Last week I asked my friend Kaela to pick up some peaches for me at the Farmer’s Market. I had an appointment that morning and didn’t want to miss out on the last batch of the season. I am very serious about my peaches, y’all.
She said it was only slightly awkward when, after buying her own peaches, she asked for a separate bag for a friend and the lady asked what names she wanted her to write on them and she had to answer Kaela and…Kayla.
She moved last week so I told her I would drive out to pick them up so that I could see her new place and drop off her housewarming gift. We were texting about directions when she wrote “Note: you have to go over a slightly rickety bridge.”
“Um, is it over water?” I asked. “Because this could completely change our relationship.”
She said that it was but then assured me that it was only about 20 feet long. This did not stop me from slightly freaking out for the entire drive to her house. I do not like bridges. I really do not like bridges over water. But rickety bridges over water? That basically sounds like, oh I don’t know, MY GREATEST FEAR.
So I am driving down this really long, dirt country drive that barely has room enough for one car trying to convince myself that it can’t be that bad really. I mean, you have to drive over it to get to her house and people live there. People wouldn’t live there if they had to drive over an incredibly scary bridge every time they wanted to leave their house, right? And then I see this:
Don’t be fooled by it’s rustic charm and gorgeous wooded canopy. It looked terrifying. I had a mild panic attack, if by mild you mean completely full blown, and contemplated calling Kaela to say “So maybe we just have a picnic in this field to my left that does not require me to drive my car over a ravine. You don’t mind if all of our social time from now on is spent a quarter mile away from your actual house, right?”
Scarlette was peering out of her window in the backseat cheerfully chattering about how she couldn’t wait to go over the water. Obviously my offspring did not inherit my neurosis. It took me several minutes to gather enough courage to drive over said bridge and when I did I had another panic attack because apparently when she said “rickety” she meant “SHAKES AS THOUGH IT IS FALLING APART BENEATH YOU.”
Once I made it to her house I got of out the car and was all “Hi, I’m here, do you have an extra room because I AM NEVER GOING TO BE ABLE TO LEAVE.”
I still kind of can not believe that I did it at all. I mean, I might never do it again but for one day last week I was a really fantastic friend.
