Questing Through the Valley of the Sun

Today is a lovely day simply to be by myself for a while. I have been suffering from time lag and lack of sleep over the last two days and nights. The difference here in Phoenix is only two hours, but with the night owl habits of the friends I have been visiting, this makes the shift from manageable to being out really late. I spent the night listening half way through my play list on my mini-computer rather than to my host's snoring (carried to me thanks to the otherwise quite lovely two-level, open air loft they call home). When I woke this morning, groggy, I believed it when my computer told me it was 9:30. Thus I was confused, after a leisurely stroll and equally leisurely breakfast of coffee, yogurt, granola, and fruit, why the art museum was not open. I returned to my temporary home, Tracy & Jan off at work, believing it to be well past noon to find it only 10:30 in the morning. So I did the only thing one can do. I took a nap on the couch. I roused at 1:00 o'clock local time to wander down to the fancy wine and cheese restaurant in the retail level of this five story condo building, then wandered back up to write, finish reading the Sunday Times, and otherwise putter away the afternoon.

I am deeply contemplating a second visit to the pool. I thoroughly enjoyed my visit there yesterday, where I began to deeply appreciate the hedonistic glory of a private pool. None of the other residents were as foolish as I to venture out into the hundred-plus degree afternoon, but after slowly splashing my way back and forth across the crystal clear, eighty-two degree waters a few times, I found the Arizona heat to be quite perfect. As I sat in the poolside lounges and read a magazine, the southerly breeze made my wet suite into a chiller as the water evaporated. I was finally driven in when the sun became too low for the tall, sea-green umbrella to do it's job.

As I contemplate that, I am also aware that I am not too far from an art district. I have lately outgrown several of the prints I bought while still a teenager and have been thinking of replacing them. My budget, however, remains limited. This is a quest which may take some time.

I have enjoyed loud bars (a rare occasion for me), bad beer (I don't like beer, so there really is no other kind), wonderfully eccentric poets, good conversation, frustrating meditation (nothing new there), much laughter, new friends (some of the feline variety), good wine, good food, and irreverent philosophy (the best kind). Several of the people I have met here in Phoenix are artists of one kind or another, and quite good ones too. I have a feeling they would not steer me wrong, and may see who is up for such a quest.

Perhaps after the pool...