Prompt: I actually wrote this exercise wearing a mask. This was all in the spirit of Halloween!
It was a time when chaps were the hippest accessory, when we zig-zagged the Shanendoah highways without tourists slowing us down. Bonnie rode behind me, her acrylic nails scratching my leather chest excitedly. Her smoky voice would whisper, “Keep it rolling, baby!” and we’d catch a 70 mile-an-hour wind! Sometimes she’d wrap her finger around a strand of my curly hair. Around us a landscape of green, yellow and orange would emerge. We’d be up and out!
On nights we’d set up basic camp along the Skyline Ridge Highway with a blanket for two and a mandolin that I’d strum until midnight by a ravenous fire. Bonnie would bend her neck backwards to take in the stars, braids of blond would unravel like Rapunzel and we’d listen to bluegrass tunes dance off my strings. Yes, we were outlaws by nature. She was a wild child who ran away from home at 16. I, long ago, abandoned my hometown in Campton, Tennessee. I bought a motorbike at age 19 after two summers hustling in an auto garage through humid summer heat.
Bonnie and I lived like nomads that summer. That was before the money ran out. That was before reality set in. We learned whole stretches of National Parks – from the Grand Canyon to Assateague. But that much on the run runs you down.
