and the rain keeps falling

I was worried before I left, terribly so. Saying goodbye to my family was the hardest part, really. I have to reassure them constantly that I`m going to be all right, and that means that there`s no one to reassure me. But isn`t that always the way?

Taking off is always a rush, a pull, gravity and reason both striving to deny another stub-winged silver bird its flight. It held on to my worries, but the plane slipped free, and brought me with it. And suddenly my fears were as far away as the rapidly diminishing ground.

I love flying, I really do. It`s like being in another world, suspended from the burdens and cares of the world. The space that separates you from them is invisable and yet almost insurmountable, a moat of air.

I went for a constitutional over Alaska, and spotted the muddy and still river of a glacier snaking around the mountains. The peaks were craggy and spotted with the pure vanilla of snow. Shouldering through a frozen sea of turbulent sea of clouds, Mt. McKinley loomed large over the others. A companion peak rose a little beyond, and more mountains served as escort. And I looked down and wondered, that I was seeing the home of the gods, about which their subjects had once only been able to dream.

<> <> <> <> <>

I went out with the other people in my prefecture tonight. Had my first ever experience singing karaoke, and had an awesome time. Their selection of English songs was actually quite good . . . I sang Help!, and Bring Me To Life (with a partner to sing the male part, w007!), and Bohemian Rhapsody, Breaking the Habit, and . . . um, they needed someone to sing the female part for Barbie Girl, so . . . um . . . I did it . . .

Under duress! I was the only one who could manage it!

I swear!

Then a bunch of people went back, and those who were left (the mad ones) went out again to a Japanese bar to drink sake and eat small dried fish.

Yummy. Just don`t look at their eyes.