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Window

Writer's picture: Leah Scott-KirbyLeah Scott-Kirby

Passing the window are Giant Sequoia. I ache to reach out, brush my hand down their thick bodies. Their bark peels off more like a dogs fur than the trunk of a tree. Eucalyptus is a good example of a tree that peels properly - pleasantly. Eucalyptus peels in strips, like you’re handling a large banana. A banana stretching into the sky and then winding off in different directions, as if afraid of the clouds. I don’t like things that are the way you would imagine them to be. I rather enjoy obscurities. I enjoy walking down the road, donning shorts and a tank top because it’s a stunningly sunny day, just to find myself suddenly swept up in random downpour. I smile. It brings me joy. Just like petting a redwood brings me joy as it roughly splinters and breaks off into a mess of bark-hair. I have fond memories of my family taking quick vacations to the Redwoods. Running my hands over green moss and these peculiar trees. I have keen memories of all our family vacations. San Francisco, Bodega Bay, down to Disneyland. Waking up in tents to a world (and our shoes) covered in rain, poking at banana slugs, building sand castles and sand tunnels and sand mazes, running down dunes, arms flailing in every direction. Yes, quite keen. We never flew. We drove. I’m grateful for that. I can now endure long drives much better than the average person. You see so much more of the journey in a car than you do in a plane. But as kids, Stuart and I never took full advantage of that privilege. My parents were always telling us to “Look outside! See where we are, look where we are going!“ Sometimes in a demanding tone, oftentimes with a deep sigh. A sigh that asked why they even tried. It’s weird to think about now, because it’s not like we had our phones as distraction. It wasn’t like it is these days - infants learning to play with an iPad before they can even fully speak. I suppose my generation had our gameboys, but I never had one. I didn’t even have a phone until I was in my teens. No, technology didn’t avert our eyes from the outside world. We would just be sitting in the back seat, arguing over pencils and sketchbooks or playing silly games amongst ourselves or reading books or sleeping! (Stuart still always seems to find a way to fall asleep during most car rides). We just wouldn’t care enough to look out the windows. We were more excited about the destination than we were about how we got there. As I’ve gotten older, and even more so nowadays, I’ve noticed practically all I ever do when I’m in a car or a bus or a train is look out the windows. I think maybe it started when I found myself venturing off on my own. Or maybe it stemmed from having to drive myself around. With a drivers license came the responsibility of looking out windows and onto roads, as a means of survival. The only difference is, when you’re the one driving, you have a set direction you’re (hopefully) looking toward. When someone else is chauffeuring you around, the options are much more plenty. I admit, I will use my phone for a picture or a quick text or to jot down something that jumps into my head, and occasionally I’ll flip through some pages of a book, but I’m always wanting the window seat. I’m always leaning against the window, pressing my face against the glass. I’m always dying to see what comes next. I find satisfaction in drawing poetry from the landscape that whizzes past, "The road traveled alongside the mountain, like a youthful scar, cut deep into the side of an old man.” I always want to know where I am, where I’m going. I want to experience myself alongside the rest of the world. I want to experience the world, alongside myself.

So I guess what I’m trying to get at is this: Thank you mom and dad. It seems your incessant prodding paid off and now all I want to do is look out the window.

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