The fourth of July, continued
Jul. 5th, 2003 11:32 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ravenYesterday was... well, I may as well write about it.
Indianapolis has a canal. When I heard "canal" I got mental images of the Manchester Ship Canal, but nothing could be further from the truth. The canal is not made for shipping, as it's all of ten metres wide and five metres deep. It's a tourist attraction, with long sidewalks beside it where people ride their bikes and rollerblade and jog, lots of greenery and flowers, small bridges, pedalboats which you can hire - all very pretty. Yesterday, it was all decked out ready, with flags and tri-coloured banners, and a band playing, and lots of people getting ready for the fireworks. I went with the family and some of their friends at about six in the evening.
I was very pissed off yesterday, not for any reason apart from loss-of-liberty, for as![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
purplerainbow said, there was some cosmic irony in the fact that on America's independence day, I should feel quite so unfree. Talking to Hannah cheered me up in the morning, but by evening, I was pissed off again. However, the atmosphere around the canal was too infectious for even me, and I started enjoying myself, jogging along to keep up with Nupur on her rollerblades, looking at the people and the stalls and displays and everything.
It was then we got the thunderstorm warning.
I ended up watching from beneath a bridge where everyone was sheltering. I have never seen rain like that. The lightning was ripping the sky into two and the canal looked like a tsunami had hit it, and there were kids screaming at the thunder and people putting down umbrellas with metal points for fear of doing Benjamin Franklin imitations. I've never seen anything like it. According to everyone else, this was the first time it had happened on the fourth of July in memory, and they were all moaning at it, but I loved it. Someone had evidently got off the water in a hurry and beached their boat, so I sat in that, watched the storm and was aware that I'd never been in quite so surreal a situation in my life.
When the rain let off, we made our way back, as the fireworks were off. We went back to the house of a family friend, and on the way there, I made a friend. One of Nupur's acquaintances, he's younger than her, half Hindu, half Jewish, so while very Indian in appearance, he rejoices in the first name of Joshua. Nupur has other friends, among them a sixteen year old girl named Chanda whose house we were at, but I hated that girl. In this world of apple pie, I'm supposed to say she was someone for whom I did not care very much, but I'll opt for the more expressive and in my opinion accurate, "bitch."
So it was strange, but I made friends with Joshua. I'd met him before and liked him, but this time, I noticed it more. I'm not saying I liked him like that, but I did wish he was a little older(!) when I was talking to him. We started talking about lots of things, and he was delighted to hear I'd finished Harry Potter, and after a while he asked me which one I liked the best, I told him Prisoner of Azkaban, we got on to talking about werewolves and suchlike, and I started to enjoy myself again. When we got wherever we were going, Nupur lost an earring (twice) so we hunted for it, and even though it was distinctly not his problem, he helped, getting car keys and whatever from the right people so we could search. We didn't find it, but I was very impressed with his willingness to help. After that we tried channel-surfing to see what was on - all there was was this film about... werewolves. We both
started giggling and couldn't stop. Always nice to have a friend to giggle with.
We had fireworks of our own to finish up. They weren't very good, and besides, Chanda-whatshername was lighting them and trying to ignore me, but while we were out there, I saw the last of the storm mingling with the fireworks. Every so often, the low lying clouds would light up, and for a split second, you could see the outline in stark white light as more lightning flashed and thunder crashed. Again, I'd never seen anything like it.
We got home about midnight, and Nupur was exhausted enough to start doing weird things. She talks in her sleep, I know that - a couple of nights ago she scared me half to death by talking about popcorn in the middle of the night - but last night she went one further and started playing the violin in her sleep. I laughed until I fell asleep myself.
On the way home, we saw a rainbow.
Indianapolis has a canal. When I heard "canal" I got mental images of the Manchester Ship Canal, but nothing could be further from the truth. The canal is not made for shipping, as it's all of ten metres wide and five metres deep. It's a tourist attraction, with long sidewalks beside it where people ride their bikes and rollerblade and jog, lots of greenery and flowers, small bridges, pedalboats which you can hire - all very pretty. Yesterday, it was all decked out ready, with flags and tri-coloured banners, and a band playing, and lots of people getting ready for the fireworks. I went with the family and some of their friends at about six in the evening.
I was very pissed off yesterday, not for any reason apart from loss-of-liberty, for as
purplerainbow said, there was some cosmic irony in the fact that on America's independence day, I should feel quite so unfree. Talking to Hannah cheered me up in the morning, but by evening, I was pissed off again. However, the atmosphere around the canal was too infectious for even me, and I started enjoying myself, jogging along to keep up with Nupur on her rollerblades, looking at the people and the stalls and displays and everything.It was then we got the thunderstorm warning.
I ended up watching from beneath a bridge where everyone was sheltering. I have never seen rain like that. The lightning was ripping the sky into two and the canal looked like a tsunami had hit it, and there were kids screaming at the thunder and people putting down umbrellas with metal points for fear of doing Benjamin Franklin imitations. I've never seen anything like it. According to everyone else, this was the first time it had happened on the fourth of July in memory, and they were all moaning at it, but I loved it. Someone had evidently got off the water in a hurry and beached their boat, so I sat in that, watched the storm and was aware that I'd never been in quite so surreal a situation in my life.
When the rain let off, we made our way back, as the fireworks were off. We went back to the house of a family friend, and on the way there, I made a friend. One of Nupur's acquaintances, he's younger than her, half Hindu, half Jewish, so while very Indian in appearance, he rejoices in the first name of Joshua. Nupur has other friends, among them a sixteen year old girl named Chanda whose house we were at, but I hated that girl. In this world of apple pie, I'm supposed to say she was someone for whom I did not care very much, but I'll opt for the more expressive and in my opinion accurate, "bitch."
So it was strange, but I made friends with Joshua. I'd met him before and liked him, but this time, I noticed it more. I'm not saying I liked him like that, but I did wish he was a little older(!) when I was talking to him. We started talking about lots of things, and he was delighted to hear I'd finished Harry Potter, and after a while he asked me which one I liked the best, I told him Prisoner of Azkaban, we got on to talking about werewolves and suchlike, and I started to enjoy myself again. When we got wherever we were going, Nupur lost an earring (twice) so we hunted for it, and even though it was distinctly not his problem, he helped, getting car keys and whatever from the right people so we could search. We didn't find it, but I was very impressed with his willingness to help. After that we tried channel-surfing to see what was on - all there was was this film about... werewolves. We both
started giggling and couldn't stop. Always nice to have a friend to giggle with.
We had fireworks of our own to finish up. They weren't very good, and besides, Chanda-whatshername was lighting them and trying to ignore me, but while we were out there, I saw the last of the storm mingling with the fireworks. Every so often, the low lying clouds would light up, and for a split second, you could see the outline in stark white light as more lightning flashed and thunder crashed. Again, I'd never seen anything like it.
We got home about midnight, and Nupur was exhausted enough to start doing weird things. She talks in her sleep, I know that - a couple of nights ago she scared me half to death by talking about popcorn in the middle of the night - but last night she went one further and started playing the violin in her sleep. I laughed until I fell asleep myself.
On the way home, we saw a rainbow.
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no subject
on 2003-07-05 09:58 am (UTC)You've picked a wonderful time to visit America; we're suffering from a slight bout of Tropical Storm Bill.
After that we tried channel-surfing to see what was on - all there was was this film about... werewolves
I'm surprised you didn't find the 'all-day' MASH marathon. Then again, The Bitch's family might not get the station it was on.
Re:
on 2003-07-05 05:29 pm (UTC)Boo.
And I always pick brilliant times to visit America. I've been hurricaned and blizzard-ed before now, too!