{Writing this more as an experiential story, instead of first person, just for kicks n’giggles}

The young man hadn’t left his house much, all day.

A meeting in the afternoon re the benefit some friends were throwing to help him keep his house, and staff and interns laptopping all over his house had kept him—and his dog, Redford—marooned all day. So he—and especially his dog—were grateful when he closed his laptop at 7 pm and they could bike/run downtown.

Fresh air. Sky above. A moment of exercise. The party was at the hyper-cool, hyper-green showroom for Tesla Motors, a 100,000 dollar electric sports car company that had chosen his hometown as one of its first beachheads.

Waylon tethered Redford to a fence, locked his bike, jumped the fence and greeted a random assemblage of beautifully-dressed friends he hadn’t seen for a long time. He ordered veggie yummy Mexican food from the big pink food truck—the first of its kind he’d seen in Boulder. Makes me feel like we’re hip, urban here in Boulder, he said through the window. The Flatirons loomed orange and gold against the sunset.

He walked into the showroom, and there were dozens of children, all dressed up. Later he’d learn they were all students in the ballet school. He saw more friends, drank an Izze (healthy natural soda, founded in his hometown) and caught up with a friend who was cradling her newborn baby, a delicate little pink hand extending out from the cradle.

His voice was still half-shot, so it was painful to talk over the din. He greeted former cyclist Tyler Hamilton, and saw a few more friends. There was a conversation about sailing and about what people’s names rhymed with (Dana as in Banana; Greg the egg; Sailin’ Waylon, Maya Papaya…). There was a conversation about how Waylon couldn’t remember any names, ever, and whether or not that would be an obstacle to his political ambitions (he mentioned one of the first scenes in The Candidate, where a Senator has names whispered into his ear as he walks through a crowd; and they went on to talk about Clinton and Obama and BP and Chicago).

But before you knew it the main feature, a modern ballet demonstration, had started and ended. Halfway through, he’d had to go out to check on Redford (yelping, wanting to run around and eat yummy Mexican food). And speeches were made, and the silent auction was wrapping up.

Waylon, bid on something, a friend said. He grimaced, smiled, shrugged his shoulders. Apparently she hadn’t been reading his web site, lately. But he’d write a review on the benefit, later, and before he left the founders of the wonderful ballet company said hello and Way reminded them he was always happy to cover, to donate an ad for performances.

They were so sweet, so talented…a drop of culture and refinement in a liberal cowtown.

And he greeted Bobby, was half ignored. He unlocked his bike, and he and his dog biked off into the sunset. They rolled up West Pearl until his pooch was tired and it was nearly dark.

And then they went home and, his router out of commission, he sat on his porch. Redford, tired and wet (from jumping in raging river) and now-well-fed, lay curled at his feet. And the not-so-very-young man blogged up the evening he’d just lived as the dark deepened and bugs gathered, magnetized as so many of us are, to the light of the laptop.