Comfort ("Hi! My name is Aimee and I can connect my xbox to my laptop! but apparently it signs out of aim and doesn't sign back in..)

Comfort. Peace. Weightlessness. That's exactly what I felt when I turned on my ipod. I was sitting in the back of my dad's pickup rolling through the planes of West Texas. The piano flowed like the gentle hills out the window. The sun was only about a hands breadth from the horizon, and I knew it was going to be a long day. The tambourine in the background accentuated the bumps in the road as our dusty truck made its way past cattle, windmills, and sometimes even antelope. I had my feet up on the dashboard and my green and grey socks made a reflection in the windshield. I started humming the nonsense words that were penetrating my head and reached down under my seat for the paper. Dad always brought the newspaper with him, and he had some pencils in the glove box too. I pulled out the comics and puzzles and stashed the rest back under the seat. Sitting up, I took out a pencil and started to work on the crossword. I had gotten about a fourth of the way done when I felt a tap on my shoulder. I pulled out an earphone.
"We're going to stop for gas at the next town."
"Okay," I replied and started to pull on my shoes. We exited, and pulled up to a little Texaco station right off the highway. I switched songs and put on some experimental rock. As Dad was filling the tank I had hopped into the back of the truck in search of my book sack. I pulled my camera out of the front pouch and looked around. There wasn't much to look at, just a few buildings and not much plant life. Nodding my head in rhythm to the music I hopped back out and examined the gas station more closely. I snapped a few pictures of the top of the building and the blue sky. Of course I had to get one of me brandishing my peace sign. I put my camera in my pocket, and air guitar-ed my way over to Dad.
He was just placing the hose back in its holder. "Okay," he said "ready?" I nodded in reply and we were off again.
"I'm always hopin' for a good time, never happens on a Tuesday night," sang the voice from my ipod. I smiled. It just so happened to be a Tuesday. ***Woah.. today is tuesday.....freaky***

We drove until we finally hit New Mexico. Dad pulled over and he took a picture of me standing under the "Welcome" sign. ***Note: writing this is making me miss New Mexico, its a really beautiful state. Looking at the map on Google is almost too much.. I see where we drove through last time. :.[ (All this heartsickness could be attributed to the song I'm currently listening too.. hmm..)*** It was about supper time and my stomach growled as we flew past plateau after plateau. Dad promised that we would stop at the next town that looked like it could hold a diner. That put me on the lookout. Finally we found a town, Logan, right on the edge of a state park. Thankfully they had a Dairy Queen. I got my hamburger and ice cream and sat down at a table on the side of the restaurant. Dad followed and sat on the other side of the table. As I was gleefully munching on my food he asked, "Good?"
"Yeah!" I replied.
"Good." He dipped a french fry in his ketchup and used it to spread some of the red tomato blood on his hamburger. "We should reach the cabin late tonight. Depending on the roads we might have to stay the night in town. You're uncle was telling me that when he went they were pretty bad."
"Did they have a lot of snow?" I asked.
"Yeah, and it's snowed since then. They might not have gotten the snow plow up the road to the cabin."
"Hmm.. shovels?" I offered.
He laughed. "Hopefully not." We finished our burgers and got back on the road.

As we made our way through the plains of the Land of Enchantment, I stared up at the sky. At the clouds more precisely. They were in rows that always reminded me of my grandfather's nursery.

"Every time the clouds look like this I can imagine Papa up in heaven riding his tractor, tending to his plants." Dad smiled and looked up too. Papa, my dad's dad, died when I was five. Some of my earliest memories are of him. I would crawl through his legs when he was sitting down in his great big chair and he would catch me, and I would laugh and laugh. ***I wish I could have gotten to know him***

"Yeah, they do look like rows of plants." Dad said.

We rode on in silence for a few more minutes and I continued to stare out the side window.

"Dad?"

"Hmm?"

"Do you ever feel far away from God?" I asked softly. Dad was quiet for a minute before he replied.

"Sometimes, sweety. But I think that that is just a normal part of life. It's kind of like a mountain." He pointed straight ahead where the blue mountains had appeared in the far distance. He continued slowly. "We go up and up and up, getting and feeling closer and closer to God. Then we hit the summit. For that brief moment a 'mountain-top moment' we feel the closest to God. But you know, once you hit that top you have to come down again."

I looked at him, "Yeah, its the coming down part that's so hard."

He smiled, a sweet smile. "I know boo." I smiled back. I could feel tears welling up, begging for release, but I held them back. I don't cry in front of a lot of people. Soon they were gone, replaced with anticipation of the week we would have together. As the mountains got steadily closer, my outlook brightened.

I sighed and leaned my chair back. Reaching in the back seat for my pillow I managed to pull it out from under the loads of foodstuffs in a brown paper bag. I settled down for a nice nap.

An hour or two later I woke up to Dad rolling down the windows of the truck. A mountain breeze flew in and danced around the cab.
"We're near Cimmaron." Dad said. I believed him, we were practically on the mountain now. A shiver ran down my back and I was glad I wore jeans.
Up and up we went. I looked back out the window and saw the tan and red landscape below for the last time before rock and evergreens barred it from view. Ah, the mountains.. I could never get tired of them. The sun rises late, and sets early, casting the valleys into premature shadow. The temperature is warm in the summer, cool in autumn and spring, and freezing in winter. There are actually four seasons, and you can see the trees change from green to auburn in the fall. In the winter the snow covers everything, and the evergreens get a white outline to their dark green leaves. You can go sledding in the street and snowboarding on the front lawn.
Dad pulled over in our usual spot. There was a little alcove on the side of the road complete with trees and a water spout. I leaped out of the truck, happy to stand, and stood stretching for a minute. There was snow on the ground, a good two inches of it too. I smiled and dug out my gloves from my book sack and pulled them on. I walked over to the edge of the asphalt and descended carefully onto the cold ground. The bubbling of water was audible as I made my way to a certain tree. The tree was an evergreen and the ground around it was worn. There was a small iron cross nailed to the base of the tree.
Perhaps it was placed in memory of someone or something. Maybe the person believed that God inhabited this specific tree. Plausible, I thought, God is everywhere after all. I took off the glove on my right hand and gently touched the cold metal. It didn't feel like a God-inhabited cross, it felt just normal. I crouched there gazing at the cross for a few moments before, smiling, I headed back up to Dad.
"You ready?" he asked.
"Definitely." I answered. I knew it was going to be an amazing vacation.