How Many Sunny Days Are Enough?

I've dropped off the edge of the world again, and this time I really mean it. Thankfully, China's here to break my fall. Yet, being on vacation means I don't have as much or accessable internet connectivity as I do back in my own apartment, so some things suffer. Of course, there's little chance my blog even noticed.

I have been in China traveling, though, and have been having a blast. Saw the Forbidden City and the Summer Palace and the Great Wall. Which is rather huge and hard to climb, when you're surrounded by people, all of whom are wanting to walk by the handrail so when they slip on the 45-degree slope they'll have something to catch their fall before they end up sliding all the way to the bottom and having to start over like a modern-day Sysiphus that only has to worry about getting himself to the top of the hill. We carry enough baggage around anymore that the boulder's just a drop in the bucket anyway.

Of course, when people get tired of climbing the wall, they end up sitting wherever they are. Which invariably means that although everyone wants to use the handrails to help climb..just in case, nobody can. People are littering the ground around the rails, leaving just a well-worn trail leading to the top. So I didn't feel so bad when I was unable to indirectly even use the railings to stop myself from having to run back to the bottom. For, you see, my lens cap was unable to grab the railings to stop itself. Too many people in the way.

I suppose it hated being stored in my pocket, and wanted to see the world too. I can't really blame it, I suppose. But it would have been nice if it had said something instead of simply running away the first chance it got. But it ran anyway. Jumped out of my hands and began to roll down the Great Wall. Past the masses of people relaxing while they recuperate enough to re-start their climb, past the people that just smiled and waved at it as it ran along on its merry way. Past the people that began laughing at me as I ran along after it.

I suppose it realized that it had little chance of running faster than I. It had gravity on its side. I had economics on mine--do you have any idea how hard (and expensive) it is to get a new lens cap when you're on the Great Wall in the middle of nowhere? Me either. I don't think it's even possible. There was no chance it was going to get away. I just had to have more endurance, as it was reaching a valley. But that's when it found a way out.

Most people try to take a souvineer with them when they leave from their vacation. Alas, I left one from mine. Somewhere on the Great Wall, halfway down a water drain, is sitting a lonely lens cap that surely is wishing it had stayed with my camera. For now it's alone and can do no more traveling; it has nothing else. While I may not have a lens cap, but at least I have a story. And about a mile's worth of uphill exercise.