is the word 'diary' better than the word 'blog'? probably not.
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Time of Day.
Today I drove in the morning. Evany really wanted to see the Beehive house in which the Mormon leader Joseph Smith housed his polygamous family. I woke up slightly grumpy-sad and not in the mood to be converted to the Mormon faith, so I said I'd do the grocery shopping while she walked around town. Then I got in the car and started driving, and, well, all I have to say is WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON WITH THE STREETS IN SALT LAKE CITY? The addresses all radiate out from the main Mormon Temple, which makes sense given the Mormontastic orientation of the Deseret State in general. But what this means in the practice to which it is put in Salt Lake City is that all the streets are named things like 200 S (for South) or 300 E (for East) or the like. And then those streets are divided into east-west or north-south sectors, so a typical address will be: 532 S. 300 E. That's right, 532 South 300 East! Or, maybe, 140 West North Temple. After about 6 versions of me pulling over to the side of the road and looking frantically at the map, all full of disbelief, and then thinking that I finally thought I understood what the map was saying to me, only to find soon thereafter that I had no idea where I was or how I got there, even though I was driving, I finally found the Albertson's supermarket at the corner of 400 E and 200 S. I bought the food. I then found Evany on the corner of State Street and South Temple (which, by the way, is NOT EVEN THE SAME STREET as North Temple). She was a bit late meeting me because an earnest Argentinian Mormon woman was trying to bring her into the loving arms of Mormonism. We hightailed it out of Utah, pronto.
It was still morning, and I was still driving, which probably explains how we managed not to notice that we had already passed Brigham City, which is where we were supposed to get on the highway to Bear Lake. Evany got the map out and got us another way there. Bear Lake is this AMAZING body of water on the Utah/Idaho border that is a bright brilliant turquoise blue because of a large concentration of limestone that is suspended in its waters. It is such an astonishing sight when you come over the top of the mountain pass of Hwy 89 and see this surreal but utterly beautiful thing before your eyes. Look!
Evany got really excited and said "Thank you Thank you Thank you Jill for making me come here." (It is possible that before that moment she was annoyed with me for taking the long way to Yellowstone? In any case, it was the looong way, and we were way way tired by the time we finally found Canyon Village, Yellowstone.) Another thing about Bear Lake is that it is known for its raspberry milkshakes. And we came to know these milkshakes, too. Mine was from Quick'n'Tasty and hers was from Le Beau's. I preferred the tartness of mine whereas she liked the creaminess of hers, so all was well. And we even got our photo taken in a miniature covered wagon while taking it all in. We LOVE Bear Lake.
By the way, speaking of LOVE, I am having a LOVE AFFAIR with America's two-lane highways. I have already started to resent every deadening generic minute I spend on a big interstate.
Today during Evany's nap I saw some amazingly beautiful things as I cut across the corner of Idaho toward Wyoming. I was asking myself why it is that I always see such amazing things while she is sleeping. And I think it might be more about the time of day than it is about where I happen to be driving or the fact that I am left only to my own eyes and thoughts for an hour or so. Just as it has been demonstrated time and again that I am not good in the morning, nay, let's just say it, I am STUPID and USELESS in the morning, I am shining and alive and ready to be inspired at 3pm. And that goes all the way through dusk and some way into the evening. In fact I often get good writing work done between midnight and 3am, after a lull around 11pm. Whereas Evany is hap-hap-happy at 11 am. And often much earlier than that, too. This is not to say that she can't dance until the breakadawn if it is time for such things. Nor is it the case that I can't get out and into the wilderness (or the classroom) at 8 or 9am if that is what the situation merits. All I'm saying is that Evany and I seem to have different physical orientations toward times of the day.
Are people born with these dispositions toward certain times of day, or do they develop them like habits? I think I have always been night-oriented, but I can't be certain about that. When I was doing archaeology in Israel and had to be up at 4:15 every morning, I certainly was able to do it, and was able to appreciate the beauty of seeing a sunrise every morning, but I never really enjoyed it or got used to it. No. And I didn't start waking up earlier on the weekends when I could sleep Jill Hours. And then when I was a secretary for three years and worked from 9:30 to 5:30, I was able to do it but never really felt like it was right to be waking up at 8:30. In fact I negotiated the 9:30 thing to give me a bit of extra sleep time. My boss was a nice guy.
In other news, today we saw one of those diamond/square-shaped yellow-and-black signs that has the silhouette of a cow on it, to tell/warn us that cows are in the area and might be on the road, and then moments later we turned a bend and there was a cow on the side of the road in exactly the same position or stance as the cow of the road-sign, and that struck us as HILARIOUS.
Tonight we are sleeping in twin beds in a tiny and uninspiring but entirely adequate cabin. It's like we are a married couple from an early situation comedy. Which reminds me that as we were driving through Yellowstone in the dark under the almost full moon, we saw the moon's reflection in the placid surface of Lake Yellowstone, and it was very lovely, and Evany said, "I am going to go out on a limb here and say That is BEAUTIFUL! I might accidently start making out with you!"
Stats:
Salt Lake City, UT to Canyon Village, Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming (Elevation: 8000 ft; Population: in flux)
Miles: 440
Lodging: $82
10:21 p.m. - August 27, 2004
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