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August 28, 2003

It's not supposed to happen this quickly. I'm not supposed to be falling in love yet. There should be grief and sleepless nights. Instead, I'm walking around still feeling his hands on my belly, my waist, my hips, still feeling the rough of his beard against the sensitive skin between my shoulder blades.

"I'm just watching the show," he said to me last night. "You're just a constant show."

It's nice to be watched, to be appreciated. In fact, it's more than nice. It's downright delicious. I feel like a starving person who's been set down in front of a feast.

Last night, we met up with some friends—my friends and his friends—and ventured to the top of the Museum of Science to check out Mars, which is the closest to the Earth this week that it's been in like 50,000 years or something.

It was a madhouse up there. Susan Curran and I looked at each other, and we both thought of a fourth movie for the Heavy Metal Parking Lot series. First, there, was Heavy Metal Parking Lot. Then, there was Neil Diamond Parking Lot. Then, there was Harry Potter Parking Lot—I'll never forget the scrawny little girl sucking on her lollipop and boasting that she'd read The Prisoner of Azakaban 11 times. And finally, Museum of Science Parking Lot!

There was a mob scene of people just waiting to get into the stairwell and the elevators to the top of the parking garage. I led the folks past all that craziness and up the ramp of the garage itself, past cars going by at a crawl, and past other folks coming and going in that space normally reserved for cars.

"Pay no attention to the No Pedestrians signs!" I said, and raising my arms high in invocation, invited them onwards. "Follow me, fearless Followers of Frances!" It was a good time. We got to the roof of the parking garage, and there were huge lines of people snaking around the entire thing.

The lines weren't actually moving, and it wasn't clear whether the observatory was actually going to be open. We considered standing in line, but really we were just there for the scene. He commented that it was like a Grateful Dead show: lots of people milling around and staring up at the sky. He said he kept expecting someone to come around with a plate of fruit.

It was a gorgeous night, despite the small amount of cloud cover. Just the right combination of cool breeze and heat left over from the day. We could see the lovely lights of the city surrounding us.

When Mars came out from behind the clouds—we never did get to see it through a telescope—people actually clapped, like it was Sting making an appearance. That bright reddish-white dot, brighter than any star or planet has a right to be.

Mars, we all came to see you. What havoc do you have in store for us?