I turned around in my seat and greeted the stranger on my Chicago bound train.
“Hi, I’m Diana.”
“Hi, I’m ******.” I had it in me to say hi but I didn’t have it in me to hold eye contact quite yet, so I sneaked a look and saw piercing blue & then steadied my gaze on the muted navy of the booths we were sitting in.
We chatted for a good thirty minutes until we were the last passengers still lingering in the dining car, everyone else back in their seats getting ready to deboard. Learned that ****** is also currently backpacking via the Amtrak, that he’s a PHD student & an engineer & trilingual & is currently converting a van that he will live out of and travel in. He is French & has a thick accent and two brothers and a sister - all doctors. His English is not great and my French is nonexistent so our attempts at communication are feeble at best. The conductor finally kicked us out of the dining car and ushered us back to our seats and I thought to myself, “Well, that was nice.”
We waved goodbye and shuffled back to our seats and I figured, that was the end of that, goodbye train stranger. I didn’t really think anything of it after parting ways. Well I’m getting off the train and there he is on the platform! Waiting for me! We lock eyes and his face lights up, “I have two hours until I need to catch my next train, do you want to walk around for a bit?” “Sure!” I responded without hesitation, despite the knowledge that not only can we barely understand each other, I also have a bus that I need to catch exactly 40 minutes from now. But I snuck another glance at that sharp blue & my mind was made up. Texted *****, “Might be a bit late, met a stranger on the train.”
“Yeah, I also have some time to kill here in Chicago.” The lie rolling off my tongue. He went to the bathroom & I whipped out my phone to check the bus maps, only to make the grim discovery that there are actually no more busses that would get me to the destination of Milwaukee in time for *****’s art exhibit tonight. Damn, my bad y’all. Clicked purchase on a ticket to Madison instead, scratching the Milwaukee plan in its entirety.
The stranger and I began our hike, backpacks strapped to our person, talking, talking, talking away. He is heading east on his journey, his next stop being Michigan for a few weeks. Looked down at his feet and saw a pair of beat up trainers in lieu of those hideous slides that he had on earlier. We walked all through Chicago & my shoulders were aching so badly from the weight of the backpack. Feet felt swollen from the extended walking in my fuck ass ballet flats. Why am I backpacking in fuck ass ballet flats? We made it to The Bean and he suggested that we sit in the park for a bit and I said YES.
Memory flicks back to when I partook in this exact act (solo) a mere few days ago.
Sat in the grass to the left of The Bean and the more we spoke, the more alien I felt. Even without the language barrier factor, we are just two completely different humans. Different humans in different stages of our lives in different calibers of life, IE he is in his early 30’s, a PHD student who comes from a family of doctors and is trilingual and all these other ridiculous accolades that rolled off his tongue like they were nothin’. Was tough to communicate with the language barrier, ‘cause he kept starting his sentences in French and then trying to find the words in English, and I just felt like the ignorant American trope. He touched on that trope, saying that it’s hard for him to communicate with Americans on a fundamental level, like even if his English was fluent, there would still be an undeniable missing layer of understanding.
Prime example, a baby ran over to the two of us and he picked up the baby with this huge grin on his face and my heart stopped as he cooed and swung it around. It being the baby. I looked on in horror and made eye contact with the parents, who had equally horrified expressions fixed on their faces. The three of us wide eyed, mouth agape American’s wordlessly frozen in place, observed in disbelief as the French man obliviously continued to gently manhandle the random baby. He started tossing it and I felt my stomach lurch.
My initial shock & nervous laughter dissolved into total awe and a pang of jealously at the sight before me. Made me want to pick up the baby too but the I-would-look-like-a-predator thoughts forced me to keep my hands to myself. They must do things differently in France. I forgot his name but that sharp blue is a permanent file in Memory Lane.
Wisconsin
Quarter to midnight, & Katie is waiting for me at the bus stop, parked in her SUV. I ran over to her, tossing my backpack in her backseat and tossing myself into the passenger, into her open arms for a squeeze. “I’m sure you’re probably tired from all the travel, do you want to drop your stuff off at ********’s, and we can chill at the apartment?”
Pretended to think for a second. “I’m… down to rally.” I responded. Devious little twinkles in our eyes as we giggled & she sped us up Madison’s isthmus. I didn’t know what an isthmus was 10 minutes ago but now as I type this into my notes app at the bar, I’ve heard the word parroted so many times, everyone’s voices laced with Wisconsin pride. “Diana, have you grasped the isthmus of it all?”
Katie & I met on Substack when she slid into my DM’s on New Years Day, informing me that she would be in Brooklyn visiting her friends that week, and asked if I’d want to hang out. Yes, please. We clicked instantly and I met her friends that night who I also clicked with instantly- the conversation never ran dry & I knew I stumbled across something special. Katie & her friends remind me of me & my friends in an alternate timeline & now it’s almost half a year later and my turn to visit them.
First stop was Genna’s, everyone’s unanimous favorite dive bar that’s an isthmus of its own when you look at it on a map.
Instead of being bordered by water it’s bordered by W Main St & S Hamilton St & drunk college aged people peppering the streets & squeezed into the bars.
Katie ordered us a round of Spotted Cow, a Wisconsin favorite beer. As we guzzled those down, she instantly recognized familiar faces from her University, and we started chatting with them- about school, post-grad, my whereabouts on this backpacking trip, Everything Else. We spent the night running all around rainy Madison, soaked & spry- bodies raked with beer & cigarettes & laughter & joy.
Next Morning
Parallel on a blowup air mattress. This feels so luxurious compared to my past few sleepless couch & upright-in-a-train-seat nights. Took a deep inhale in and could feel in my throat the pack of cigarettes that I inhaled last night. Said this out loud to Katie, who was laying 10 feet away in the bed with ******** and she echoed the same sentiment. She goes on that she’s been so good, living at home with her parents right now, so this is her weekend to be mischievous. I’ve kinda been mischievous all month, but I just want to keep it going! Let the mischief never end, please & thank you World.
Migrated from the air mattress to the bathroom where I snooped around a teeny bit trying to see if ******** has any tweezers. Nothin’. Inspected my appearance in the mirror. Not loving what I’m seeing. My bangs are growing in lopsided & sparse eyebrow hairs have overtaken the entire top quadrant of my face. My lips are cracked & my face is dry & my hair is brittle & I feel like the piece of dehydrated citrus that garnishes a cocktail.
Shuffled over to the kitchen where I fixed myself a glass of tap water. Downed that and then another and then stalked back over to the bathroom mirror to reassess. Okay, why did my appearance not magically transform after two glasses of water? Whatever.
Brushed my teeth & brushed my hair & washed my face with my little travel face wash that I brought. Patted my skin dry & ran my knuckles along my jawline & dragged my pointer fingers along my cheekbones as a faux lymphatic drainage of sorts. Re-inspected my appearance in the mirror. Better.
Unzipped my makeup bag, this pink lacey pencil pouch that I pocketed at a Goodwill a few summers ago. I began to do careful damage control on my appearance while Katie ran out to acquire the three of us some breakfast bagels.
In my makeup pouch I packed:
a Shiseido eyelash curler
L'Oreal Telescopic mascara
Smashbox Highlighter in shade Moonstone
Glossier Cloud Paint Blush in shade Puff
Neutrogena Tinted Moisturizer
Clinique Black Cherry Almost Lipstick
So that all went on my face and I felt fine about what stared back at me in the mirror. Katie came home with our breakfast and the three of us gathered around ********’s dining table, unwrapping our bagels & giggling at the sights before us. Katie chose an onion bagel with scallion cream cheese, I got a salt bagel with plain cream cheese (I never get this, I don’t know why I ordered this), & ******** got a plain bagel with smoked salmon cream cheese. We all made weird choices and my bagel was so horribly salty that even after picking off as many salt crystals as I could from the dough, it still made my lips pucker and my stomach turn. The salt overload I just consumed did not help my I-feel-so-dry-and-brittle case but God was it kinda delicious.
Explored Olbrich Botanical Gardens with Katie and her friends *****, & ********. Feels so nice to be with a group of people. A group of somewhat familiar faces. Katie picked this place to take me specifically because they have a pressed penny machine (she is so thoughtful & perfect) (I love her). I collect pressed pennies & thought it would be cute to collect one in every state that I go to, but the wholesome idea faded to the back burner of my brain after the first 48 hours of my trip. Whoops! Got a penny in Boston (first stop) and then… forgot. But Katie remembered and we made a pressed penny that I gave away to a little girl who was playing with the machine, spinning the handle round & round. Did not give the child my penny out of an act of true altruism, I did this because I wanted to acquire more good karma points on my trip.
I wanted to walk around Katie’s favorite museum, the Chazen. Katie has a really lovely blog post about it & it’s what made me want to check it out while I’m here in Wisconsin. We escaped Madison’s chill & slipped into the museums entrance, taking our sweet time putting our bags away into the lockers. Thoughts drifted towards Amelie’s father encouraging me to go to as many museums as I can during my travels. The Chazen was unfortunately closed for renovations so instead of walking around the art museum, the four of us migrated towards a little picnic table by the water and family style shared a glorious meal of cheese curds & bratwursts & pints of Spotted Cow. Just remember it being sooo cold outside but everyones personalities being so warm.
We came back to ********’s apartment, where we turned her bathroom into a salon. I trimmed my bangs over the sink while ***** trimmed Katie’s in the shower & we drank more Spotted Cow & gossiped about our Current Life Events. Later in the evening some more friends came over and we again shared a family styled meal. Fresh salmon that Katie’s father caught, roasted vegetables & sautéed spinach & lemon garnishes & a thick bed of rice. Made my heart flutter, sitting in on how gorgeously communal this all is. Madison & its inhabitants are really something special.
Passing a tiny vial of poppers around a mellow dive bar. This drunk girl asked to sniff them so ***** handed her over the bottle & the drunk girl proceeded to take a real comically large whiff and started blinking her eyes all rapid letting out loud chortles, but she forgot to unscrew the cap of the bottle & just inhaled a whole lotta dive bar air. I loved her.
After we came home from the bar, Katie and I stayed up talking in the kitchen nook for hours. I had already taken out my contacts for bed at this point, so I was trying my best to make eye contact with the blur of her face where I thought her eyes might be. Picturing her thinking to herself, “Is there like, something on my forehead?” We spoke, and spoke, and spoke, until I looked down at my phone and discovered that it was four in the morning.
Laying on the air mattress. Thinking about how I’d like to extend my time here. I feel tempted to to stay an extra day here in Wisconsin, ‘cause I’m just having so much fun hanging out with Katie & her friends. This band that we all love (Water From Your Eyes) is playing a free show tomorrow night that I’ll be missing if I leave in the morning like I’m supposed to, but I’ve already been so wishy-washy with the girl who I’m staying with on my next stop, so I know that my time here needs to come to a close. It’s time! Time to keep going, going, going. Going, going, gone!
10 am. Woke up to the sensation of Katie hesitantly tapping my shoulder, “Diana, don’t you have to leave soon?” She whispered gently but urgently. I shot up on the air mattress, peeling off my eye mask. The room became flooded in light with the thin fabric removed from my eyes. “Shit, shit, shit.” Wiped at some spittle on the side of my mouth. Damnit. Set an alarm for 9 but didn’t plug my phone in last night (as I do), so the alarm rendered useless on my dead device.
Face is smudged in mascara flakes and a headache is percolating behind my temple. Brushed my teeth & washed my face & swallowed my vitamins, stuffing my belongings into my backpack.
My plan was to wake up with enough time to shower and drink a cup of green tea and make a bowl of instant oatmeal, but none of that happened and instead the two of us ran out the door into the cold. So horribly cold in Madison. If it wasn’t for the warmth of everyones personalities, oh god would I have been bitching & moaning. Think I loved my time in Madison so much because I loved seeing how much they loved Madison. Drew such strong parallels to my Florida fondness. Sweet to bear witness to.
Before we left, I throughly inspected ********’s studio to make sure that I hadn’t left anything behind. Keep accidentally leaving a little snail trail of my essence in every state I stop in. Bobby pins here, my favorite tweezers there, socks & scrunchies & pens & cords & other misc. items slowly dwindling from my supply. Being careless. Don’t care that I am being careless. Keep telling myself, at least my bag is getting lighter by the day!
Train to Oregon
I didn’t have enough time to shower at ********’s which makes my skin crawl because it’s another overnight trip on the train. This one’s gonna be rough. Squeezed Katie & her friends goodbye. Thought some more about how much I liked them. Thought some more about how much I’ve liked everyone I’ve met so far. Everyone’s being so kind to me - a stranger, when they don’t really need to be. Letting me into their homes, their communities, buying me dinners & beers & letting me ramble about my life events & telling me about theirs. All this humanity I’ve been indulging in has been such a treat. I see myself in everyone I meet. It’s all so novel & new & yet so wholly familiar.
From Madison I took a bus back to Chicago. On a technicality I’ve managed to frequent Chicago the most on this trip, while simultaneously barely actually seeing anything of the city, sans The Bean. So ridiculous. If I could take the train from Madison to Oregon I would, but Chicago seems to be the main Amtrak hub. Lotta my New York friends seem to be Chicago expat’s and speak about this city in the same way that I speak about Florida.
Something that has been universal in every state I have traveled to so far: talking about Clavicular. Didn’t really know who this was prior to my train trip, but now I have somehow had a conversation about him in every state, despite the fact that I had never heard of this man prior to this month. Proceeded to go down the rabbit hole & watched the Andrew Callaghan interview of him while I waited at the station for my train. Thinking back to that stint in college where I was hyper fixated on Andrew Callaghan and Channel 5 and switched my major to journalism for a semester ‘cause I was convinced that that was the direction that my life would go in, but I am too conceited and would prefer to just document me, myself, and I. My journalistic pursuits end when the things that I am documenting do not directly correlate to Diana World.
Ruby called me after I got settled onto the train, and we updated each other on Life Events that have occurred in the past 48 hours. She updated me that she hung out with Girl Roommate the other night and I said, “Who?” Not registering that she meant my Girl Roommate. Ruby pauses on the other end of the line. “Girl-Roommate… your roommate?” I paused. “You hung out with my roommate?” I asked incredulously. The concept of them hanging out didn’t even cross my radar as something that would be occurring while I’m gone.
The first emotion that I felt at this realization was jealously-fomo-what-the-hell! (I apparently can’t grasp that life in New York is still happening, even when I am not there). The second emotion was elation that my new roommate & Ruby, my closest friend in the city, are bonding & forming a connection. That feels nice to think about. The community of it all. Mind drifts to Madison.
Ruby continues, rubbing salt in the wound, that she actually even got Girl Roommate a job at her cafe too! So now, they are coworkers. Jealously has returned. Ruby & I met as coworkers last summer, and now the torch is being passed. Jealous. Sitting here feeling jealous and lame.
The unreasonably jealous & lame attitude I’ve copped now all makes sense, ‘cause after we hung up, I walked down the train aisle towards the 3 by 3 bathroom, where I came to the gruesome discovery that blood is gushing out from between my thighs.
I was just on my period two weeks ago, so she’s horribly early. What the hell World? A grim realization has set in. My plan was kinda to play in LA, but this feels like a sign from World to not play in LA.
7:34 pm Body is buzzing with excitement at the knowledge that I am finally, officially, heading west. Can finally strip off my layers of outerwear. Strip out of my Brandy Melville black quarter sleeve & brown corduroy pants uniform I’ve been dutifully wearing day in & day out. Typing this from the dining car where me & my belongings are sprawled out in a booth. My Orwell paperback & laptop & cords & headphones & diary & watercolor kit & water bottle & a paper cup filled with hot water for an instant oatmeal packet. Don’t understand how people spend these trips stuck in their assigned seats and not sprawled out in one of these booths like I am. The dining car is virtually empty except for me and a family of four and there are still approximately 33 hours left on this trip.
Sad that I’m missing so many cool states, Minnesota & Montana & the Dakota’s, but I just don’t have the time! 30 days flies by when there’s 50 states to chose from.
There’s a nerdy looking middle aged man alone in the booth next to me who has just exclaimed out loud, “Deer! Finally!” Frantically pointing out the window where there were in fact a family of deer staring back at us as we shuttled by. His excitement felt contagious and we smiled at each other fondly. I spent the next hour staring out the window myself and my heart leapt when all this time passed by and horses were grazing in a field in the distance.
Having serious regrets about my not showering. Already was feeling frumpy, but this has just taken it too far. Day dreaming about the delicious shower that I would have taken this morning if it wasn’t for the fact that I woke up 10 minutes before I needed to be out the door and made poor Katie speed me to the bus stop, (thank you Katie).
Tomorrow I am gonna wake up early at a reasonable time and write, write, write away. By write I mean edit the words I’ve accumulated the past few weeks that I have not touched. Haven’t looked at any of my words in days. Don’t want to see what she had to say. She is no longer me. I probably would’ve picked different words than Diana from two weeks ago initially chose. But I don’t want to think about that right now. I don’t want to think about anything at all. All I want to do is stare out the window and try to spot more horses & cows & deer & continue to free bleed into my pants, oh my god I forgot that I am on my period and free bleeding into my pants. Need to acquire a tampon.
I think I’ve just met the older version of myself on the train. A frail older woman with wispy white hair, she had on a Garfield sweater & a long denim skirt. Both of her eyes were lazy ones so I zoned in on making eye contact with her unibrow, to be polite.
She’s doing the same thing I’m doing, traveling/ train-hopping with the thirty day pass. She told me that I need to do the Eurostar next, and I think that I need to do the Eurostar next. Well I need to go back home to New York for like 2 seconds and maybe go back home to Florida for like 2 seconds, but then what?
She stood in the aisle and we spoke about our travels. Which trains we’ve taken, our favorite routes & destinations & people we’ve met & sights we’ve seen. I gestured to the empty seat across from me in my booth, asking if she’d like to sit and chat. “Oh no, I would love to dear, but my husband is waiting on his Cola & he’s gonna start wondering what took me so long.” She starts waving around the Pepsi bottle in her hands, condensation all over the plastic. She solidified herself as my favorite person ever because she goes, “I hope you know that you’re young, you’re beautiful, you’ve got everything going for you. Enjoy it dear.” Is this my angel? Feel like she might be my angel because stepping onto this train I wanted to explode from vanity/ feelings of disgust towards my brittle appearance, and now I kinda feel like the most beautiful girl in the world. Also, she gave me a pad. Perfect angel. She sighs out before turning, “My poor husband! I’ve been chatting up a storm with you, and he’s waiting for me to bring him back his damn cola!”
Before she left, I asked her her name.
“Diane.” She said.
My jaw went slack.
“I’m Diana.” I replied.
She just smiled at me and I gave her a wide eyed grin, looking her in the eyes for the first time. Her gaze didn’t meet mine, but the connection felt biblical.
Next morning
Out the window I am seeing the occasional shed & structure & overall air of nothingness. Nothing out there but miles & miles of land and fields.
Sitting alone in a booth in the dining car, sipping on a bottle of orange juice and a cup of drip coffee. The train stopped for a layover in Montana where I stood on the platform and chain-smoked cigarettes and scanned the area for Diane but couldn’t see her anywhere. I wish we had exchanged information. I want to keep indulging in the act of speaking with a kind old lady who doused me with compliments & wisdom left & right.
Montana is miles and miles of nothing. It’s so gorgeous. The occasional cow. The occasional horse. The occasional little plot of 5-6 houses nestled together all surrounded by nothing, nothing, nothing. I don’t mean this in a degrading way. I think it is very beautiful. Reminds me of that one book, I Who Have Never Known Men. I didn’t like that book very much, but what I am seeing out the window is what I pictured that books environment to look like. Miles and miles of nothing, slight dips and curves in the earth, and mountains in the far distance, but overall the land is simply meeting the sky. No greenery, no nothing. Just yellow and brown and a pale blue sky.
I really haven’t done any self reflecting this whole trip. It’s 8:41 pm and I am 21 days into my journey. Thought I’d have time for all this thinking, but I’m thinking all my same thoughts. Nothing has changed other than my environment. What’s that one quote? Wherever you go, there you are. #Truth. I’m typing this out because I’m feening for my evil iPhone right now but we’re traveling through Glacier National Park and the view is splendid but I have no signal and I miss my evil iPhone. Yes these mountain ranges are beautiful but so is Instagram Reels.
Woke up to my phone ringing out with a call from Ex-Roommate, Henry. Let the call ring out to voicemail, popped in my contacts and rubbed the sleep out of my eyes. Had a night of listless half sleeping, half adjusting myself in the chair trying to will myself into a slumber. Kept checking my phone every hour, 3 am, 4 am, the sun began rising & I hadn’t managed to do it, to sleep. The person a row in front of me snored so loud, loud enough to bypass the muffle of my ears being clogged from the elevation.
Sleeping on the train was novel & exciting the first few rounds but now I’m just dying for the next couch or air mattress I’ll find. Hate when the novelty of Everything always wears off, and then comfort sets in, and maybe honeymoon stages really are a thing. Feeling the novelty of Everything wearing off right now. Just need to keep going and experiencing more new. If I just keep going, going, going, maybe I won’t have time to notice the novelty fade.
Peeked out the window and saw that we were still traveling past miles & miles of nothing. Called Henry back and spent the next hour or so catching up on life events & gossiping about high school. Of who is married or pregnant or atheist or in jail or dead or a born-again Christian or a combination of it all.
Oregon
11:42 Sitting on a bench outside Portland’s Union Station. It’s overcast and breezy and the wind is whipping my hair across my face. Can already tell that I would love Portland, if it wasn’t for the fact that I will only be here for 24 hours. Sad. Wish I didn’t spend so much time in Connecticut a few weeks ago ‘cause now everything feels rushed and I’m scrambling from one place to the next. Why did I do that? I had so much fun lounging around in Connecticut but now I only get a day in Portland and I only got a day and some change in Wisconsin and I wanted another day in Portland and another day in Wisconsin. No point in ruminating on past decisions. The consequences of my actions, and all that.
Had a hankering for a cig so I smoked one & then another & then spotted ***, the girl who I am crashing with tonight, pulling into the station. Stubbed out the last little bits and the wind had me take a big whiff of myself and I realized that I smelled really not great. Combination of cigarette smoke & stale train air & like a girl who didn’t shower in Wisconsin ‘cause she accidentally overslept. Felt self conscious sitting in her car, sitting in my musk, as we introduced ourselves and made casual small talk.
I didn’t plan this leg of my trip accordingly so I will have to be back at this train station tomorrow afternoon at 2 pm. Feel bad about it. Have been very wishy-washy with *** & then last minute hit her up asking if I could still crash. Poor decision making on my part. Need to laundry & shower & charge my dead phone & FIND SOME GODDAMN TWEEZERS. Want to be beautiful before LA. Want to feel beautiful in LA. Want to be sun kissed and happy and free and for my friends to think that I am in a good place. I am in a good place, I just want to make sure that they see it too.
This morning before scurrying off the train, I gulped down half an adderall in addition to my usual litany of vitamins. Have been conserving my stash that Mila gifted me a few weeks ago. Didn’t sleep and wanted to be on high alert & on my best behavior with ***, since I’ve been annoying over the phone. I’ll be good in person! Well I took the adderall & then asked the cafe attendant for two cups of hot water to make my green tea & instant oatmeal packet breakfast combo. *** suggested that we get coffee’s and I said YES, body already buzzing with all this synthetic stimuli. A double shot of espresso gets ingested by me and an iced matcha gets ingested by *** and I am having the full body shakes at this point but I keep reminding myself that I need to be on my best behavior today.
Walked around downtown Portland feeling like I just did a line & then another, taking little sips out of my water bottle ever so often in an attempt to settle my stomach and stop the heart palpitations. Cherry blossoms were blooming and the petals sprinkled the streets so gorgeously. Kept reaching out my fingers to touch every plant I walked by, the thing you do as a kid where you just drag your hand along the bushes, letting the twigs & leaves scratch at your skin. Stopped into Powell’s, a maze of a bookstore, where I picked up a copy of a Willie Nelson book, Roll Me Up and Smoke Me When I Die. Gaudy cover and I’m too vain to read this in public, so I put that down and picked up Big Sur by Jack Kerouac instead. Tapped my card to purchase and felt satisfied with my decision. Have been itching to read the Willie Nelson one just out of personal curiosity and felt delighted when I stumbled across it, the singular lone copy tucked away on a bottom shelf. Felt like fate, but then I picture myself reading it in public and fate wilted down to shame so I opted for some good old Kerouac instead. *** took me back to her home in the suburbs where I showered and did laundry and sat in front of the TV and cuddled with her puppy and had a nice night of rest from my usual antics.
Next morning
Standing outside of the train station with ***, thanking her profusely for being so accommodating & sweet & welcoming me into her home for such a ridiculously short amount of time. We hugged goodbye & I am now sitting on a bench outside of the station. My train to California departs in exactly 46 minutes and there is a CVS a 12 minute walk away. Should I risk it to hunt for some tweezers? Yes, I need want tweezers so bad. Speed walked over to CVS and made it there in 8, despite the backpack weighing me down greatly. Purchased new tweezers & a lipliner (being vain). Surely do not need lipliner or tweezers while “backpacking”, and yet, here I am standing in this liminal space of a CVS tapping my card to purchase tweezers & lipliner. 21st century backpacking. Girl backpacking. Something like that. Ran back over to the train hall & onboard the train that will transport me to the city of angels.
Part three soon. Bye bye!
Everytime I read one of these blogs I can't stop thinking to myself: please write a book, please write a book!!!! Or turn this into a book or do whatever you want and i'll probably read anyway. Also smiling from ear to ear at Diane and Diana, how beautiful
Finally got around to reading this and remembered how you’re such a magical writer!! Love you Diana would adore to see short fiction from you