a brown box

When my Mom was a little girl, her two older sisters (already away at college) sent a curious Christmas package. Inside a big brown box you could lift with a finger, was...a tumbleweed. To my Mom (and her four siblings who were still at home) in her Field-of-Dreams Is-This-Heaven-No-It's-Iowa, it was an unfamiliar natural curiosity, sent home.

Tonight, as I crossed the highway, a tumbleweed bounced up and over the windshield, blissfully buoyant, onto the car behind me. I watched it in the rear-view mirror and got on the freeway, heading home.

I left the party, decisively taking the scenic-route. It was raining (only just) and I knew I'd be able to catch the last glimpse of the stormy sunset as soon as I hit Wasatch Boulevard. I put an untitled CD in the player, anxious to see who and what would sing back. I'm driving my Mom's car while she's out of town for the next few weeks. It's amazing how dials and glowing gages, although offering the same information (i.e. MPH, empty/full, heat/AC) become unfamiliar behind the wheel of someone else's car. By the time I figured out how to get the heater to simultaneously drum out a heat-beat onto the windshield (defrost) and my feet in perfect amounts, I was lost. The thought of turning around simultaneously entered and exited my mind, just like the force of the heater. I looked up into the vast expanse that is the east bench of Sandy and thought: What the heck? You only live once, right? Then, the Native Utahn in me said, This is the right way. Drive On! I cranked up the CD player and sang along as I turned...east(?) towards home.

Panic set in a few minutes later, when the road became narrow and seemed to wind up the mountain into the mist. To make matters worse, More Than A Feeling suddenly sallied forth from the stereo, and (this is the worst part) I had the sudden urge to play the air guitar. This was not good. Just as I was about to lift my hands off the wheel and start my arena rock solo, something caught my eye. There it was, off in the distance, like a beacon to my Boston-ballad moment-of-weakness, lamp posts leading the way up the hill. In the rainy mist, and with Shawn Colvin's Fill Me Up as a serenade, I passed the lantern-lit road to La Caille, which shot me out onto Wasatch Boulevard. Alas, twilight long since summoned the sun, which had dipped its head under the Ocre Mountains, closing the day. The city lights were flickering. I found comfort in the familiar scene of the Valley at the dawn of dusk. I drove on.

I was headed towards 215 when the infamous tumbleweed toppled over Mom's car. I thought of light-as-a-feather brown boxes, sent between sisters from Utah to Iowa. I turned onto the freeway entrance and headed home, taking in the familiarity of scenes and sentiments, tumbleweeds and all.