Hula-Hoop Girl

 

 

By Katja Dillmann

Hawthorne Fellow 2011

 

 

___________________________________________________________

 

 

For the next 10 days the three of us explored the south-western coast of Baja, spending just about every waking moment together.  

 

Somewhere in this continuum of days differentiated only by sunrise and sunset, Hula-Hoop Girl, as I nicknamed her, showed up.  Hula-Hoop Girl hooped endlessly.  She would hoop down the length of the beach, her body rhythmically undulating, the rhythm accented by backbends, vertical splits where her raised leg maintained the hoops motion and other contortionist positions, which in their own right were impressive but astounding with the hoop.  She would glide down the beach, doing as she pleased in the moment. My daily flow yoga, with its set 26 poses, its need for parallel arms, straight lines, perfect stillness, was rigid in comparison. 

 

Additionally, Hula-Hoop girl was only ever seen in a bikini. Probably because of all that bikini time, Hula-Hoop girl’s skin was tanned a deep brown, retaining its olive hue.  Mine was only a few shades of white darker then when we had arrived, protected either by clothes or endless amounts of sunscreen.  Unlike Hula-Hoop Girl who was in her bikini from the fresh morning sun until the cool post-sunset lingering light, I wore my oversized men’s flannel-lined Carharts and my burnt orange long-sleeve running top underneath the magenta fleece well into mid-morning and again at dusk.  

We had purchased flannel lined pants for the trip.  It was Chad’s idea. He felt they would be good for the cold nights.  The women’s flannel-lined pants were significantly more expensive than the men’s pants on Sierra Trading Post, so Chad bought my equivalent size in men’s pants.  Either men’s pants are cut differently or Chad did the conversion wrong, regardless I could have been hung like a horse and still had room in the crotch – the crotch came to mid-thigh and by the end of the trip left a fantastic chaffing rash mid-way between my knees and hips.  

 

Hula-Hoop girl was also traveling with a boy. This added to the intrigue.  She and Bus-Boy, as I called him, were always together, but for her hoop-walks, slept in the van together, though never touched in daylight.  Neither Bodhi, Chad, nor I had ever seen them up close, and so I concocted stories of the possibilities about them, which I freely shared.  

 

I suggested that they were undercover DEA agents trying to better understand how southern Baja factored into the drug smuggling at the Tijuana border. Bodhi suggested in order to test this theory we needed to wait and see if they ever approached us to befriend us and if they did, we would have to assess the types of questions they asked or observe if they steered the conversation in the direction of drugs.  Chad’s contribution was saying my name in his most annoyed sounding tone of voice, sighing dramatically and going back to reading his Rolling Stones magazine. 

 

I then floated the idea that they were college students, she was a lesbian and he was madly in love with her. He had invited her on this trip in order to spend time with each other in close proximity with hopes of winning her over and having her fall in love with him.  Bodhi jumped right in to help flesh this theory out and wanted to know if it was excessively rude to ask someone without introduction if they were a lesbian.  I told him that I thought the best approach to ground truthing this theory out would be for us to befriend them, observe the dynamic, and if it was warranted post-observational interaction, to ask such a question.  Again, Chad’s contribution to the conversation was a long-winded sigh, complimented with dramatic eye-rolling. 

 

At some point, I proposed the theory that Hula-Hoop girl and Bus-Boy were brother and sister. Chad was out surfing when this stroke of brilliance hit me so there was no eye-rolling or sighing to be heard.  Bodhi asked, “Why this theory?”  “Well, they don’t touch.”  I said.  Bodhi replied, “In the week that I’ve hung out with you and Chad, I’ve never seen Chad touch you.  People wouldn’t think that you were a couple if they didn’t know.”  

 

I didn’t say anything, but his statement felt like an insult flung my way because I knew that in the entire time that we had been hanging out with Bodhi, Chad had touched me once – the quick hug the night after the rain which had been dissatisfying enough that it stayed with me. 

 

At sunset when I went to the water’s edge to do my Yoga, Hula-Hoop girl frequently headed out for a hoop-walk.  Ironically it was also then that Chad and Bodhi dragged their chairs to the top of the beach with beers to watch the sunset.  Due to the configuration of the beach, Hula-Hoop Girl and I were both in their field of view for a long time before she headed past the curve in the shoreline.  I always finished before she came back and would ask the boys:  “Enjoy the show this evening?  Did Hula-Hoop do any new moves?” Without fail they would respond, “We don’t know, we weren’t watching Hula-Hoop.” For Chad it was one thing, for Bodhi not to notice, downright confusing. 

 

Their lack of fascination also fascinated me.  Here was this bikini-clad undulating woman and neither of them raised an eyebrow.  Chad had written her off within hours of the initial sighting as a ‘fat and ugly cow,’ which I felt was unfair and unnecessary. First of all, we had never seen her up close enough to know if she was ugly.  Secondly, though her tummy formed a protruding arc between her bikini top and bottom, there was something sexy about her and it didn’t put her in the cow category.  Thirdly, why would you call someone a bovine? 

 

So when Hula-Hoop girl finally, actually, picked up her surfboard to paddle out, giving her exhibitionist hooping a break, I had to go see what she was made of.  

 

As soon as she was down the path, I announced that I was going to go spy and invited the boys.  Chad did not want to see the “fat and ugly cow” surf, making it that Bodhi and I walked down the beach to spy on her.  

 

I felt strained as we walked the ten minutes down the beach.  I couldn’t think of a single word to say.  Had Dakota still been alive, she would have been with us, giving us a natural topic of conversation, but she wasn’t. And so I was grateful when we finally got to Hula-Hoop girl’s break and took a seat on the sand in the sun.  

 

Waiting for Hula-Hoop girl to catch a wave gave us something to focus on; both of us looked at the water, intermittently commenting on other surfers and the waves.  

 

Had I been paying less attention to Hula-Hoop girl and Bus-Boy and more attention to the small drama which was unfolding in our campsite, I might have anticipated what came next. But I hadn’t been and so I couldn’t have known that this walk would change the trajectory of the trip and Chad and my relationship.  The irony being that since I had been so oblivious to it all, if I hadn’t gone on this walk there would have been another relatively soon because what I thought was hidden inside the confines of our relationship – that Chad and I were as far apart as we had ever been – apparently was not.  But there is something instinctual about self-preservation; our bodies know before our mind.  And somewhere between a moth to fire and the paralyzing inaction of fear; we find our path.  So it was that this walk presented me with my first glimpse of a passageway leading out. 

 

After staring at the water for a few moments in silence, Bodhi said, “You know, if you and Chad don’t work out, you should come visit me in Seattle.”  

 

I stared intently at the water.  My heart beat faster.  For a moment I wondered if we were going to sit on that beach all afternoon because I couldn’t think of a damned thing to say and once I did, too much time would have passed between comments making it useless to say anything and then we would just sit there in silence to avoid the awkward walk back.  But then without thinking I asked, “What made you say that? Do you feel a need to tell people how you feel about them because of your accident?”

 

 “No,” Bodhi said, “I believe I need to tell people the truth of how I feel.” 

 

“Hmm,” I replied, refusing to take my eyes off of the water.  Immediately I knew that if Chad and I didn’t work out, that I would not look Bodhi up in Seattle. 

 

Bodhi continued, “You are really full of life and fun when Chad is not around, but when he’s around you’re totally different.”

 

I felt shocked.  Bodhi called the question; he verbalized the unspoken between Chad and myself. He exposed what I had tried to hide from myself.  

 

In the silence of the next several seconds, as I watched Hula-Hoop girl paddle out, I felt offended.  Marriage is sacred.  A married person is off limits.  End of story.  Marriage is hard enough without active intrusion by outside forces.  With one simple statement, Bodhi had violated all that and proved himself to be selfish.  

 

His comments from the last several days popped into my head in a whole new light.  In that silence, I realized that every night since meeting him after dinner, despite the fact that in my opinion, all of us were helping fix the food, Bodhi always said, “Thank you for dinner, Nikka.”  Each night I had found this incredibly odd and had answered, “It was a team effort.”  Or some other dismissive comment.  

 

And then I consciously realized, for the first time, that whenever he was done surfing he would sit on the beach and wait for me to paddle in – every time, even if we paddled out twice in a day. The first time this happened, I had told him that I was used to being in the water, despite being a terrible surfer, and that I always surfed alone because Chad was so much better than me that we would surf in separate spots.  He had answered, “I would never let my girlfriend surf alone.”  Which I had found exceptionally annoying, yet oddly comforting, because sometimes the surf picked up and I got scared being out alone – a fact I would never admit to anyone. 

 

Now, I realized that when I looked up from the dancing flames of the bonfire Bodhi hadn’t looked away, but held my gaze and almost imperceptibly licked his bottom lip.

 

And then I remembered the moment when I looked up from washing the dishes in the blue bucket after dinner wearing my headlamp and the light hit him squarely in the face, making it obvious that he had been watching me. 

 

All of this and more poured into my head, as I squinted at the sun reflecting off the water, waiting for Hula-Hoop girl to finally catch a wave, feeling the hard sand underneath me wishing Dakota was still with us because she would have prevented this conversation by being cute and distracting or needy and restless, either way demanding our attention.  But Dakota wasn’t there.  Bodhi’s statement settled in.  Being offended wore off. 

 

Finally Hula-Hoop girl did take a wave. She dropped in on a big wave – way bigger than anything I had ever dropped in on.  And she had a pretty good ride.  I knew she was better than me, and better then I’d be for a long time, but I didn’t really care about Hula-Hoop girl anymore because, in that space which is all body and no mind, where our desire for survival exists, I felt the almost undetectable minute shift in my internal compass towards this new passageway. 

 

I got up, brushed the sand off of my board shorts. I sighed and looked out at the line-up. Hula-Hoop Girl had posted up one more time.  I looked at Bodhi and involuntarily I twirled the curl of my long brown hair around my left index finger, cocked my head, smiled as I tucked it behind my ear, “You ready?” I asked as reflexively I popped my right hip out.  Still sitting, Bodhi looked up at me and smiled, I reached my hand out to help him up. 

 

As we walked back to the campsite together, I could see myself from that observational place –tucked into dark blue board shorts, the free kids’ sized ones, they fit but they’re tight in the wrong way; regardless my laugh is light, my hips move freely. 

 

We trip back down the path to find Chad just where we left him, in the beach chair in front of the van.  “Hi Babe,” I say. Chad doesn’t respond. I pull up my beach chair next to him and for the first time I take off my shirt and sit down in my orange string bikini top to soak up some sun.