Our Spot

-I really love this entry, I hope someone enjoys it because the one who it was intended for will probably never read it-

The day ended much as it might have been expected.  Nine months of college courses had given the three of us a sense of being spoiled while we studied books as opposed to laboring as many of our fathers had done in years before us.  The end of the day closing in brought with it a sense of satisfaction in a hard days work; that long forgotten feeling that was accoupanied by the exhaustion of the physical body. 

The three of us were already getting along as best we could, Greg was easy-going enough, and Ben, he had been a trip since the day that we had met and realized that we would be neighbors for the summer term.  We talked about what we were planning to do in the evening to come, it seemed somewhat refreshing to think that the days were growing longer as time went on, consequently plans for the evening were always of the utmost importance.  We had all missed afternoon break, which was no great concern, but after all we were entitled to it, so why not take advantage.  It was actually past the time for a short ten minute breather, but we had all met up with weed-whips at the most distant edge of campus, so why not sit and socialize about the upcoming evening or weekend?

The ground was soft in early May, but it was dry from the heat of the sun that made more appearances in one week than it must have all winter.  The three of us lied on the bank of a hill and relaxed for the time being.  They talked for a while, and soon I realized that I had somehow, more or less, withdrawn from the conversation.  I was taking in everything.  This setting that I had seen so many times before shown a new vigor as I saw it for the first in a season of warmth that promised summer as opposed to a season that promised winter. 

We were slightly off to the right hand side of the cement walk way that lead me so many times to the dreaded time at chapel that I was surprised that the mere sight of the Church over the crest of the hill did not give me a sickening feeling.  I sat and stared at the scenery as if I were there for the first time.  In a few minutes I lived a hundred trips to that very spot…it became ours.  Just three hundred yards off in the distance was city street, busy as one could have imagined at three o-clock in the afternoon, but that distance squelched the sound and it became nothing more than a background of a movie screen; totally separate from the main plot that was taking place inside my head.

I told you all the time that summer “meet under the Maple trees at the back of campus,” or I just said “I’ll see you tonight,” and you would understand as if you had said it yourself in your own thoughts.  It was our spot.  We’d retreat there after a day that wanted nothing more than to frustrate us or push us away.  It was a magical place where the city and houses were stopped by invisible boundaries and nature was left to do as it pleased.  The parking lot to the church would sizzle in the sun as summer moved from may to through June and July.  The cars would beep and weave in and out of lanes, but they were never more than a thought or a whisper to the background of where we belonged.  Nieghborhood kids walked down the street, but the sound of their laughter and the smell of cheap cigarettes never reached us on the hill.  We watched the world go by and remembered home because of the summer breeze that moved in the treetops, or ants that crawled over our knees…but there was no way that home could have ever rivaled the our place of retreat. 

We spent hours there all summer long.  Most times you would find me there reading in the late afternoon.  I could see your bare toes playing in the grass when you would lean back into me between my legs as we sprawled out on a hill of green carpet.  We would sit in silence listening to the distant sound of the city that was not allowed to penetrate our world.  And just as the summer would sneak up on us, so would the end of the day.  The sun would set over the buildings and the crickets would tell us that it was almost time to go home as the summer heat finally began to wither away to a cool evening.

It was our spot, even if only in the confides of my own mind.  The summer would come and go quickly, but how many times I would retreat to that place in my fantasies.  And even if you never hear of the place that met worlds to me that short summer that seems so long ago, it will always be our spot.