We have left behind the alien wasteland that is Utah.
The Great Salt lake reminded me of my ocean home, the water stretching to the horizon, small shrubs clinging to life amidst the alkali sand. As we chased the setting sun towards Nevada, the great sea dried up and gave way to a gray desert as far as the eye could see. We pulled over to walk on an evaporated ocean where sculptures made of rocks and discarded beer bottles dotted the landscape. I felt like our footprints would last forever in this place outside of time.
The orange pink sun dipped behind the mountains and I hit cruise control at 80mph, there was a little over 500 miles of desert between us and the "Biggest Little City in the World".
Monday, August 31, 2009
DIVE IN!
Well, here is the moment that we have waited for. Its been an epic session of staring down the open road to get here but we made it. What comes next I do not know, my vision of the events about to unfold are merely speculatory and I am left with only my open arms to accept an unpredictable experience. I suppose that's how all true experiential learning happens though, I am confident that I will come out the other side a slightly changed person in postivily shifted direction. I have been thinking about this day for months, perhaps years now, and living in the moment of it is quite unlike I had ever anticipated. Well, nothing to do now but dive in with open arms, I'll see ya'll on the other side.
burnin, man!
as i write this i am sitting on the edge of a familiarly unfamiliar couch in reno, nevada--on the edge of a dusty, purple/red horizon that looks faintly like a man with his arms raised above his head in victory, and lemme tell you baby--we are ready to burn, man. one last morning of predictability--coffee, couch surfin' big talk (the opposite of small talk), sleepy smiles and the clacking of impatient fingers on keypad--soon we will be thrust into the wholly unexplained, unpredictable, wild-eyed fury of the fiery abyss.
salt lake city was beautiful, a frighteningly clean jewel amidst the swelling rocky mountain range that cradled it, and there we found yet another psychadelic couch ready and willing to swallow us up in its blissful arms. we encountered food not bombs and met a bizarro-tony hall who argued against BMan due to its "intrinsic corporate-ness" though he was not too proud to hand over some stale hippie bread and soft strawberries, which we ate with furious abandon-- indeed, we were too hippie-happy to break it to him that without those intrinsically "corporate" organizations he detests so much those strawberries would not be in so much gluttonous abundance they could be found in every dumpster on every street corner everywhere from sea to shining salt lake. but i digress (or regress). we also stumbled upon some mutant eyelined juggalos sustaining themselves on free veggie chili-gruel and classy 2 liters of dr. thunder (why wasn't it faygo?)...alex was enthralled, but couldn't bring himself to WHOOP WHOOP in their presence...i, however, had no such restraint. of course, as soon as the chuggaloads turned around and acknowledged me, i giggled like a japanese schoolgirl and hid behind alex like a squirrel skittering up a tree trunk.
i don't know what the fuck is going to happen next, but i have faith it will happen exactly as it needs to.
LOVE!
heather
ps- more later. cut us some slack (not that we need any more of that), kids! much more to come after the man (and our brains) burn baby burn...
salt lake city was beautiful, a frighteningly clean jewel amidst the swelling rocky mountain range that cradled it, and there we found yet another psychadelic couch ready and willing to swallow us up in its blissful arms. we encountered food not bombs and met a bizarro-tony hall who argued against BMan due to its "intrinsic corporate-ness" though he was not too proud to hand over some stale hippie bread and soft strawberries, which we ate with furious abandon-- indeed, we were too hippie-happy to break it to him that without those intrinsically "corporate" organizations he detests so much those strawberries would not be in so much gluttonous abundance they could be found in every dumpster on every street corner everywhere from sea to shining salt lake. but i digress (or regress). we also stumbled upon some mutant eyelined juggalos sustaining themselves on free veggie chili-gruel and classy 2 liters of dr. thunder (why wasn't it faygo?)...alex was enthralled, but couldn't bring himself to WHOOP WHOOP in their presence...i, however, had no such restraint. of course, as soon as the chuggaloads turned around and acknowledged me, i giggled like a japanese schoolgirl and hid behind alex like a squirrel skittering up a tree trunk.
i don't know what the fuck is going to happen next, but i have faith it will happen exactly as it needs to.
LOVE!
heather
ps- more later. cut us some slack (not that we need any more of that), kids! much more to come after the man (and our brains) burn baby burn...
Sunday, August 30, 2009
Trapped in a Maize
fucking corn.
its in all of our foods and its the only thing we saw for hundreds of miles. We didnt take any photos because it would be too corn-ographic. *we have tons of corn puns written down somewhere.
trapped in a maize
jesus is risen and she sports a beer gut at the worlds largest truck stop which is right near ronald reagans childhood home. Just say no to corn. Sorry Ronnie
It really started to drive us up the wall, endless endless monoculture, cornfields, farmhouses, cows... repeat until insane.
The radio stations were innundated with horrible country music and christian rock, most notably songs like, "she's sporting a beer gut" and "its a business doing pleasure with you"
Jesus was there all over the radio, overpowering the cosmic backround radiation. I had the feeling that he was amongst the corngregation of floral worshippers. What happened the the maize gods ? I think these people still beleive in them.
I was so damn illannoyed that i just said no-braska.
eventually our sapceship dubbed "Barry Vanallo" cruised into the outskirts of Denver Colorado, a suburb called Aurora
We pulled up to the home of our first couch surfing host, Steve. He met us outside after a few text messages asking if we were down for some drinking games and some "we are on your street, and lost" phone calls. They were having a party when we showed up with our overpriced Milwaukees best ready for anything. Everybody there was really cool and many interesting conversations floated around mingling with the cigarette smoke and eventually sticking to the floor amongst the spilt beer. Once we got settled and i had a few in me we played a round of stump with the locals. Everybody who played seem to really like this strange, barbaric drinking game from the northeast. The next morning we cleaned up, made some lunch, explored the city then said our goodbyes to our awesome hosts.
Wyoming is fucking beautiful i don't care what anybody says. It does exist, just like nantucket. The open prairies are amazing and they eventually become foothills to mountains with unbeleivable rock formations. I will publish a small post soon entitled.... Alex says the darndest things, in Wyoming
Eventually we passed out of the mountains and into the promised land, where christ spent his time amongst the native americans, hail the prophet joseph smith we have arrived !
its in all of our foods and its the only thing we saw for hundreds of miles. We didnt take any photos because it would be too corn-ographic. *we have tons of corn puns written down somewhere.
trapped in a maize
jesus is risen and she sports a beer gut at the worlds largest truck stop which is right near ronald reagans childhood home. Just say no to corn. Sorry Ronnie
It really started to drive us up the wall, endless endless monoculture, cornfields, farmhouses, cows... repeat until insane.
The radio stations were innundated with horrible country music and christian rock, most notably songs like, "she's sporting a beer gut" and "its a business doing pleasure with you"
Jesus was there all over the radio, overpowering the cosmic backround radiation. I had the feeling that he was amongst the corngregation of floral worshippers. What happened the the maize gods ? I think these people still beleive in them.
I was so damn illannoyed that i just said no-braska.
eventually our sapceship dubbed "Barry Vanallo" cruised into the outskirts of Denver Colorado, a suburb called Aurora
We pulled up to the home of our first couch surfing host, Steve. He met us outside after a few text messages asking if we were down for some drinking games and some "we are on your street, and lost" phone calls. They were having a party when we showed up with our overpriced Milwaukees best ready for anything. Everybody there was really cool and many interesting conversations floated around mingling with the cigarette smoke and eventually sticking to the floor amongst the spilt beer. Once we got settled and i had a few in me we played a round of stump with the locals. Everybody who played seem to really like this strange, barbaric drinking game from the northeast. The next morning we cleaned up, made some lunch, explored the city then said our goodbyes to our awesome hosts.
Wyoming is fucking beautiful i don't care what anybody says. It does exist, just like nantucket. The open prairies are amazing and they eventually become foothills to mountains with unbeleivable rock formations. I will publish a small post soon entitled.... Alex says the darndest things, in Wyoming
Eventually we passed out of the mountains and into the promised land, where christ spent his time amongst the native americans, hail the prophet joseph smith we have arrived !
Thursday, August 27, 2009
Chicago
Pizza Metro 925 north ashland, chicago IL
driving to the windy city, well, blows.
Ohio is full of wonderul flat nothing, novelty fast food chains i've never heard of.
the skyway looked like were driving across a bridge of reflected light in the poring rain. blurry electric light splashing on the windsheild, sleepy driving, so close, avoiding police like divers keeping their distance from sharks.
we made it
long as hell car ride to a nice apartment in pilsen where our friend Ann lives. permanent residents include 3 humans 2 cats 1 dog. smells like patchouli and coffee.
3 bleary eyed transient wanderers sprawled out in the living room.
coffe and curry and pizza that must have crack in it or something.
more to explore.
-Jim
speaking of bleary eyes, i think this city hasn't wiped last-nights brain crust from the corners of its own eyes--the sky is as slate grey as the sidewalks, and i haven't quite woken up yet either. tried to avoid conversion by some communoccultists (politicultists? pun courtesy of Jimberly), who refused to give an interview but deferred to their "leader", suspiciously named Bob. now fiending off the pizza shakes in metro pizza with some apocalypto (apocalypso--new genre? lets get on it) bleepmusic blares through the greasy speakers. i feel like i swallowed an inner tube of cheese. about to overdose on puns and parmesean (as if that were possible). following the 22s from corner to corner....pictures soon.
denver next. what furious horizons await us?
MAINTAINING MY RAGE,
heather
driving to the windy city, well, blows.
Ohio is full of wonderul flat nothing, novelty fast food chains i've never heard of.
the skyway looked like were driving across a bridge of reflected light in the poring rain. blurry electric light splashing on the windsheild, sleepy driving, so close, avoiding police like divers keeping their distance from sharks.
we made it
long as hell car ride to a nice apartment in pilsen where our friend Ann lives. permanent residents include 3 humans 2 cats 1 dog. smells like patchouli and coffee.
3 bleary eyed transient wanderers sprawled out in the living room.
coffe and curry and pizza that must have crack in it or something.
more to explore.
-Jim
speaking of bleary eyes, i think this city hasn't wiped last-nights brain crust from the corners of its own eyes--the sky is as slate grey as the sidewalks, and i haven't quite woken up yet either. tried to avoid conversion by some communoccultists (politicultists? pun courtesy of Jimberly), who refused to give an interview but deferred to their "leader", suspiciously named Bob. now fiending off the pizza shakes in metro pizza with some apocalypto (apocalypso--new genre? lets get on it) bleepmusic blares through the greasy speakers. i feel like i swallowed an inner tube of cheese. about to overdose on puns and parmesean (as if that were possible). following the 22s from corner to corner....pictures soon.
denver next. what furious horizons await us?
MAINTAINING MY RAGE,
heather
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