my life in two pieces

one part business casual with day planner and manual smile caked on. sitting by myself on the first day of training because everyone else already flocked into their little groups and i was glad no one wanted to sit next to me. everyone wants to show everyone else that there is some area of life that they are expert in, or at least well experienced. like the guy who was telling everyone in the break room about how to act in paris and how parisians are because he went there once, and i sipped my water bottle and laughed a little bit inside. the girl next to him was trying to explain the red light district in amsterdam and her great insight to the class/break room/rest of the world was... “and there really are red lights there.”

we had to stand up in front of class and say our name and the first place we plan on flying to with our travel for free privileges. they spurted out places like hawaii, costa rica, new zealand, new york, italy. they looked at me with straight faces when i said i’ve always wanted to see delaware.


one part alone again, but this time on the trail. almost surreal today, running through downtown, around construction cones and hundreds of thousands of people, the concrete world. then in almost an instant i was alone on a single track heading through memory grove straight up a cold water creek canyon. posted: no cougar hunting. and i wondered if utah cougars had somehow gained the ability to read, how else would they know not to hunt? the altitude and heat made me stop and dip my head into the creek and i thought about what a great target i would be for the big cat in the tree. the canyon only echoed the water and it was hard to believe that the rest of the world was just a mile away.

one part of me makes me smile.