Open Doors

One thing I love in this life? Those moments of connection with a total stranger. Even if I know I'm not going to see them 5 seconds from now or ever again. That "ssssnap-shooooop" of the bolt being thrown thrills me

Friday morning I stopped at the gas station to donate my paycheck to the needy oil companies. There I was standing at the pump, admiring the rainy morning, whistling mindlessly to some Dave Matthews in my head. A tall, burly, not so shabby lookin' trucker came strolling out of the station's convenience store. Even at 30 paces, he had gorgeous eyes, which I wouldn't have noticed had he in turn not seen my truck - which has its name in decals on the sides: Birddog. In what sounded to me like a joyful tone, with a deep, rather husky baritone, he hollered, "BirrrrrdDAWG! Oh man, I like that!" I looked over, saw this studly dude and gave him a huge grin. I loved the way he said her name. "Thanks!" I hollered back. "It's cuzza da way she go down da road!" He responded with his own grin and a gloved wave, hopped into his truck and was gone. The moment stayed with me all day. It felt so good

Same day, later that evening, I was yawning and surfing through craigslist ads. Initially I was checking the roommate section, but then I hopped over to the personal ads just so I could amuse myself with the pathetic composition and bad grammar of the posts. First post I opened was a very simple, "Anyone out there want to chat? Email me your IM." "What the hell?" I thought. "This will be short." I'll engage him on chat. He'll ask what I'm wearing, what I'm doing. I'll cleverly respond, "I'm wearing surgical scrubs. I've just finished sharpening the knives. Tell me, do you still have both kidneys? Want to come over?" and watch just how fast he disappears

Instead, I fell into a 6.5 hour online conversation that blew me out of my provincial mental shoes. Not only did I hear the ssssnap-shooooop of the bolt, but the tzappp-hssss as the sodium arc lights illuminated the gloom. G'lord. We talked about everything - spirituality, likes, dislikes, movies, music, art, writing, humanity, cheese and practical applications thereof - everything. At 4 a.m., full moon be damned, I finally said, "I gotta sleep." Same thing happened Saturday evening. I was just going to say, "Hi, how are you?" It turned into another typing marathon. And again last night (but I made myself go to bed by midnight). I'm intrigued, fascinated, beguiled - he's a very cool human being. But, he'll probably stop talking to me after Tuesday. He's got ridiculously lofty expectations, that's why. C'est la Vie... it's been fun, and the connection was startlingly lovely

Who's next?

.....ssssnap-shooooop.....