my arms a fog began to roll in reminding us that there was nothing else in the world. On the way back home we talked. We talked about our day, our childhood, our hopes, our dreams, our fears. We didn't talk because we had to, we talked because we wanted to. Language was no longer an awkward barrier, but a fluid conduit to express the bond we had formed.