bananna928

I love Bozeman…I always will. I love skiing the Bridgers, actively-lazy floating of the Madison, the Cat Eye Cafe, Vargo’s Books and Jazz, AleWorks, the Upstairs Zebra (no longer there), Cheever Hall, Alara, Down-to-Earth Ashtanga Yoga, Soundfix, Eightrack, the Baxter, that orchid greenhouse out in Belgrade, and the people of course.

Beautiful Prague, what an amazing place! I really felt like I had just stepped into a fairy tale. As a bonus, it was very inexpensive.

While in Japan, my brother and I would joke that we had become the Japanese tourists that frequent Yellowstone Park. We were hovering over people’s shoulders trying to figure out how to buy train tickets. We spent a half of our days at least being lost, but we welcomed it! It didn’t help that I was trying to take us to obscure places to visit Tadao Aando’s work (such as the Buddhist water temple and the Church of Light). We did eventually find these places! We landed the day that the cherry blossoms opened up! We stopped momentarily, “Oh, look at the pretty flowers.” Suddenly the work day ended and the metros belched up hundreds of thousands of people! Tokyo has a buzz similar to NYC, people are moving with determined looks upon their faces, not slowing down for an instant. So it was interesting when everyone started to slow down suddenly and whip out three cameras a piece and stop to admire the blossoms. “This is a big event,” we thought. The Japanese were all very interested in what we thought of the cherry blossoms. There was even a time when we were asked to be interviewed for the TV news. Our descriptions were entirely inadequate. “Yes, they’re very beautiful…uh, pink and white…very nice…” As the Japanese kept smiling and waiting for more response (which we had run out of), I realized that I didn’t quite understand the affects of these little blossoms. Quite simply, they had not revealed themselves to me. I have a fondness (love actually) for the Montana Beartooths that swells within me. I’ve tried to show visitors the mountains, fully expecting the love for them to be equal. But unless one is living with these things, only the superficial beauty can be revealed. The rest comes eventually…with time. I will keep admiring the cherry blossoms, and eventually maybe I too will feel the significance.