Intersecting

I've been reading a book that I bought a few months ago. I purchased it because Scott Russell Sanders was an author that did a reading when I was in college and I visited with him for awhile about writing and a sense of place at a reception afterwards held at my professor's house. He writes personal essays and was also a reading assignment when I was in college. As our final paper in that class, "the environment and american literature", we were to choose one of the authors we had read during the semester and write a creative piece in the style of the author we chose. I chose Sanders and wrote a personal essay (I recall being happy with the final product). I wrote about driving home during my last spring break of college.

Back in college I was reading Writing from the Center. Today I am reading Hunting for Hope (which isn't really a new book, just a recent purchase). There is a lovely intersection between what I wrote in college and what I am reading today. I wrote about stopping my car just before turning into the driveway at the farm. It was dark, maybe 11:00 or 12:00 at night and it was one of those nights when the number of stars seems to have quadrupled. I looked up to find the Comet Hyakutake. That was in the Spring of 1996. In the book I'm reading Sanders talks about seeing that same comet only where he was living there was a Spring snow storm. Kansas was in the grips of a severe drought and accompanying spring warmth. I wonder if you remember that comet.

P.S. I watched Children of Men this weekend. Very grim, but you should watch it. It reminds you of how precious life. Every life is as precious as the one in the movie, and if you don't believe that then atrocities are acceptable.