Indeed, I *am* posting again because I am once more waiting in a train station. Keen observation, keep it up.
Yes, I am wrestling another four+ hour “hiccup” in my travel “plans”.
These moments do offer opportunity. Managed to do some exploring:
But having another day of strawberry picking- [to see explanation turn back to page 2, to write this off as another “quirky metaphor” turn to page 3, to fight the tigers instead turn to page 50]- I’m sparing some energy to reflect on the level of surrender involved in group transportation.
In short, [the royal] we give up our comfy, air conditioned, decorated, familiar vehicles and throw ourselves into a cryptically scheduled, unfamiliar, periodically untrustworthy system of high velocity metal capsules where we breathe more germs in an hour than in a standard week [unless you are some kind of sewage maintenance professional in which case I commend and thank you]. It is the atheists’ ultimate exercise of faith. No other non-religious scenario relies so much on an invisible and inscrutable entity unfolding its doctrine in the ways its agents have preached it will. Transportation hubs are the warped-mirror temples of the contemporary. Nobody is praying but everyone within is subject.
But that dehydrated rant aside, I made art. Learned Rubylith cutting combined with photopolymer plate exposure and watercolor monotype. These are the photos I put on my Instagram but full documentation of whatever survives this mangled pilgrimage will be done [eventually] [somehow] [My promises are false and fickle].
And so, ideally, this adventure will conclude with a safe arrival in my nondescript residence to continue my glamour-less little life, carrying with me no more than the treasure of dwarven kings and a ring to bequeath my dear nephew, in as expedient a fashion as possible. Until then I am at the mercy of Almighty Amtrak, and trying to avoid the orcs.
Wish me luck.
Susanna F. Barger 