Monday, December 24, 2007

I need a road trip

Notice how different road trips in movies are from the ones you do in real life? There's no Shelter From the Storm playing in Dolby Surround and there's no fading of the sound track when the characters have something interesting to say. There are no long shots of the car from a helicopter. There are no deserted highways that stretch straight all the way to the horizon.

There's just a chaos of behind-the-canvas thoughts that you don't even realize you are thinking as you see a slideshow of people, towns, cattle, streetmeat and vehicles. Only the distant trees and the clouds indulge you by seeming to ride along with you reminding you that you are not really going as fast as you think you are. There is music playing whose only purpose seems to be to divide opinions in the car. There's the harsh wind rushing through the window and making exhaling difficult. There's the short moment of eye contact with the occupants of a passing vehicle when you make snap subconscious judgements at all of them. There are the pee breaks, usually meant not just to change the drivers but also the rhythm of the journey. And then there's arriving.

I want to go on a road trip.

"Spirituality" is looking at a Sequioa tree

I'm driving through a shrub jungle behind a huge pickup on a pleasant day. The road is winding and I'm alternating between concentrating on the turns and cursing the culture that has made driving big cars fashionable. While I'm still staring at the yellow pickup with disdainful eyes and casting sadistic curses on its driver, after one particularly wide curve, the car in front shrunk. That's the first thing I remember thinking when we entered the Sequioa forest. The second thing that I remember thinking is "There must be a god!" The trees are just awesome. They make you feel everything is right with the world. They make you wanna shut up forever. And after I got my atheism back, they looked most magnificient.