Today, you're going to live (however pathetically) in the moment!

You and Marcy's husband Roy are staying behind because you both have leg injuries, while Marcy and your husband Jake go hiking through the snow to try to find food and hopefully a ranger who can find a way to get you all down off this mountain. 

And the only cure for cabin fever is?

“They could be gone for days and they might not make it back,” Roy will say, limping around the cabin. “We should start having sex now.”

“How can you—”

“Oh spare me!” Roy shouts. “The longer you play this game of being the loyal, loving wife grateful to her husband for risking his life for you, the less sex we’re having.”

“But they’ve barely just left,” you say. “Look, I can still see them. They’re waving.”

You motion for Roy to come to the window and wave back to them. Roy slaps you.

“Dammit you need to think realistically,” he shouts. “If we wait to have sex until we’re sure they’re dead, we might be too weak to even feel sexual, not to mention we’ll be trying to come to grips with the reality that our spouses have died somewhere out there in the snow, possibly never to have their bodies found by anything but packs of hungry wolves. Think you’ll be up for boning with the image of your husband’s limp body being shredded to ribbons by bloodthirsty wolves on your mind?”

You concede that no, you would not. Neither would Roy, he says. He loves Marcy way too much to cheat on her while her body is being eaten by animals.

“And supposing we do wait,” Roy continues. “And when we manage to have sex we find out we are the perfect mates for each other, that the sex is the best we’ve ever had. But, oops, we waited too long and we’re too dehydrated and hungry to have sex a second time. Almost more tragic than if we’d never had sex at all! We’d die regretting that we waited, regretting that we stood on formality instead of grabbing as much erotic opportunity from what little time we had left.”

You’ve spent too much of your life regretting things. Roy is right. You love Jake, but waiting to be sure he’s dead before you have sex with Roy is just another instance of you living as if tomorrow is some kind of guarantee.

You take off your clothes and Roy enters you for approximately 30 seconds before Jake and Marcy burst into the cabin with a half-dozen park rangers. The rangers had been hiking up the mountain when they bumped into Jake and Marcy having frantic sex against a snow bank around 200 feet from the cabin’s front door.

Today, love in an elevator.

You know how every great once in a while, you'll be going about your own business when all of the sudden something or other happens and you stop and go 'wow, I'm going to remember this moment forever'?

Yeah, you think about those a lot.

Today your going to walk into your apartment building at the asscrack of dawn still wearing your clothes from last night.  You fell asleep on the couch at Bella's boyfriends house after fighting off the drunken advances of some guy named Lance.  You swear an oath to yourself to never date anyone named Lance.

Anyways, you've also sworn off drinking and you have a grocery bag full of pastries and greens, with which you are making a celebratory healthy breakfast to put your most likely futile plan of sobriety into full effect.  The heels you're still wearing from the previous night make you wobble a little as you breeze through the glass doors to the lobby just in time to see the elevator door start to slide shut.

There's someone in the elevator.  "Wait!"  You call out.

The someone sticks his arm in between the elevator doors and they bounce back open, chivalry ain't dead yet.

So you'll clomp your way in and dump your little big of silly crap on the floor.  It promptly spills out half the contents; a bag of pita bread and some hummus, a cantaloupe, and something you think is a quiche but weren't sure.

"Looks like your representing the cuisines of about 8 different cultures this morning," the man remarks.

You smile and make a show of rolling your eyes.  "Yeah well."

There is a pause as both of you wait for a follow up.  You sigh.

There's someone else in the elevator.  It's a small boy, about 3 years old.  Seems a bit hyperactive.  You watch as he dances his way over to the button panel and whangs the heel of his palm against it, lighting up every floor.  You look at his Dad to gauge his reaction but he is busy picking up dates and water cashews and packets of semi-exotic herbal tea that you will probably never drink.

You open your mouth but before anything comes out the hyperactive little boy crows joyously and hammers on the emergency stop button.  The elevator lurches to a sickening halt, sending pistachios and raspberries everywhere.

"Oh, shit!  Dodger!  No!"  The man says.  He grabs the boy lightly by the arm and gives him a swat on his rear.  If this punishment had any disciplinary effect, Dodger's face failed to register it.

You look him over.  He's wearing the tiniest plaid shirt you've ever seen and has the smallest checkered vans on his feet.  Dodger pops over in front of you, and you see that this child is never going to be a beauty.  His brown eyes are flecked with gold but they are too close together, a shock of orange hair rests on the top of his head like a brush fire, and jug ears poke out of the side of his head like the handles of pink fleshy teacups, but you look at him and you still love him.

For lack of better things to do as good 'ol Dad gets the elevator going again, you crouch down in front of the boy, cover your eyes with your hands and then you take them away and you say Boo.

The boy squeals high-pitched laughter and hops up and down with his hands flapping loosely at the wrist, making you wish that anything could make you that excited.   You're having fun so you do it again.  And again.

"Dodge, leave the nice lady alone," says Dad.

Neither of you stop.

It isn't until the doors have been standing open for a few seconds that you realize the elevator has arrived at your floor.  Dodger is shrieking with laughter as you collect yourself, a big cheesy grin smeared across your face.  You pick up your swearing off drinking breakfast bag and stand up, barely registering how the man is just standing there regarding you with a bemused expression.  There's a pregnant silence again.

Ok, you tell yourself, now I just feel stupid.  You say bye to Dodger as he dances around your feet and you get off the elevator, your face a little heated.

You've gone four steps out of the elevator and down the hall to your room when Dodger's Dad speaks up from behind you.

"You know, when he grows up he's going to fall in love with a girl who looks just like you, and he's not going to have any clue as to why."

You turn around.

The elevator door is closing fast as he leans out to say, "But I will."