Garden of the Gods Musing

I spent some time meandering among the gods this weekend.

No, really. I did. I went walking in their garden.

I'd always heard about the Garden of the Gods, but I'd never been ... if I'd only known what I was missing out on.

My roommate, Debbie, from the Liberty days, was in Colorado Springs with her husband on vacation, and I had the privilege of spending part of yesterday and today with them.

Have you ever read "Till We Have Faces" by C.S. Lewis? If you haven't ... well. I recommend it. I also recommend that you be at a fairly happy time in your life when you read it, because it doesn't necessarily have a happy ending, nor does it give you many opportunities to feel generally happy about the story or its main character.

The book is a re-telling of the Greek myth of Cupid and Psyche (which is too long to be even briefly retold here).

In the book, though, after Psyche (Istra) has been offered as a sacrifice to the god of the Grey Mountain, her sister, Orual, takes Bardia the soldier with her to gather what may be left of Psyche's remains. Instead, she finds Psyche herself, alive and healthy, living in a beautiful, verdant valley ... and, later on, in the mist, Orual faintly sees the outline of Psyche's dream castle, where she lives with her god lover.

As we rounded a corner of the loop around the main part of the Garden, I looked down ... and if I had ever been asked to describe what Psyche's valley looked like, the Garden of the Gods is what I would have described. I had to look hard to make sure there was no castle hiding on the edges of my vision ... and I guess that if I sat there in the heat long enough, I could imagine anything I wanted.

But seriously -- this place was amazing. We got out and hiked several parts of it, posing as though we alone were holding up ginormous chunks of red rock that seemed magically perched, ready to tumble at the slightest breath of wind ... It was an amazing experience. And a free one. The good things in life don't get much better than that.

******

I have found a new word that I love. Just love.

Squicked.

I discovered this word while reading the "Best of Craigslist" on, of course, craigslist.com. They're hilarious. I almost peed my pants laughing last night reading some of them. Like the guy who peed on his ex-girlfriend's floor when they broke up. Or the guy who doesn't miss his ex-girlfriend, but he misses her cat. This post, however, was an open letter to men, a bitter diatribe, if you will, from one of my disillusioned sisters. The entire entry can be found here. I guess I need the "fair warning" clause here, stating that this girl swears -- quite a bit -- in her post. It's not something that would amuse my mother, I think. But we're all adults.

But back to being squicked. Rather, squicked out.

In its context, here is my new favorite word:

"... (and) while I'm at it...old guys. Stop it. Just stop. I don't know what makes you think that leering at me, sending me dirty pictures, or telling me I'm hot is going to do, but it's certainly NOT going to make me want to date you, do you, or little else besides sitting there all night being squicked out because some creepy, hairy, old man who looks like my Dad just told me I had nice boobs."

I can imagine the sound of being squicked out. It's that not-quite-squeak that someone makes when they, say, see something really, really gross or when they swallow too big of a gulp of water that also goes down with a bubble of air ... I also imagine it's the sound a mouse would make if you squeezed it. It wouldn't sqeak; it would squick. And I'd be squicked out at the sight of said mouse. It's the sound I would make if some hairy (or, in some cases, completely hairless) old fart told me I had a nice chest. I'd get squicked out. Then I'd get pissed off. Then I'd probably get arrested, because I'd probably hit the old geezer after that, and I'd be charged with assaulting an elderly man ...

*******

And now it's after midnight, which, I think, means I'm going home. I'm tired. I'm sunburned. I need a shower. And a bed. I slept on the floor last night (not quite as bad as the are-you-sure-this-isn't-the-driveway yard at Adrienne and Josh's in Sheridan, but it's still a floor ...). I need a massage, something to work the cement out of my neck and shoulders. Ack.

cheerio, all.