10 June 2007
Paris is Burning
Novotel Hotel Room, Canberra, in wide angle lens
The first thing I heard after landing in the Capital was about Paris.
There is only one baggage carousel at Canberra, though there are flights out all the time. The Navy Chief was arriving, if the three-star-car out front with the Bo’sun Warrant Officer next it was any indication, and a senior Army official as well, if his car and driver were to be believed.
The occupants of my flight and perhaps more were waiting around the single baggage racetrack, and I was closer than I would have liked to the bluff fellow who was talking to his companion. It was the first real news I had heard since I shut off the cell phone when the door closed on the airplane at Dulles, some thirty hours before.
It was about Paris. She had almost made it three straight days in the slammer in LA before a mysterious medical malady got her sprung by the Sherriff, who undoubedtly has better things to occupy her time than Ms. Hilton. That must have happened during the time I had been airborne, and she was back in, since the Judge apparently took umbrage.
Apparently she was burning.
But why am I telling you this? You are in the middle of it, awash in the news. What astonishes me is that I was instantly dripping in it, even if the internet is the equivalent of a payphone here.
I managed to weave into the city, getting turned around on the roundabouts only twice. One of them, I was headed way out of town, and had to backtrack as best I could, entering down and circling until something made sense. I pulled up in relief to the Novotel Hotel, though it was going to be an ambiguous relationship.
I got to learn lot about the town, standing out front every couple hours, smoking. It was pretty drunk down the block, a knot of young people standing out in front of some establishment all evening, smoking and laughing.
It felt a little like looking down from the Balcony at Big Pink on the State Department rental house across the street with the sound of raucous youth washing over. Something gets out at twelve thirty, or is getting ready to start, since there were streams on kids heading across Northbourne Avenue to the northeast.
I have not been awake at this hour in Eastern Standard time in years, so it is a novelty to be awake.
It was chilly; they said winter and they almost meant it. California winter, the kind where you could wear shorts right though and pretend not to notice. The girls were in tiny dresses and skin, arms across their waists from the cold, the boys roughhousing. When my body urged me to go outside again all was quiet and the grey was coming up over the construction derricks across the street.
I have no idea if Paris made it. I should tune in Sky news and see if there is an update. I know how frustrating it must be to be confined, particularly if you cannot step outside for a smoke when you want one.
Copyright 2007 Vic Socotra
www.vicsocotra.com