In a way it seemed the perfect antidote to the militarism of Bush and company--make love, not war. This time the invaders' ammunition would only be the deliciously poisoned arrows of Cupid, their conquests ending up with more life, not death.
I should have been warned by the first Americans I met on the plane from San Francisco. One insisted, "I'm the reincarnation of the yin-yang inventor.'" He tried to show me pictures of his bride on the digital camera he carried, but kept changing his mind. "Uh, I can't show you this one," he kept on saying, a strange grin on his face, as I caught brief glimpses of his unclothed Yang posing awkwardly in an anonymous hotel room.
The next I liked much better for his straightforward lustiness and honesty. "I'm not marrying nobody, I got a 12-pack of Viagra right here in my hip pocket and I ain't leaving 'till it's all used up. I'm 70 and there aren't too many miles left on the ole odometer so I'm driving full-speed ahead!" He was half-Hawaiian, half-Japanese, hundred-percent hedonist.
I hadn't realized quite how seriously the natives took the idea of pen pals anyway until the jet lag wore off. In the provinces, life was something like it was in Baltimore in 1902. A kiss was not a kiss--it was a marriage proposal. And in a country with no divorce, that's a serious thing. |
