Have you ever dated an NCAA Division 1 athlete (let
alone captain) despite barely making the varsity squad for your high school
tennis team? No way! Me too! In that case, add this to your arsenal of daytime
dates to not attempt.
It was the dead of winter in Los Angeles,
the sun was blazing, the birds were singing, and both of our day jobs were on
hiatus. Staycation had officially begun and the burden was on me to come up
with something fresh to do on that Tuesday morning. I know… a daytime hike in
Griffith Park! What could be more “L.A.” than that? Perfect. Only I’m not
exactly the athletic outdoorsy kind of guy I like to daydream that I am. Let’s
just say I don’t relate to the band Weezer solely because of their music.
So on we went from her Fairfax apartment north
towards the forsaken valley. Traffic. Shocker. Thirty-five minutes later we
arrived at our dusty destination. It’s on. Daytime fun here we come.
I’m starting to get the hang of this, I think. So
you just walk and talk and gawk? Ok I can handle that for sure. During a
conversational lull I thought back to last night when we were high and she told
me how she loves to run up the hilly parts of her hikes, and that way the hard
stuff is over so much quicker, and its downhill thereafter, literally. Sounded
like a swell idea to me. So right then and there I decide to spontaneously book
it up what seemed to be an appropriate hill.
I feel her smiling eyes behind me and look forward
to her praise for my refreshingly adventurous spirit, and she followed my lead.
Just shy of 30 seconds later, as my pace rapidly dwindles to a halt and hers
remains steady, I’m doubled over with hands on shaky knees and beyond winded.
More like gusted.
“Are
you ok?” she asked.
“Yea
I’m great,” I try to convince us both.
“You
sure?”
“Yea
why?”
“Because
your face is bright red, and people can hear you breathing down in the parking
lot.” An artery was bulging out of my neck in unison with every audibly wheezy
gasp for oxygen. Fantastic.
At this point I’ve crawled my way over to a
random bench in the middle of all this nature and I’m lying on it as you would
a stretcher. I’m trying not to die from equal parts shame and exhaustion
(celebrity style). At first I used last night’s smoke sesh as a potential
culprit, and of course tried the ‘I’m weedzing’ joke, but clearly that didn’t
make me feel any better. Nor did talking, or sunshine, or even breathing at
that point. I much rather would’ve preferred to squeeze into a gopher hole and
just hibernate/die peacefully but obviously didn’t have the energy to squeeze
then either.
She quickly picks up on my request for
silence and self-disdain, and wound up lying beside me on my scenic hospice
bench until life returned to me. Needless to say we never hiked again, nor did
she have to give me a ride home (on her back).
