Mood:
Music: The Postal Service - Such Great Heights


Nicole! Nicole, Nicole, Nicole. Wow. How do I even write this entry? How do I thank you? Thank. That sounds so tiny. It's something you do when someone passes you the salt. No, not thank then. How do I repay you? I couldn't possibly. Everything about the trip was amazing. But not just that, amazing in wholly new and different ways. It was all so radically dissimilar from my norms, and I can't stress enough how refreshing a change of pace it truly was for me. Somehow, I managed to find myself in a new place, with new people, trying new things. I listened to music I would never otherwise have heard, saw sights that are just completely impossible to describe -- let alone capture, try as I may -- and just enjoyed every single breathtaking second of it all. I tried so hard to not gush about it in person, hoping maybe that if I was able sit on it some and react here that I might be able to do the experience justice, but I just couldn't hold it all in. It was impossible. I mean, how can you not say something to this..


..a sight that can at once make you feel as if you're on top of the world, and at the same time so very insignificant?


Or how about this? That's one of the lakes we hiked to, and I could have sat there all day and not tired of the view. Same with this beach..


..this completely and utterly perfect beach, which I did spend literally an entire day on.

But I'm not going to let this turn into just another picture entry. This trip deserves some verbiage. One of the things I was most appreciative of wasn't just what the trip was about, but what the trip wasn't about, as well. I didn't drive, I didn't meet up with old friends, and there wasn't a computer in sight -- no Facebook, no Xanga, no Digg, nada -- hell, my phone wasn't even on. There was a bit of separation anxiety (from the Internet, ha!) the first day or so, but after awhile I just stopped caring about all that stuff and started to really enjoy myself.


There wasn't a superficial moment or scenario or person or interaction the entire time. Everything surface-level was stripped away. Money, clothes, hygene!! All gone. All that was left was the essential, and you couldn't accessorize your way around it. And I don't mean that in a small way, like a bag or a hat, I mean it in a big way. Everything is in an accessory. Your clothes, your car, your job, sometimes even your friends or your significant other. You pick and choose who and what you want in your life for various reasons, but they all say something about you, whether you mean them to or not. Out there, though, it wasn't like that. It was so far removed from that. What you had was what you needed, and getting to know such disparate people under so unusually honest a circumstance intrigued me to no end.


The person who got to know me best, and who I then of course got to know best, was Nicole. Camping with her and her friends meant I had to be okay with a couple of things that I normally am very much not -- especially since I'd be meeting them all for the first time. There was no shaving, there was no showering, and there was no electricity and all the wonderful things that it provides. The only thing that made it bearable was the fact that it was a shared experience. We were all in it, together. Plus, when you strip away all the glitz, you get to see people for who they really are. And not just the tick-tocks of their soul, which of course is ultimately the most interesting, but the things that make them beautiful even when unenhanced. I don't know what that is for me, but for Nicole it would have to be her eyes. And I know that eyes are generally one of those things you reserve waxing poetic on for when you're more than friends, but at the risk of people incorrectly assuming just that, I feel like I need to say it. She has, I kid you not, the most devastating blue eyes I've ever seen. Really, I can't do them justice.


The life she leads is so different from mine, too, which normally skews as bad but in this case I only mean different. The trip did little to answer some of the questions I had about her, but at this point I think it's actually more fun not knowing. Besides, if there's one thing I've learned after what happened with Winnie it's that trying to figure everything out is pointless.


And, if this weekend was any indication, I'll have plenty of other opportunities to do so.

Someone recruiting for Facebook called me and when I said I wasn't interested he shot back, "Are you sure? They offer 3 square meals a day over there, it's pretty impressive!" I tried not to laugh when I told him how truly unimpressive that actually was, for the Silicon Valley. Don't get me wrong, I love Facebook, and with them being such a hot little piece of pre-IPO ass I've of course entertained the idea of working there, but they haven't really figured out how to monetize their traffic -- nor convinced me that they'll even be around long enough to do so -- and so their pitch to me is going to need to be a whole hell of a lot better than "We will feed you."