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Driving banter ranked among the many highlights from our July 2011 Multi-State Wedding/Bike/National Park Extravaganza. Whenever Chris and I take a road trip, we engage in an endearing silliness absent from our daily lives. This time I attempted to jot down some good lines - after all, it's tricky to write dialogue; lately I find myself paying closer attention to how people converse.
What follows pretty much sums up our relationship: I bring the goofiness along with bordering-on-obnoxious optimism and enthusiasm, and he shows up with dry humor and a curmudgeonly those-are-the-facts approach to life.
Maybe these snippets will amuse others (and hopefully not offend Mormons, country-music lovers, hippies, farm animals and those suffering from halitosis). Perhaps, I now hear crickets chirping in the ether. Anyway, here it goes ...
Which side of the fire?
"Wait a second," Somewhere outside Opal, Idaho, I started to make a connection. "If Garth Brooks is singing that 'life is not tried it is merely survived' if you're standing outside the fire, then he's saying you should stand ... in the fire?"
"Nothing gets by you, does it?" Chris shook his head in what I like to believe was just strangely displayed pride.
"Well, sometimes you just hear the lyrics, you know? I never really listened to what he was saying."
Perhaps this, coupled with the fact that I broke out Garth's Double Live album in the first place, signaled too many hours in the car, but my mind felt blown.
A week later, as we journeyed across South Dakota, I contemplated something ridiculous with far too much hesitation - eating cold spaghetti from the previous night's camp dinner - to which my dearest smart-ass responded, "What did you learn from the Garth Brooks song?"
Sigh. "Eat the spaghetti."
Almost paradise, we're knocking on heaven's door
traveling Hwy 6 in Utah to Salt Lake City
Chris: I wonder what the Mormons were taking that they thought this was paradise.
Me: I like these vast open spaces. There's so much unknown, yet you know something is out there. They represent possibility. There's beauty in the expanse.
A little later ...
Me: Well, there's no roadkill here.
Chris: There's nothing alive to kill.
If Saffron McDonald had a farm
Idaho - somewhere ...
Me: Look at that barnyard! There are geese, goats and llamas!
Chris: Those are hippie animals, not barnyard animals.
When the mood strikes
Montana - passing a sign for the War Bonnet Inn
Chris: We should get you a war bonnet. It'd be a bit of a heads up.
Me: That's not funny. (fighting back laughter)
Chris: Yet, you're laughing.
Me: I'm crying on the inside.
Dirty is in the eye of the beholder
Passing sheep ...
Me: There are sheep.
Chris: Those are dirty sheep.
Me: That's not nice.
Chris: I'm not saying all sheep are dirty.
Me: Hollywood has tainted your expectations of sheep.
We pass horses ...
Me: Are those dirty horses?
Chris: They look like the standard horse variety.
Carnage
Me: The windshield is full of bugs again.
Chris: The bugs gave their lives so we could have this trip.
The exact moment I knew we'd spent too much time in the car
Wyoming - somewhere east of Cody
Me: What did you have for ... (burst out laughing so hard that tears stream down my cheeks)
Chris: (Blank stare that seems to question my sobriety)
Me: What, what, what did ... (more belly-aching, sobs of laughter)
Chris: (Focusing on the road and not amused)
Me: (Recalling the phrase my dad used for bad breath growing up and spiraling further out of control with laughter. The quantity of my tears makes it appear that I am weeping.)
Me, again: Did you eat ... Oh my god, I can't stop. (Now hyperventilating.) It's not even funny. It's (laughing) It's (laughing) It's so stupid.
Chris: (Waiting in disbelief)
... Twenty minutes pass with several failed attempts to complete my sentence ...
Me: What did you have for breakfast? (I take a running start at the words before I laugh again, they spill out into one) Ashitsandwich? (Uncontrollable laughter ensues once more) Oh, my god. I don't know what's wrong with me. I'm ridiculous.
Chris: (Laughs and shakes his head.) Yes, you are.
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