Hot and smoggy and me stuck in L.A. traffic on the I-5. The exhaust fumes were so bad I had to roll up the windows. And since I couldn’t run the air conditioner without overheating the car, the air just got thicker.
I turned up the radio but after a few seconds it was drowned out by someone who pulled up beside me, someone with a loud, mufferless engine filling the air with an immense throbbing that made my ribs vibrate like our washing machine on the final spin cycle.
For a moment I wondered if I’d been squished by an 18-wheeler and deposited in Hell, only to learn it was staffed by demons on mufferless Harleys. If so, Hell looked a heck of a lot like the I-5 on a smoggy summer day in stop-and-go traffic.
But no, it was the regular ole’ I-5. And as I waited patiently for the chopper to pass so I could more fairly question the owner’s ancestry… I realized the chopper demon wasn’t a he, but a she.
She finally pulled up ahead of me and I could breathe again without rattling ribs. The picture is blurry because I was moving and my windshield was dirty (the bees are swarming in Carlsbad) but you can still see what I saw: a woman who waits for nothing and no one.
Me, I’ve spent my life waiting to lose some more weight before I do stuff like go to a pool party and actually go swimming, but I’ll bet this gal goes swimming at ALL her pool parties, and wears the tiniest bikini she can find—maybe even a thong.
Frankly, she appears to be the kind of woman who told the world the hell with it, I’m gonna get me some tattoos and a tube-top and some low-rider jeans and the biggest, baddest Harley sold in America today, and while I’m at it, the hell with the damn muffler, too.
Nobody gets in front of her at in the “9 items or less” line with 32 items and a fistful of expired coupons, nobody whips into the parking space at the mall that she was waiting for, and nobody EVER dings her van when she’s sitting inside it waiting for kids to finish swim team.
And even though I was taking a picture because it would last longer, I knew she could easily poke my eye out with her little finger if she was so inclined—so I didn’t spend any time trying to get the perfect shot. I just put the camera back into the bag and continued my stopping and going on the I-5, all the while wondering how big my butt would look on a Harley.
I’m not sure if I agree with her being overly assertive, but I love this picture. I admire how she lives her life the way she wants. I wish all people could be like her. Hiding behind one’s weight,age,looks is cowardice and I admire how she lives in the moment . I wish we could all be like her.