Long walk home

I have a funny story that I wanted to write about. This incident happened on Tuesday, June 18, 2002; the day before my 18th birthday. I'd just been promoted the previous Friday to an associate manager at the movie theater where I'd worked since my 16th birthday. I was the manager in charge of closing that night, so I was the last one to leave the theater. My mom was out of town visiting one of my sisters, and since I didn't have my own car yet I was depending on friends to take me to and from work while she was gone. (I usually drove her car to work, but since she was gone I wasn't able to.)

Anyway, my boyfriend was supposed to pick me up from work and take me home that night, but when I called him he didn't answer his phone. I called him over and over, but he never answered, so I knew that he must've fallen asleep and was "dead to the world." (This was something that had happened before, so that's how I knew that he must've fallen asleep when he wasn't answering his cell phone.)

It must've been about one in the morning and I didn't know what to do and I didn't know anyone to call. I decided that I would just have to walk to my boyfriend's house, which was about five miles away. Like I said, it was the middle of the night and I was dressed in my nice work clothes -- a turtleneck sweater and a wool skirt. It was a muggy June night, so I definitely wasn't dressed for my five mile trek, but a girls gotta do what a girls gotta do, right?!

So I set off for my boyfriend's house in the middle of the night dressed in my nice work clothes. The road I was walking on was quite dark at that time of night, so I tried to stay as far off the road as I could to be safe. The edge of the road was very uneven, so I tried to walk slowly and carefully so as to not trip and sprain an ankle, while at the same time walking quickly enough to get to my destination. I think it took me about two hours to walk the approximately five miles, and once I got to my boyfriend's house I had to knock on the door for at least 20 minutes before his sister heard my persistent knocking/doorbell ringing. (My boyfriend's parents weren't home, so it was just my boyfriend and his sister at home.)

My boyfriend naturally felt really badly about falling asleep. I wasn't mad, but I couldn't help but feel annoyed that he irresponsibly fell asleep when he knew that he was my ride home. (I started calling him Rip Van Winkle after this incident.) In my head I vowed that I would never tell my mom what I had done! However, I did tell her several months later.

As I look back on the situation, I realize how stupid I was! So many bad things could've happened, but fortunately nothing did.