Barb Wire Fences

It's an interesting sensation to walk up to a barb wire fence in the middle of the woods. The wire is rusty and worn, drooping down to the countless hikers who, if they have boots, simply grab the post, step on the line and continue on their way. If they have light hiking shoes, like me, they sling their bag and tripod over before bending down to slide carefully over.
It's been raining semi-heavily every day since the weekend. Today was the first with consistent sun and I wanted to see what the camera could capture at dusk. Cacti, boulders, wildflowers, brooding and engulfing trees etc. This is all much more invigorating in person, with the cool mountain air, and not read in Georgia font on your computer screen, but just imagine if you feel like it. I've still to completely adjust to the elevation and...

NOTE: Columbia Winery, Cabernet Sauvignon 1998 is maybe the WORST wine I've ever had. I wish I could go into some passionate Paul Giamatti soliloquy about why this sucks so bad, probably using the word 'vapid' a few times... the thing is... after going through the ceremony of uncorking, unwrapping, pouring and swirling and sniffing - all in eager anticipation - and then tasting nothing until the faint finish... there is disappointment.

crouching down to squint through a tiny viewfinder and adjusting the focus THROUGH said tiny viewfinder and tinkering with that tripod and then

standing up

and taking in the multiple depth of fields of real life and having your eyes automatically adjust to the groves and tall grasses and the breadth of "I climbed up here, from down there, and I'm looking down at where I stood looking at this rock I'm currently standing on and it's minuscule." Hiking down must be a steady, gradual trip if only to balance the necessary fluids reaching and fleeting from your brain. And, anyway, it's so very calm.

I've been telling friends, through various digital communication means, that I haven't spoken to anybody near my age since I arrived here. I have no money for casual cups of coffee or microbrew sampling (until June, if then) and there's always work to do in several different departments etc. I'm keeping busy, but the solitary situation is getting to me... and, somehow, the Pikes Peak Public Library had Forgetting Sarah Marshall in its collection and I'm freaking out with it. It's good to write and read and watch films alone, plot the day for myself etc. but there's that scene in the bar with, "Let's pump the brakes," and I laugh hard before sighing and missing hanging out and, AND there's even that insipid exchange with the girls pretending to be nice to each other and the "...and you're so pretty." "Oh my gosh, you're, like, so much prettier than I am..." which, if it were to happen two weeks ago, I would vomit and/or leave but I laugh here - hysterically, in this cavernous home and the noise comes back to me, adding to the laughter that continues so I get... freaked out by the volume of my own laughter.

Same with the outtakes and the extended scenes and the initial table read with the final cast and I start to get excited about production again, thinking about... how we would do things differently, all that we've learned etc.

All right. Send me your address if I don't have it. See you soon.