Hey Universe, I’m an Idiot. Help!

A Story, Created this past Friday Night:

“You look hot.”

“Hot like attractive? Or just hot like hot?”

“Both. Let’s go take off our clothes and get in the sea.”

“Deal.”

Really, all fantastic (and fantastically stupid) ideas begin with conversations like these. These conversations often occur around 3 a.m., in places called bars. Beers are left to sweat it out alone, their only purpose now to paint a concrete table a darker hue, while their owners run off giggling into the moonlight.

Swimming in ink. The feeling of cold ocean licking buzzed skin. The sparkles of the moon blinking on waves. Poetry in motion. In darkness. The taste of saltwater in your mouth. The taste of life being lived. The taste of a memory you will think on many years later and smile that nostalgic half-smile before moving on to something else.

That is, if the story had ended there. It didn’t. This is how fantastic ideas become fantastically stupid ideas and then become great stories to retell in bars later.

We stumbled out of the 3 a.m. sea, my panties and a bra standing in and doing their due diligence as a drunk’s bikini.

“Where are my shorts? Wait? Where are our clothes?”

“It’s super dark out here. Where did we leave them?”

“By this rock, right? But I can’t remember. I’m drunk.”

“Look over there. They aren’t over here.”

“Holy shit … did someone steal our clothes?”

“Um ….”

“No, really … this is not happening.”

“Fuck fucking fucksticks, I think someone stole our clothes!”

(Approximately 9 minutes of laughing and scrambling around in sand)

“This is absurd! Shit! What did you have in your pockets?”

“The keys to my house! I mean, no real money, but shit … where am I going to sleep? I’m in a bra and panties and covered in sand and soaking wet.”

(another fit of laughter)

“At least what you are wearing kind of looks like a bikini. You can see everything I’ve got right now.”

“You know what really sucks?”

“What?”

“One of us is going to have to walk back in the bar, all wet and mostly naked, and ask for someone to go get us clothes. And being that I’m both a girl and Southern and you are a gentleman and British … well … it sucks to be you.”

“Know what’s even worse?”

“What?”

“I work in that bar.”

“At least you look hot!”

“Hot like attractive? Or just hot like hot?”

“Both. We are so fucked.”

Yes. Amateur hour. It happened at approximately 3 a.m., when we decided to basically ask someone to rob us. You would think we were first-time travelers pulling a dumb move like leaving our clothes unattended while we took a dip. But, no. Neither of  us can lean on that excuse. We just left our clothes by a rock and asked them to have at it. Thank God two sober backpackers came along, took pity on us and helped us locate our clothes, which were laying approximately 200 feet from where we’d left them, tossed in some bushes, now somewhat lighter being minus my keys, $20 and a credit card. Twenty bucks seems like a bargain when I consider the shame value of having to walk back into the bar where all my friends were still drinking, sopping wet, sandy, sporting undies and the mascara stylings of Courtney Love.

I woke up the next morning in a dorm room, on a damp bunk, wearing someone else’s pajamas and wrestling with a 900-pound crocodile disguised as a hangover. My hair was amazing. Ah-mazing. And then I remembered that the Universe loves me. I mean like really, really loves me. You would not believe half the crazy the shit I have gotten myself out of.

“Good Morning Universe. Sorry for being ridiculously dumb last night. But given our history together, I bet we can find my keys. They probably just threw them in the sand somewhere. Can you help me get them back? Then I can go home, shower and sleep in a real bed.”

And off the little blonde girl went, holding hands with the Universe. Together, they found her keys. In the sand. Near the sea. She threw away a piece of litter on her walk home to help balance out her karma and to say a small thank you to Universe for always being her friend. And then she went to bed. In her own bed. Wearing someone else’s pajamas.

The End