i had a nice drive home last night. it's been a really long time since i've driven on the highway at night, which is one of my favorite things to do. the last time i did it was probably in western montana last summer, on my way back to pullman. because after that, my car was out of action for a long time with a few needed repairs, and the only time i did anything resembling road-tripping was when i rented that ford focus and drove to salem and seattle in january, but pretty much ninety percent of the driving for that was during the day, and the other ten percent featured me having to concentrate on a snowstorm and trying to stay on the road, so i didn't exactly have time to sit back and relax.
but last night was just the drive from kent to canton on I-76/77, a drive i've probably made as many times in my life as a lot of people make the drive up the street to the supermarket (i've walked to the supermarket for eight years, so that drops my average).
it's always good for me to get out in the dark in a car by myself, because at this point, for better or worse, i often zone out pretty significantly while highway driving. it's the closest thing i get to meditation. highway driving in the day doesn't really work because there's enough traffic that zoning out makes it likely you'll kill someone.
anyway, there's a scene in the movie "elizabethtown" (after another recent viewing, i've decided it's absolutely one of my favorite movies...i'll fight with you about it if you want) where the kirsten dunst character, having just set the orlando bloom character on a cross-country road trip using a map that she designed after following him through a series of misadventures including a few epic fuck-ups on his part, tell him of the impending road trip: "don't call me until you get home. i want you to get into the deep, beautiful melancholy of everything that's happened". this is sort of how i feel about night driving. i feel strongly enough about it that i've been known to purposely turn my phone and all other communication devices off for days at a time while driving. it forces me to deal with the things in life that you instinctively want to avoid, don't want to think about, or in the case of some people, over-obsess about. there are a lot of sad things that happen, and sometimes it's hard for me to remember that this is a pretty necessary part of life, in order to help put the good things in perspective. sometimes it's easy to think "that's bad, so i should avoid it", but i don't think the same principle applies to emotional health that applies to, say, eating. emotional problems are sort of like cavities. the longer you ignore them, the worse they get, and they never, EVER go away on their own, even if sometimes it seems like they're gone for awhile. so i guess night driving is my equivalent of a dentist's checkup.
anyway, it was nice to be able to reflect on some bad things (as strange as that sounds) after having a few days' worth of good things. once again, for the sake of not taking the good things for granted.
i've been having a really good time lately up in kent, and i'm definitely sad to leave. i'm hoping to get up there a few more times before i fly out, but i'm not sure how or when yet.
getting to catch back up with my friends is always one of the better parts of any trip home, but this time it's been especially great. part of it is because of getting to be friends with dana again (i think i mentioned that yesterday) and for me personally to be able to accept that relationship as it is for the first time in what seems like a decade. part of it is that so many people have been around lately (including a few people who usually live out of state or who i haven't seen in years rather than months). part of it is knowing that there are still going to be at least a few people around when i come back in the winter. and part of it is that we've all been getting out frequently and really doing things, like hiking and playing frisbee, etc.
usually when i come home there's mostly a lot of TV-watching and sleeping late. i'm okay with this somewhat, because these are the two things i never do in pullman and so it's neat to get to do them a bit. but at the same time, fairly often i sort of feel like "well, i don't really want to do this, but my friends are doing it and i want to see them, so i'll do it because they're fun to hang out with regardless". i think it might have something to do with my friend john's insistence on getting us all out of the house frequently, but lately we've all actually been doing things as a group, and, well, it's really fucking fun. occasionally i need a day or so to recover afterwards, but it's still fun. yesterday at some point during our ultimate frisbee game i thought to myself how little people our age (other than occasionally the people i was currently playing with) do things like play games, or run, or do anything physical that isn't entirely self-centered. i don't mean "self-centered" in the inherently negative way it's usually meant, i just mean that it seems like most of the time people our age do physical activity, if they do it at all, it's running by themselves, or working out by themselves, or doing yoga by themselves (some of these things take place in a room with other people, sometimes a room of people who all already know each other, but they don't require the amount of interaction that, say, a UT game or basketball game does). lately i've realized how badly i really miss playing games with people, exercising while having an inherent part of that exercise be communicating, cooperating, and competing with other people. and i think i'm going to miss the hell out of that when i get to pullman.
of course, after they cut down all the FUCKING TREES OUTSIDE OF AVERY, i'm sure we could play frisbee on that field. bah.
anyway, i just had to get that off my chest. because it's been really fun lately, and i'm going to miss it once we disband for the fall.
there were lots of other things i was ruminating over last night, but i probably couldn't talk about them without embarrassing certain people. so there it is.
i'll embarrass myself instead: i watched "ultraviolet" and "lara croft tomb raider: the cradle of life" last night. seriously.
also, i'm two posts behind on bloomsbury. i think i'm going to do one today. i like larry's prompt, but i'm trying to do a song instead of a journal entry for it. that's why it's taking so long. i think i'm going to go tackle donna's right now, though.
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