![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Dec. 10th, 2003
(no subject)
Dec. 10th, 2003 10:57 pmI'm at a hotel right smack in the middle of Long Island, New York.
The bartender's name, at this hotel, happens to be Tiffany. Her light brown hair runs down to her belt, her eyes are a dark hazel, and she has a divot in her chin worthy of Kirk Douglas. Her smile is a bit crooked, she pulls back her lower jaw and it thrusts to the right side a little as she grins, which is the norm, in my experience, for this part of the country. Her nose is perhaps a tiny bit too big for her face. I guessed her age to be 22, until we spoke of history, WWII, and Steven Ambrose. She teaches US history at the local High School and worked her way through college, so I upped my estimate by half a decade.
In the last day I have seen the sun set into the Gulf of Mexico, seen the full moon rise over the Florida mainland, along with Mercury, Venus and Mars beading the heavens. I have seen tides rise and fall carrying bright, ripe citrus that had fallen naturally from fruit-bearing trees lining the shore. I've seen palm trees swaying in the breeze, and a five-mile bridge over blue-gray waters. I have seen the Earth from seven miles high, precisely at sunset.
I wanted to tell her that she's the most beautiful sight I have laid eyes on in all that time, but I didn't. Hotel bartenders, especially the attractive ones, are too used to transient, jet-shocked travelers too free with the complements. To me, it was enough that she entered my life for an hour or two, perhaps never to cross in again. A moment of beauty not unlike a flashing meteor.
If I were the talented![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
mrbad, I would have surreptitiously snapped a picture and posted it here...but in my own way, I have attempted to photograph her in prose.
The bartender's name, at this hotel, happens to be Tiffany. Her light brown hair runs down to her belt, her eyes are a dark hazel, and she has a divot in her chin worthy of Kirk Douglas. Her smile is a bit crooked, she pulls back her lower jaw and it thrusts to the right side a little as she grins, which is the norm, in my experience, for this part of the country. Her nose is perhaps a tiny bit too big for her face. I guessed her age to be 22, until we spoke of history, WWII, and Steven Ambrose. She teaches US history at the local High School and worked her way through college, so I upped my estimate by half a decade.
In the last day I have seen the sun set into the Gulf of Mexico, seen the full moon rise over the Florida mainland, along with Mercury, Venus and Mars beading the heavens. I have seen tides rise and fall carrying bright, ripe citrus that had fallen naturally from fruit-bearing trees lining the shore. I've seen palm trees swaying in the breeze, and a five-mile bridge over blue-gray waters. I have seen the Earth from seven miles high, precisely at sunset.
I wanted to tell her that she's the most beautiful sight I have laid eyes on in all that time, but I didn't. Hotel bartenders, especially the attractive ones, are too used to transient, jet-shocked travelers too free with the complements. To me, it was enough that she entered my life for an hour or two, perhaps never to cross in again. A moment of beauty not unlike a flashing meteor.
If I were the talented
mrbad, I would have surreptitiously snapped a picture and posted it here...but in my own way, I have attempted to photograph her in prose.