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Jul. 3rd, 2006 03:25 pmGeez I'm travelling a lot lately...
Last week: NYC
This week: Tucson, then Raleigh
This weekend: Boston to do Second Shift recording and (hopefully) see![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
choose_again
Next week: Charlotte
Next weekend: Pittsburgh to see my grandparents
Next next week: Philadelphia (hi,eruthros!)
Next next weekend: Boston
Next next next week: Technically back in Boston, but may take a class in Baltimore instead
After that: Back in Boston for at least a week. No idea after that.
I've had a pretty nice several months of traveling no more than once a month and now this. Yeesh.
Anyway, I'm really enjoying Tucson. Came out here to visit my friend Shawn, and while I normally don't do protracted amounts of time just hanging out with one person (with the possible exception ofchoose_again) the trip has been pleasant. We've geeked out, driven out to a nearby state park to look at the pretties and so forth. Basically, just taking some time to be uncharacteristically slow-moving and relaxed. Because of some medical conditions that Shawn has he sleeps about 12 hours out of the day, from midnightish to noonish. Since I tend to sleep from midnightish to 7:30ish, this gives me big stretches of alone-time in which I work, goof off and take the non-interactive time I need to retain my sanity. Every morning since I got here I've spent time just laying on my air mattress staring into space, not thinking about anything. I can't remember the last time I did that.
I love Arizona, by the way. Every time I come here I feel compelled to write about how drawn I am to this environment. I always felt the whole "what kind of biome are you" nature identification thing was a bit pretentious and corny, but as soon as I walk out into that dry heat and look at cacti and stone for as far as the eye can see I somehow feel immediately at home. I think I'm solar powered.
There's a simplicity to the desert at first glance. But every square foot can be zoomed in upon to reveal detail after detail. I think it's the flatness, the expansiveness of it all that really gets me. The landscape is not featureless by any stretch of the imagination; cacti, boulders and gorgeous red mountains decorate it in endless combinations. But none of these features upstage the land in the way that a forest or an ocean would. It is the land that makes me feel like I could walk across it forever feeling comfortably small, almost enclosed, within it.
Shawn pointed out that if I wasn't able to drive back home and get a drink of water I wouldn't have such a rosy view of it and I agree. But that's the beauty of the modern age. Humanity has pulled its self up by its bootstraps and done wondrous things. It's wrong to use that elevation to assume a posture of mastery over the land, but that's not all that our andvances are good for. Aquaducts, space suits and diving bells. Technology allows us to appreciate nature in a way that is difficult to do when constantly on the defensive.
Last week: NYC
This week: Tucson, then Raleigh
This weekend: Boston to do Second Shift recording and (hopefully) see
choose_againNext week: Charlotte
Next weekend: Pittsburgh to see my grandparents
Next next week: Philadelphia (hi,
eruthros!)Next next weekend: Boston
Next next next week: Technically back in Boston, but may take a class in Baltimore instead
After that: Back in Boston for at least a week. No idea after that.
I've had a pretty nice several months of traveling no more than once a month and now this. Yeesh.
Anyway, I'm really enjoying Tucson. Came out here to visit my friend Shawn, and while I normally don't do protracted amounts of time just hanging out with one person (with the possible exception of
choose_again) the trip has been pleasant. We've geeked out, driven out to a nearby state park to look at the pretties and so forth. Basically, just taking some time to be uncharacteristically slow-moving and relaxed. Because of some medical conditions that Shawn has he sleeps about 12 hours out of the day, from midnightish to noonish. Since I tend to sleep from midnightish to 7:30ish, this gives me big stretches of alone-time in which I work, goof off and take the non-interactive time I need to retain my sanity. Every morning since I got here I've spent time just laying on my air mattress staring into space, not thinking about anything. I can't remember the last time I did that. I love Arizona, by the way. Every time I come here I feel compelled to write about how drawn I am to this environment. I always felt the whole "what kind of biome are you" nature identification thing was a bit pretentious and corny, but as soon as I walk out into that dry heat and look at cacti and stone for as far as the eye can see I somehow feel immediately at home. I think I'm solar powered.
There's a simplicity to the desert at first glance. But every square foot can be zoomed in upon to reveal detail after detail. I think it's the flatness, the expansiveness of it all that really gets me. The landscape is not featureless by any stretch of the imagination; cacti, boulders and gorgeous red mountains decorate it in endless combinations. But none of these features upstage the land in the way that a forest or an ocean would. It is the land that makes me feel like I could walk across it forever feeling comfortably small, almost enclosed, within it.
Shawn pointed out that if I wasn't able to drive back home and get a drink of water I wouldn't have such a rosy view of it and I agree. But that's the beauty of the modern age. Humanity has pulled its self up by its bootstraps and done wondrous things. It's wrong to use that elevation to assume a posture of mastery over the land, but that's not all that our andvances are good for. Aquaducts, space suits and diving bells. Technology allows us to appreciate nature in a way that is difficult to do when constantly on the defensive.
