32 ROUND DINING TABLE

my plan for today was to have a picnic of sorts. it was overcast and windy, a little gloomy, just beautiful all around. this is my kind of weather. since i ate church's chicken for the first time ever this week (persuaded by lawrence, despite my curiosity over how good food can be so cheap), that was what i exposed slo to today.

i've been informed that the church's on 7th is the place to go. i don't know if it actually makes a difference, but i do enjoy cruising through the east side. while we were waiting for our food to come out, a girl who was probably my age asked if i had a dollar so she could get some chicken. i told her i didn't have cash, at which point she offered to give me the cash she had ($3 and some change) if i would use my card. just last night i was ranting about what's so wrong with sharing the wealth, so i figured i'd practice what i preached. she got two of the same two-piece meals i'd gotten for her and her boyfriend. i asked if she wanted something to drink, but she just got water.

slo started talking about how nice i was being, in a...i don't know, skeptical or surprised tone. maybe it was her rainbow knee socks, but i told him i can't bitch about socialism haters and balk at losing $2. big deal.

my jungian collective unconscious radar pinged soon thereafter, as we sat on the i-35 frontage road. an old car in front of us sporting a 2004 bush sticker (of all things!) started yelling at the old panhandler there. when he finally hobbled over, i saw the woman driving hand him a $10 bill. i see panhandlers every day, and i never actually see anyone give them money, much less $10. i really believe jung was onto something.

i wanted to eat at bailey playground, but there were college kids playing volleyball by the tables. as we drove up shoal creek looking for a place to eat, we found this baseball field, which i didn't know existed. i'd forgotten the park in the distance even existed. i miss my old 'hood. if i had the money, i'd buy me a house in allandale.

old, deserted wooden bleachers built into the side of a steep hill, and beautiful green grass amidst the bare trees. what's more american than fried chicken and baseball? gorgeous solitude right along shoal creek for which i'm so very grateful. i love being outside and alone.

2/7/09 15:34

After two nights, there was a sunset as I drove the back roads of OhiO.

Just spent twenty minutes sipping tea, eavesdropping on the hotel counter girls. Dirty mouths they have! Scary, intimidating, brash talk....but when I went up to make conversation it turned to knitting, shopping, beach homes in Florida, design. This will never get tiring.

Yesterday I went to Shipshewana, home of some grand flea market that people flock to from around the midwest. Silly me thought it would offer something other than knockoff sunglasses, skin-so-soft and mesh bags....One really awesome part was inside this barn all of the auctioning went down. Groups gathered around the auctioneer, men sweating while hoisting up couches in the air for everyone to see, a wooden mallard that sold for sixty bucks, an awesome table for three.

As I was feeling like a disgusting, typical American tourist, I went to the museum to learn about the Amish and Mennonites. The people on my tour ran through it, didn't read a single display and seemed more intent on ordering some homemade pretzels and ice cream and of course cheddar cheese. I left feeling like a snobbish, more knowledgeble tourist, and after a picnic in the sun with my atlas and journal, I booked it out of town.

How I could be twenty five years old and not know the history of Christianity (at all) is disappointing. Another reason I travel alone: four hours in a museum, taking notes.