16 October 2001
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As I walked into work this morning, it rained leaves. The wind blew straight into me as colors danced. I pulled my hands into my sweater, and grumbled at myself for not wearing my Gore-Tex jacket. I looked up and saw tree tops bend to the will of the wind and stopped in my tracks. How does that work? That there can be a force so strong it rips leaves off limbs, bends limbs to trunks, but lets me trudge through it? I'm not sure how long I stood there staring at sky through blowing trees, but 30 seconds would've been too long as I was running late. Again. Because we haven't fallen back yet, the dawn's darkness tricked me into thinking it was earlier than it actually was. I had pulled my down comforter over my head and fallen back asleep. My alarm clock is a battery-operated travel size, which makes it too small to see across the room, and it also means it's sans snooze. So when I get up to turn it off, every morning, I grab my cell phone or my watch. That way I can check the time while still in the comfort of my comforter. This is never a good thing. Do I break my pattern? No. So this morning I woke up, clutching my cell phone, and shrieked when I looked at it. I'd overslept an hour past my designated alarm-going-off time. (Reason #434 living with Mo was a good thing. She woke me up in the mornings. If not deliberately - coming into my room and telling me to get my sleepy ass up - then by her normal getting ready noises. Bathroom door shutting. Her bedroom door creaking. The slamming of the front door. Et cetera.) And for some reason, as I tromped over wet leaves and kept my head down against the wind, I thought of Spain. This makes no sense, since we were there in the spring, as the world gave birth to a new year and a new season. But thought of Spain I did. Maybe because it was this time last year that we bought our tickets. Maybe because it was chilly there, and often wet. On the Sunday of our trip, as Miranda and I ran around Puerta del Sol from sandwich shop to internet cafe to Metro station, it was rainy and we had to pull our hoods tight and watch our step as not to slip. We'd spent the entire day in that plaza, and I remember we sort of argued about which direction to go because we'd walked up one side of El Cortes Ingles (the mother of all department stores) and down the other, and I thought our Metro station was on the side where there was this spooky arcade/gambling place, but maybe it was over by the McDonald's or the Best Western. (Later, when we were back in Madrid, with T, we learned the awesome directional powers of a giant, glowing neon Tio Pepe sign.) Once we figured out where we were going and needed to be, we stopped for coffee or cafe, for you Spaniards. (Gah! I still don't know how to do accents. Make me clazy.) Miranda ordered what she thought was hot chocolate, but was really just pure liquid chocolate served hot. Sounds good in theory, right? Like hot fudge? Have any of you ever drank hot fudge? That's what I'm saying. Gross. But once the cute Spanish barista (I'm sure Starbucks speak doesn't cross the Atlantic, but remember,this is Starbucks we're talking about) realized she wasn't drinking it, he gave her regular coffee. Or something regular. Actually I think it was a latte. That was the day we were supposed to catch the AVE to Sevilla, but didn't because they were all sold out, so we ended up reserving a hostel through a stand in the Estacion. A good thing in circumstances such as ours, but never highly recommended. When it's not in Let's Go, skip it. It was in the ghetto. (Or what little girls who live in Ohio consider the ghetto.) Which meant that we hightailed it back to our room at the first sign of dusk. Luckily we were exhausted and had to get up early enough to catch a 7:30 a.m. train. Also luckily The World's Smallest Bathroom had us in stitches and we also found it funny when I put on Miranda's too small for me J. Crew flip-flops. (Mine were in the bottom of my pack, yet I did not want to walk around in there barefoot.) People. We took pictures of both the bathroom and my feet. This proves our lameness. (Also, not the first bathroom Miranda photographed. She's the one with a bidet photo in her album, not me.) Miranda's a really great traveling companion, even if her food pickiness makes it hard for her to eat in coastal cities. Or even not so coastal, like Sevilla, but seem coastal in environment and atmosphere. (The girl doesn't like seafood. I know! That's what I think. But, I will give her props because she tried sushi on her birthday. That's impressive.) On Monday night, March 5th, after a day of driving in Andalucia, we got gussied up and went out to dinner. (When we got to the hotel that evening we looked disgusting, plus we had on our giant Hey! We're Americans! And we're backpacking! Aren't we fun! packs. I think when we came back down to the lobby after cleaning ourselves up, the front desk guy didn't recognize us. Except, I'd venture to say that we were the only young, American blonde and redhead in the hotel that night.) The only open and fun-looking place we could find close to our hotel (I really wanted to go to the Barrio de Santa Cruz, but as it was dark and we were over by Jardines de Murillo, we didn't think that was such a good idea.) happened to be a fish place, which means Miranda ate bread. But at least sangria has fruit in it! One of the funniest things happened that night. I had my cigarettes, but M had forgotten hers, along with her lighter. The waiter had given us his lighter to borrow earlier, but had just taken it back. I didn't know the word for 'lighter' so I told her to just go into the bar and say the Spanish word for fire. So she walks inside, and holding her cigarette, shyly cocks her head and says, "Fuego?" Suddenly she had like eight lit lighters in her face. I like to imagine that men were pushing people's heads down and stepping on them to get to her quickly. So for the rest of the trip we would bat our eyelashes and say, "Fueeeego?" But nothing, nothing, beats "Mas creama por favor."
The notify wants you muy mal.
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