Peachy

This belated entry is brought to you by my Comcastic internet service.

For Labor Day weekend I went to Colorado for Niffer-bur's wedding reception. It was the first time in four years that I'd found a good excuse to visit Colorado in the summer, and it wasn't just summer: It was peach season. Colorado's peaches seem to be a well-kept secret, but believe you me, they are delicious. It could just be because I experience them closer to the tree there, but I generally don't even bother buying peaches anywhere else, to spare myself the disappointment.

Delicious peaches don't grow just anywhere in Colorado, but fortunately they do grow close to my grandparents' place on the Western Slope (i.e. the third of the state that's west of the mountains). Of course, peaches weren't the only or even the best reason to visit my grandparents for a couple of days, but they were a significant side benefit.

By the way, Mr. and Mrs. Niffer-bur's reception was lovely, even though no peaches were involved. In addition to the groom's family and a few people I'd met in college but since forgotten, I was introduced to a style of swing dancing Mr. Niffer-bur and his friends invented as undergraduates. Good times.

Boulder

On my long Western journey I went to Boulder for an afternoon. Pueblo and Boulder should really be more than a two-and-a-half hour drive apart; they're about the same size and located in the same state, but going from the depressed desert industrial town to the mountainous hippie enclave gave me culture shock.

For example, you wouldn't find a "women's bookstore" in Pueblo, much less an oxygen bar. The reason I took a picture of this sign, though, is that it introduced me to the word "smartinis." Whatever a smartini is, I want one.

Friday

I flew into Denver on Friday afternoon, and Niffer-bur picked me up from the airport and drove me to Deme's parents' house, where we'd be staying for fifth year reunion weekend. Deme and SGB were already there. We chatted for awhile and then went to our class reception.

As expected, I didn't recognize many people there. Appart from a handful of close friends, I somehow didn't get to know many people in college. We did run into a friend who'd lived on our floor freshman year, a Peruvian who's now a lawyer in Miami and going by a different first name. I knew I'd been gone for a long time when he asked me where I'm from originally and I said automatically, "I'm from Colorado," realizing a moment later that I was in Colorado Springs, talking to someone who'd lived there for three years, and could really be more specific.

Other signs I'd been gone awhile: I got out of breath from walking up a single flight of stairs, and though I didn't get drunk off the two glasses of wine I had at the class reception, I did wake up with a headache the next morning.

The other person I recognized at reunion was one of my housemates from junior year, now an artist and hairdresser in LA. Once a self-identified lesbian, she's still with the same boyfriend she was when we lived together. No, I did not ask whether she's still a lesbian.