And then he will board a large, comfortable 747, sit down in a large, comfortable seat, and take out from his carry-on bag pages of notes, written on small sheets of lined yellow paper. With these notes, he will peck away at a IBM ThinkPad, first slowly, then his fingers will glide along, as he thinks about the houses, the bridge, the tunnel, the small plastic dish that the stewardess is trying to put on his seat tray-table. He will type and type as the plane flies over the Atlantic , and wonder what all of it means. Why do we have all of this: transcontinental airlines, Chinese take-out menus, Melrose Place. What does it say about us?
He will sit back in the seat, resting his head on the small polyester blend pillow, and thinks about how content he is. The contentment that comes from playing Tetris, from watching Star Trek and the Simpsons, the contentment from eating a large pizza with the works. Again, he wonders what all of that says about him, and whether he is really happy. Then, he will remember standing in a redwood forest, looking up through the canopy of 500 year old trees, seeing the light trickling down through the giant green leaves, tinted emerald by chloroform, tilting his head so slightly as to catch a brief glimpse of azure sky. He will remember the thick, earthy smell of undergrowth, the soft squish of moss beneath his Timberland boots, the small rustling and chirping of forest life. He will close his eyes as he remembers, and smile.
(But you are reading this paper now, and he is still in the redwood forest. So it is entirely possible that instead, he will board a bus to Seattle and daydream about a dry savanna in central Africa. It's possible.)