lorange blog

robert, rd, call him what you will. 
you know how the world is full of all sorts of smalls, as in worlds to the moon and back? six degrees of something or other lead you to your own neighborhood and then all of a sudden a person you've struck up a bloggy sort of relationship with turns around and he's the same guy you talked to a few years ago back when you still went out and sat outside at bars, smoking. you have many mutual friends and then you realize, 
hey...six degrees is all sorts of small.
rd, as i like to call him, writes lorange blog. 
and we're the sort of friends who have never really hung out, not on purpose anyway.

but the night is young, eternally young.
continuing the 'what inspires you?' series is a goal i set for myself this year. keepin on with the keepin on. 
it makes me so so happy and honored to have rd be my very first inspiration post of 2010. 
fitting, fo sho.

I spent the last rainy Saturday at the LA Zoo with my soon to be 8 year old son.

He picked out a red shirt to match mine while I insisted on a scarf, wrapping it around his neck just like the way mine twisted. The scarves were not to create LA fashion statements as often the case here but for the real need of keeping our necks warm. Our hands rested in pockets while we talked to each other before picking up identical black umbrellas set by the door.

The place was empty with the rain staying somewhere between being brushed by cotton balls or brushed by wet cat fur around bare legs. If you haven't been there before, the LA Zoo is laid out between a wide valley of sorts in Griffith Park, exhibits climb up the hill to nearly the top where the chimps and giraffes are placed. You have to go to the top for the good stuff - It's true in life, it’s true at the zoo.

We had our choice of paths that day.



As we left the upper exhibits, making our way down to the exit the rain started dumping, no, really dumping down on us. Storm drain depressions became buried under small ponds. The uphill nature of the zoo created streams and rivers and runs if you come from a place that calls them runs over the walkways. Most were easily jumped over by my son but some were so wide that I my jumps landed me still a foot inside the flowing water.

My son yelled, "We're not going to make it out alive!!!" in the same tone he once yelled "We are driving straight into the face of danger!!!" one day seeing the smoke plume of a forest fire 30 miles away as we drove to the mall.

I instinctively played along. "I'll save you Jake! Let me throw you across the river!" as I swung him over the two foot wide stream. This was repeated over and over again.

We eventually made to the car in double the normal time and more soaked then we needed to be. If you just happen upon us at that moment I would have smiled and simply said, “We were inspired.”