This morning at the bus stop, I started reading Swann’s Way, the first volume of Proust’s In Search of Lost Time (is that a fantastic title or what!?). The book starts out with a dialogue about the narrator’s dreams and that bizarre, often confusing state of consciousness between sleep and wakefulness. It reminded me of my dream last night: I was back in the plane, touching down in Austin, watching the sunset through the window. The plane, as it landed, bounced, and the sun bounced with it, up and down, above and beneath the horizon. I thought of Monet’s florescent sun, which reminded me of a list I made on that very plane trip that had me bouncing on the runway: Things I Will Miss About London. At that particular moment, I felt akin to
#7. Free museums
The book is fantastic, so far, but not a light read. I think it requires more concentration than the bus affords.
Just a couple days back and though my spirits are roughened by the agony of the job search and the longing for loved ones abroad, I am feeling physically revitalized. There are occasional sleepy bouts that I associate with jetlag. But already I feel my waistline deflating as the pub in me dissipates across the river Colorado (so long, half-pints, I bid you a fond farewell, I shall miss you, especially at lunchtime!). I ran along Town Lake this morning, something I’d been looking forward to. The air was so clean! And am I hallucinating, or is the color already returning to my cheeks?
Was Tim right: is Austin my spiritual home?
I don’t know about that. But I do know that my day has been so classically Austin that I almost feel nauseous. Beyond the run, and after the Spiderhouse, I had lunch at Wheatsville (inspired by a random run-in with Michael C), the cooperative hippie grocery store. I ate my vegetarian tempeh-based chile outside on the patio, while 4 lanes of traffic whizzed by to my right. While I ate I read the Chronicle, Austin’s free entertainment magazine.
After lunch I wandered up to yet another coffee shop to check my email, from which I am currently recording this diatribe. There’s a woman at the counter talking about her “holistic dentist”. “It’s more expensive but it’s worth it.” She’s also wearing some kind of hand-woven shawl thing and cowboy boots. She’s now talking about some herbs that do something helpful for the “woman’s menstrual cycle” (as opposed to the men’s menstrual cycle, a scary time of the month indeed). She may even be one of those rare breeds of people who are actually from Austin, born and raised.
I’ve already randomly bumped into 3 people I know. Austin is so damn small. I forgot about that.
Related posts:
- Just because I like shopping at The Herb Bar doesn’t mean I’m a granola-eating tote-bag-toting Whole-Foods-shopping “Keep Austin Weird”-tshirt-wearing hempster yup-face
- Caffeine = 1,3,7-Trimethylxanthine
- Three Weeks Caffeine Free
- Life Experiment: First Coffee after Four Weeks Caffeine-Free
- Four Days Without Caffeine
I’m so jealous.