I came across an old souvenir last night. I was packing up to move into my new house when I found an old postcard - a faded picture of a perfectly white beach with translucently turquoise water. “Cancun” was written in the lower right corner. I flipped it over and read my message from what must be over a decade ago.
“Dear Mom and Dad,
How are you doing? I don’t know if I mentioned it to you, but I ended up going to Cancun for spring break. It cost a little more than I thought it would and now I’m stuck here unless I can get some money for the trip back. I’m really sorry about this. You can reach me at the Hotel del Sol.”
I never sent it, because I managed to find a few pesos to pay for a phone call to them and they wired some money over the same day. It was probably the craziest time of my life. Or at least the craziest thing I’ve ever done.
I blame it all on Azure. I met her in college. Tall, taller than me even at an even 6 feet tall. She had the wide, big boned frame of a jock, but she didn’t play sports and stood slouched over, with her shoulders hunched up, as if she was trying to be small. Her breasts were a little too small for her frame, and her hips extra wide giving her an uneven pear-like proportionality. She could have been a model for one of those Renaissance nudes with the small hemispherical breasts, rounded belly and generous hips. When we first met, I wasn’t even particularly attracted to her, being hung up on a petite little red-headed girl at the time.
We first met at the drive buddy board. I was planning to spend spring break at home, but needed a ride. There was this bulletin board at school where people who needed companions to split costs with would post ads. As I walked up to the board, I could not help but notice Azure, sporting a full head of bright blue hair. I came up to look at the board, and she accosted me.
“I’m going – you wanna come along?” she asked me in a melodious contralto. I looked up at her, and said “Yeah,” contrary to all sense. Maybe I did it because I’d never been asked to spend an entire week with a girl. Or maybe I wanted to go do the Spring Break experience at least once in my life. Part of me figured that it would never happen anyways.
“Ok, meet you in 15 out by Cobb Gate.”
“We’re going, like, NOW? I still have a final!”
“Move it or lose it, buddy. Get packed, and meet me there in 30, and bring some food.”
I emailed the professor that I was sick. Threw some stuff in a duffel bag, and just left. There was something about Azure’s carefree confidence that attracted me. No matter what happens, I thought to myself, this would be an adventure.
We met at the gate and finally introduced ourselves. With a name like Azure, I could see why she was fond of the color blue. Besides the blue hair, she wore blue lipstick, painted her nails blue, and, as she told me matter-of-factly, only wore blue underwear. The first leg of the trip would be to Omaha, where she would drop off the car for a friend. From there it was by train to the border, and a bus in Mexico. No wonder we were leaving early.
She told me that she needed company because she was “not good with boredom.” And splitting gas and hotel rooms wouldn’t hurt either. She was a real alterna-chick. An extreme feminist, multiculturalist, revolutionary and activist all rolled into one. At least three times a day, I got a lecture on how everything she did was designed to upset the patriarchy. The blue hair, for example, was to protest the patriarchy’s demand that women conform to sexist ideals of beauty, elevating the surface over the substance. With blue hair, she assured me, men would have to go beyond looks and actually try to like her for who she was.
I called her on her smoking habit though, which was both unhealthy and bad for the environment.
“All the cool people do it” was her only reply, waving a cigarette stained with her blue lipstick in front of my face. The trip to Omaha was fun – much more fun than I expected. Azure was highly intelligent and we had some great conversations. And she was not at all shy about sex.
“I’ll have sex with any man I want. I don’t have a problem with using them for sex just like they use women for sex. The time for equality has come,” she proclaimed to me. I felt an uncomfortable tightness in my jeans at the thought that I might be getting laid. I was not a virgin, but I’d only had one steady girlfriend and one drunken one-night stand. It had been over a year since my last time, and I began to see Azure in a whole new light. But she still acted the same way towards me. I think she enjoyed being able to play with my mind.
We arrived late in Omaha and we got lost looking for the guy’s house. We ended up getting a motel room together – one bed, to save money. I was tired from the long drive, but the thought of sleeping with someone again had me jittery with excitement. I wanted to ask her if we would be having sex, but I thought that it would sound too naïve. So I brushed my teeth and got ready for bed. I didn’t think to bring pj’s, so I put on some shorts instead. She was in what would have been an oversize t-shirt on another girl, but on her, it was small enough that I could glimpse turquoise underwear just below the hem.
“Is that really what you wear to bed?” she asked me.
“Uh – I mean – well, no. I was just trying to be considerate.”
“Don’t tell me that you’re trying to impose sexist rules of conduct and an inferior role on me.”