it seems that every time i resolve to spend a quiet night inside, someone calls. i shouldn't say i mind, because i don't really. it was just raining and cold and i didn't feel like driving....well. it was a pleasant enough evening, anyway, sitting in a shiny red diner full of giant candy canes, flashing stars and dangling santa heads that looked quite rosy and intoxicated. sitting with the red-haired violinist, with our backs against the cold window and our legs stretched over the vinyl seats. she talked about the southwest, and about warm evenings spent on the roof of a car in the middle of nowhere, staring at the desert. about the tranquility of horizontal lines. i said i'd like to go sometime. that to sit that way, slightly denting the top of a car, leaning back on your hands and staring so long that you almost can see the curvature of the earth...it could only be the sort of moment when it feels as though everything is just as it should be. a few of us went to colorado just after we graduated from high school. we were doing some volunteer work in a tiny town, and had to take a plane with one row of seats to an airport with one terminal, and also had to spend one day without our baggage because it was stuck in colorado springs. it was really hot there. my skin turned very brown, and my hair turned very blonde. we climbed a mountain and ate sandwiches at the top, and i slipped on some snow and skinned my knees. a couple of people got ill from overindulging at the russell stover factory outlet. melissa and i shared a bed, and every night we would just lie there and laugh and laugh until we were exhausted, and then we'd fall asleep. i don't think we were really laughing at anything. or we were each laughing at the other's laugh. we were staying with an elderly couple...dick and helen. they were sweet, and apparently didn't mind the stifled snorts and giggles escaping our room in the wee hours of the morning. on the last night, knowing we had to get up at the crack of dawn to take the scary tiny plane to denver, we stayed up all night on top of a hill overlooking the town. the town was nothing. looking down, there was a cemetery, and there were a few sad-looking bars and a gas station. looking up, there were more stars than i'd ever seen in my life. and straight ahead....mountains. a few people cried that night, and there was an awful lot of hugging, and everyone got angry at me because i wasn't feeling sentimental and i kept saying creepy things about giants. i don't know why. it just seemed like a good time to talk about...giants. yeah. anyway...that was one of those nights, i think. this was much longer than it needed to be. goodnight kirsten Care2 make the world greener! http://www.care2.com - Get your Free e-mail account that helps save Wildlife! +-------------------------------------------------------------------------+ +---+ Brought to you by the Sinister mailing list +---+ To send to the list mail sinister@missprint.org. To unsubscribe send "unsubscribe sinister" or "unsubscribe sinister-digest" to majordomo@missprint.org. WWW: http://www.missprint.org/sinister +-+ "sinsietr is a bit freaky" - stuart david, looper +-+ +-+ "legion of bedroom saddo devotees" "peculiarly deranged fanbase" +-+ +-+ "pasty-faced vegan geeks... and we LOST!" - NME April 2000 +-+ +-+ "frighteningly named Sinister List organisation" - NME May 2000 +-+ +-+ "sick posse of f**ked in the head psycho-fans" - NME June 2001 +-+ +-+ Nee, nee mun pish, chan pai dee kwa +-+ +-------------------------------------------------------------------------+