Father's Day (UK style)

dear jeff & keith,
thank you for being our fathers. and for feeding us. and for paying for all the stupid stuff we wanted when we were eight. we appreciate it.
love,
.amanda&kevin.


SO. i'm here to clarify. today is sunday, england's father's day. on thursday we drove up to see White Horse Hill. photos to prove it will be provided tomorrow.

on friday we drove to Stonehenge. which was cool. and just as big as i had expected, i guess. i feel like, with big famous things, they always turn out to be smaller when you see them in person. but, these rocks were real big. just how i'd imagined they would be. so that was nice, and not disappointing. the £6.50 it cost to go inside the gate, however, was disappointing. so, we admired from behind the fence.

on saturday morning megan, vicky, and the babers went to london to be touristy, but since kevin and i had been there already (and had no desire to spend more money to go there, eat there, and come back from there) we decided to man the fort back at vicky's place. and what better to do while man-ing a fort than to take a nice leisurely bike ride, right? right?

our little trip started with kevin in the lead. we rode for about an hour and then went back to vicky's because we had gone in totally the wrong direction. (because kevin was in the lead) So. we started over, going in the opposite direction. there it was in the distance, our destination: White Horse Hill. we rode and rode and rode. finally we got to the bottom of the hill, right outside of the pub we stopped at the last time we were here. at this point, i was in front, but gave the lead back to kevin to head up the hill. he started ahead of me, i looked down to put my foot in the strap thing, looked up, and he was gone.

this is where our individual stories start. i'll begin with my side of things:

well. i thought, looking at the fork in the road ahead of me with trees and curves all over so i could only see 50 yards in either direction, i wonder which way he went? i headed down the left fork about 20 feet. down. down doesn't make sense. we have to go up this giant hill. obviously he would have gone up. i'll just wait here for a minute, and he'll come back, wondering what is taking me so long. yeah. i'll just wait a minute.

maybe two minutes.

well, maybe he's working so hard going up that hill that he can't look back, and even if he did look back, he'd assume i was walking so he wouldn't want to turn back just to ride up the stupid hill for a second time. right. i'll go up.

so. i went back the way i came and turned up the hill. i proceed to walk up said hill with vicky's bike for the next 20-30 minutes. i thought about simply riding the bike, or even just tossing the bike across my shoulders and sprinting up the hill instead, but for some reason i just kept on walking. oh, that's right. because it's a ridiculously big, steep, ridiculous hill.

i arrive at the top of said hill somewhere between 4-4:15pm. and there i wait. i cannot be sure of the time because kevin has the watch. i cannot be sure of the time because i cannot find kevin anywhere in the parking lot full of children with kites for flying, and an ice cream truck with ice cream for eating, and an information booth for information to be learned. i don't know the exact time because kevin isn't there. he isn't there waiting for me with a funny comment about how long it took me to reach the top, or how long he's been waiting for me, or an ice cream cone.
he isn't there at all.

so i wait. patiently. 4:30. . . . . 4:40. . . . . . . .4:45. . . . . . and then.
a red helmet.
trudging up the hill.

cut to: his side.

i let him take the lead, and he sped off. down the left fork. down. and down. he rode on without looking back for about 10 minutes. then he stopped and realized i wasn't behind him. he waited. for about 2 minutes. then he started riding back towards the pub & the fork in the road. but i wasn't there. so he waited there for about 5 minutes. but i didn't show up.

i had the keys to vicky's house in my bike. surely, he thought, she must have gotten tired or scared and gone back. she must have thought that i would go back, too. so. he then proceeded to ride the 3.7 miles back to vicky's house. once the front door was in sight, his fears subsided. the front door looked like it was open. so he rode up and opened it.

except it was locked. because i had the keys. and i has 4 miles away, climbing up a ridiculously big, steep, and ridiculous hill.

so he got back on gary's bike and rode the 3.7 miles back to the pub. and then, i assume, thought to himself, oh, maybe she rode up the hill because that's why we went on this bike trip in the first place, maybe.

so then he began to ride. (he said that he got about half way before he started walking, which is impressive. . . even though vicky can make it to the top without stopping. vicky is a machine. she spins.)

he made it up to the parking lot. the good ol' familiar lot that we had been to not 2 days before with vicky and megan. but now there was an ice cream truck there that hadn't been there before. and kids. with kites. and a beautiful girl walking towards him. with a bike. and a beautiful face. that looked kind of mad, but a little relieved, and a lot confused.

where have you been?
-oh. oh, baby. i was so worried. don't be mad. i wish i brought money to buy you an ice cream cone.

it's okay. because i found 50p in the grass. when i was waiting. for 45 minutes. on the top of that ridiculously big, steep, ridiculous hill. but it's not okay because an ice cream cone from that truck would have cost £2.50. so i didn't get to have one after all.

happy father's day.