Anticipation
When I think about the true joys of life, I can think of none that is as powerful, as overwhelmingly sustaining as anticipation. What is better, really, than the moment just before something finally happens? Something long hoped for or long awaited? Better, both? Or even further, the fidgety anticipation experienced in the seeming eternity that passes in only a few seconds when those seconds expose something so beautiful and potentially perfect that you previously had not even dared to think it possible. The potential is never truly fulfilled, of course; nothing is ever really perfect. But that makes the idea of it no less. The allure of anticipation is that it is completely independent of reality.
Such anticipation can happen, has happened to countless love-struck souls during the tiny tidbit of time that elapses when one face lingers in front of another's before a first kiss, during the last minutes of sweet touching and yearning before making love, during the simple moment taken before opening a gift. You look at the box, shake it with curiosity, touch the paper, or pull at the bow before finally tearing it open to see what's inside. I have fond memories of long childhood nights awake in my bed before my birthday or Christmas. I can too easily recall girlish days spent hovering over the telephone, waiting for it to ring and living in the endlessness that crawls by until it finally does.
When I was 16, I went on a school trip to Europe. Our group was a typical one: awkward 16-year-olds full of what we might have claimed as rebellious angst if we even knew what that word meant at the time. We were comprised of a few nerds, a few jocks, a couple of cheerleaders and otherwise popular girls, a girl in the Spanish club, a boy who played chess. Given the wonderful places that we visited, it's a little pathetic that so much of what I remember is spending time on the tour bus. I laughed most of the time away on the road with a heavyset girl named Carrie who I now remember as mostly a caricature. She was round and red-faced and very outgoing. She gestured abundantly with dimpled hands and made us all laugh.
Near the end of our trip, we stopped in Heidelberg to buy German chocolates. We had looked forward to it and spent over an hour in the sweet shop, looking at all the candies, choosing carefully, finally deciding, and making our purchases. When we all piled back onto the bus, I sat by Carrie. She threw herself into her seat, which exhaled plastically with the weight of her. She clutched her bag of goodies, squeezed my arm excitedly, and said, "Let's eat our candy now!" She then did just that, gushing over the excellence of each one, until they had all disappeared into her bulging belly.
This is a story I've told my friend Lisa, and when she and I traveled in Europe together, we made many conscious decisions to indulge. Many times when we did, we would say smiling, maybe as a reminder to ourselves or just as an acknowledgement of our own decadence, "Let's eat our candy now..." and then, awake to ourselves, we would or would not partake in whatever it was that tickled and tempted our senses at the time.
I have obviously recounted this episode in a way that paints Carrie quite the glutton. Truth be told, there's a tiny little part of me that envies her willingness to take what she wanted, no holds barred. Maybe if I had a little more nerve, I would be able to gobble up more of the sweetness that comes my way, ravenously tear open the bag and savor every morsel. I just can't bring myself to do it. I can come close, but I have a tendency to leave that last chunk of chocolate, even the tiniest crumb, for later. Because once it's gone, it's gone forever. And I guess I just need something to remain, something to look forward to. That last little pinch somehow keeps me going. It gives me something, I suppose, to anticipate...
Such anticipation can happen, has happened to countless love-struck souls during the tiny tidbit of time that elapses when one face lingers in front of another's before a first kiss, during the last minutes of sweet touching and yearning before making love, during the simple moment taken before opening a gift. You look at the box, shake it with curiosity, touch the paper, or pull at the bow before finally tearing it open to see what's inside. I have fond memories of long childhood nights awake in my bed before my birthday or Christmas. I can too easily recall girlish days spent hovering over the telephone, waiting for it to ring and living in the endlessness that crawls by until it finally does.
When I was 16, I went on a school trip to Europe. Our group was a typical one: awkward 16-year-olds full of what we might have claimed as rebellious angst if we even knew what that word meant at the time. We were comprised of a few nerds, a few jocks, a couple of cheerleaders and otherwise popular girls, a girl in the Spanish club, a boy who played chess. Given the wonderful places that we visited, it's a little pathetic that so much of what I remember is spending time on the tour bus. I laughed most of the time away on the road with a heavyset girl named Carrie who I now remember as mostly a caricature. She was round and red-faced and very outgoing. She gestured abundantly with dimpled hands and made us all laugh.
Near the end of our trip, we stopped in Heidelberg to buy German chocolates. We had looked forward to it and spent over an hour in the sweet shop, looking at all the candies, choosing carefully, finally deciding, and making our purchases. When we all piled back onto the bus, I sat by Carrie. She threw herself into her seat, which exhaled plastically with the weight of her. She clutched her bag of goodies, squeezed my arm excitedly, and said, "Let's eat our candy now!" She then did just that, gushing over the excellence of each one, until they had all disappeared into her bulging belly.
This is a story I've told my friend Lisa, and when she and I traveled in Europe together, we made many conscious decisions to indulge. Many times when we did, we would say smiling, maybe as a reminder to ourselves or just as an acknowledgement of our own decadence, "Let's eat our candy now..." and then, awake to ourselves, we would or would not partake in whatever it was that tickled and tempted our senses at the time.
I have obviously recounted this episode in a way that paints Carrie quite the glutton. Truth be told, there's a tiny little part of me that envies her willingness to take what she wanted, no holds barred. Maybe if I had a little more nerve, I would be able to gobble up more of the sweetness that comes my way, ravenously tear open the bag and savor every morsel. I just can't bring myself to do it. I can come close, but I have a tendency to leave that last chunk of chocolate, even the tiniest crumb, for later. Because once it's gone, it's gone forever. And I guess I just need something to remain, something to look forward to. That last little pinch somehow keeps me going. It gives me something, I suppose, to anticipate...
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