Today my very able girlfriend became a lost passenger. It's easy to do, I've done it myself...end up in a city completely different. A panic sets in mid-journey and you realize the things you usally see going by have been replaced. For my journey I saw traincrossings and new little towns going by at 60 mph. For Eva...she noticed a tennis courts and a remarkably empty train. So empty that she had to look for someone to question about the train--this was obviously not a train headed for commuterville Brussels.

Once she told her story, she received a ticket that said, "Lost Passenger." And then, for about a quarter of an hour she was a "lost passenger" stranded in Lier.

Lier is like a small powered magnate that is pulling us near. It's a town with canals, an old walled woman-city, and a clock that has something to do with the heavens. It's not that we really want to live in a small town with a huge cathedral and square...it just seems that everywhere we look...something is pointing to Lier.

While Eva was lost, I was busying myself with dreams. I don't know what I'm not eating or what I am eating that is setting off my wild immagination. Of course I dream multiple back to back dreams and of course I remember only fragments of a couple of them...today I remember almost nothing--an old friend showing up to see me and the usually skinny friend was chunky and in one portion I was hot and I looked down to realize that I was wearing 3 short-sleeved t-shirts, all with different sleeve lengths.

What bit of my brain wanted to deal with sleeve lengths? I don't even remember looking at my sleeves today. I was told I needed to start eating a banana before turning in for the night...I do take a women's muliti-vitamin before I crawl into bed. Could that be the problem? :)

The day was nothing short of regular and rainy. There was even lighting and thunder...something not so common here I guess. So uncommon, that Eva came home and could tell me the time that it happened...something like "Hey, did you hear the thunder and see the lightning around 1 o'clock?" Can you imagine dealing with such precision in the great midwest?

"Hey Bob, did you hear that thunder at quarter till, 5 of, 6 exactly, 2 after, 6 after, 11 over, quarter past..."
"Sure did Frank. Did you see that lighting after dark at 9:45, 9:47, 9:52, and the big one at 30 seconds till..."
"Why yes, Bob. It was a beauty. Lit the sky on fire."

Obviously I'm "taking the piss." Which is a new line I have picked up from Eva and her English-English. It was just one of those things to remind me that I'm not at the corner of route 1 (now Woodstock Road) and Route 2 (which has changed to Cumberland Road) Elkland, Missouri anymore. Not that I've been there for awhile. Not in visiting, I did that at Christmas, but lived there? I haven't lived there in over years. But is it a home-type feeling I feel for it still? Definately. A house, a barn, two sheds, woodlands and fields...80 acres. (minus 5 for Eddie and Karen)

We'd hop in the truck to go see high-water over bridges and water backing up into fields. Apparently, after church once, we even saw a small wall of water come down a runnoff ditch. I can also remember running across the back field once, under gray sky, and my dad on his tractor frantically motioning me with palms down to "get down"--my hair sticking straight up because of the electricity in the air.

No way to end this entry except to say that I answered a questionaire online today for classmates.com and one of the questions was, "How do you feel about your life?" with choices like, "I'm going nowhere." "I'm famous, don't you know?" "I'm doing what I thought I'd do." "I think I've failed a bit." and "I'm on the right path." Speaking for the little 5 year old getting on a school bus in front of her 70s style ranch house in Springfield, Missouri as well as speaking for the 26 year old who is going to school in Brussels and living in Belgium... however unexpected this life is going, rain or shine, "I think I'm on the right path."