The Girl - part 1.

I can't really think of any friends I've made on the trips, in fact I can safely say that I never met and maintained a relationship with any other kid I met along the way or at Wind River Ranch, there was no time for that, and the brief friendships I did make with other visitors at the ranch were brief and soon forgotten. I was never the most social individual and making friends was always awkward and difficult. Dad was never much help either being just as socially inept and uncomfortable as I was about strange people, so being friendly with passing ships in the night was never practiced on the trips.

A lot of the times we would spend time swimming at the motel pool with other kids and families, and like I think I mentioned before, my family and I never pursued and cultivated a friendship with any of the other people visiting the motels, it seemed pointless and the brief time spent at the motel never gave anybody a chance to get past the initial suspicion. In turn nobody ever approached us for friendship as well. This was probably a good thing too because I guess it was generally thought that it wasn't normal to be overly friendly, it was best to be polite and distant. On the few occasions someone did approach us for friendship, there was a desperate and dangerous quality about that person and we felt it necessary to passive-aggressively retreat. Like with the kid who called himself "Konk". The kid Konk was still young but a little older than me and I remember him wearing one of those yacht captain hats like the Skipper on Gilligans Island. He was very talkative and outgoing and insisted I play with him, making up games like tag or throwing rocks into the empty field. I was careful and sure to stay close to Mom and Dad while he was around. Dad was amused by Konk, and Konk explained his name: that when he was bad or wouldn't shut up, his dad would konk him on the head, I guess this happened so often that the nickname stuck. Well Konk hung out with us and was resistant about going back to his own parents (I wonder why?) and he kept the conversation going the entire time he was around, and getting a little bit annoying in the process. His parents, who I remember never emerged from their motel room, finally sensed he was starting to fray on my parents nerves and sternly called him back into the room, Konk sadly and reluctantly went back to his parents and we never saw him again.

That didn't mean I never wanted to make friends, actually the trips were often very lonely. Except for the few times I took a friend on the trip like Ted or Oliver, or the ten days spent at Wind River Ranch with David and the rest of the cousins, I generally spent most of the time by myself, swimming in to motel pools or daydreaming for hours in the car or on the occasional swingset at a motel. I would often wish I could make friends, or even just one friend would've been nice. Even better, would be if I was able to meet a girlfriend on the trip.

We stopped for the day at a motel, and I think it was a Holiday Inn, or one of the "premium" motels we occasionally stay at, and of course it had a good swimming pool with a slide and diving board. There were a bunch of other kids already at the pool and I shyly got up my courage to join the group and participate in the fun. There were a few separate families hanging out and everyone seemed to know each other and getting along in the games and sliding down the slide and it was difficult to distinguish the siblings and parents from one another. I just quietly tried to blend in. And... there she was... the cutest girl I've ever seen in the whole world, swimming and having fun with the rest of the kids. I tried not to stare or let on that I thought she was the prettiest girl I've ever seen, because obvious looking was rude and creepy, but I couldn't keep my eyes off her. She was about my age, was wearing a 2 piece bathing suit and had a thin silver necklace. She probably already knew herself she was pretty and was confident with the other kids, but not bitchy or mean to anyone. She liked to dive off the diving board, and I liked watching her, but she seldom went down the slide, probably thinking it was immature. I played it cool and pretended I didn't notice her as I confidently climbed the slide ladder and powerfully slid down the slide making an impressive splash in the pool. I would even sometimes go crazy and show off by going down the slide head first, indicating my superior experience, humor and fearlessness. As hard as I tried, I don't think I ever got her attention, or anyone elses attention for that matter. So as much as I wanted to go up to her and say something suave and alluring, something like, "hello" or something like that, I didn't dare, I was too afraid.

Everyone around the pool, including the girl, eventually got done with swimming and the pool activities and went back to their rooms to dry off, change and get ready for settling in for the night. I continued to lurk about making sure I wasn't too obvious, and actually relieved to have the pool to myself for awhile. The girl disappeared with her family for awhile, but I certainly didn't forget about her, I was acutely aware which room she was in, or in this case rooms, since her family seemed to be normal and didn't cram 2 adults and 3 kids in a single room to save money, so it looked like the girl and her brother(s) and sister(s) had a room to themselves, and I kept an eye out from a safe distance. But a little while later the girl came out again, this time not in a bathing suit but in shorts and a t-shirt, and this didn't make any difference in her beauty, she was still really cute and even more sophisticated. I dried myself off and again casually hung around pretending not to care about any of the other kids, especially the girl. The other kids played together like they all knew one another and pretty much ignored me, since I was giving off the "leave me alone, I'm too cool for you" vibe, which probably translated into just "unfriendly". But in reality what I really wanted was for one of them to notice me, especially the girl, but any of the kids making a friendly invitation would do. I tried to project positive energy while not making eye contact, but my reverse psychology wasn't working and nobody invited me to play.

It started to get late for kids, and dinner time forced all families together to disappear to a nearby Denny's or similar restaurant. I felt somewhat defeated, knowing I would never see her again, but at a loss as to what I would've done had I actually met and talked with the girl. Instead I sat on the swingset, alone, and daydreamed that she was sitting there with me.