Virginia City

Waking Time: 5.30am

In a slow blink I have gone from writing down mornings in seawashed pinky dawn to being a woman at a table inside a snowglobe. The whole town is abecoming a wedding cake as the snow continues to steadily fall, frays from an indifferent sky. The town is quiet and laid back, at the coffee place an American man speaks to me to comment on my boots.

'Are those things metal?'

'Yes they are.' I say something I can't remember about snow and he smiles.

After breakfast we take a short walk and and decide where to go. It is too cold to take a boat trip on the lake, so we decide to drive to Virginia City, a small town North east, one of the gold towns in the 1800's, with many of the original buildings intact. The drive is leisurely with views of the mountains and lake, down a hill and into a whole other world where the land is yellow, dry and bare. This really looks like America, which should be no surprise and yet it is. Dessert, cliff faces and drops, and the dust, and me starting to think about the snakebite kit I haven't bought yet. This looks like hard times, disused mining equipment rusting inresilient blue sky, homes with tin sign gardens and rockeries of bones. I am half expecting a man in long johns to appear with a gunand tell us to get of his land when we see a sign.

SEE THE FAMOUS SUICIDE TABLE

This tells us there should be people to see, and we are allowed to be here, though I wonder if this is a table tourists strap themselves to while blindfolded locals throw knives. The high street is a wave of wooden sidewalk, shop fronts and people stepping back in time. Inspite of the giftshops there is something here, a slow sun hanging on and the out of place brick church they couldn't put a price tag on.

Built: 1860

Burnt down: 1864

Rebuilt: 1868

The people in the shops are laid back and friendly,

'Howdy folks'

I put to one side a conversation I overheard.

'So that's what he said about guns. Can you believe it? I told him out here we kill people, that's just what we do.'

We stay longer than we need, just soaking it in. I like it here. There's no rush in gold town at all.

New food tried today: Chai spiced latte, sasparella

Verdict: No way can I make this, which is a shame.

Awkward moment: In Virginia city he heads over to a glass display case of rings, and asks me to try one on. I am feeling weird, embarrassed, shy and just in a situation out of my realm. What am I supposed to say or do? What is his motive? Is it right? This all seems hugely impractical- an 1860 ring from gold rush town, when each night we watch a 25 year old TV. I am thinking about etiquette, what is the right thing to do in this situation? More importantly why hasn't anybody told me it? What do girls do? I know women who would have no problem with this, women who'd take the ring, and be honest about the one they like. Women who'd go into Tiffany's without wondering if they are suitably dressed. These are the women who know ettiquette, they have rules, that a ring should cost a certain amount, that taking it is fine as long as it costs no more or less than a month's salary.

What I feel is different. I find it hard to take things, ask for or accept them. There is that practical bird on my shoulder squawking in my ear, 'for that kind of money you could buy a shower cubicle.' There is that nice girl who just doesn't like to be any trouble and wants to point him in the direction of the ring with a pricetag on he has ignored, which will only buy less essential bath mats to put outside the shower door. Then there is the me who has tiled the bathroom, stripped, filled the walls, painted over ten rooms. She hasn't worn any sort of jewellery in ten years and thinks it might be nice to be that sort of girl. But there is no one to tell me how to play out this scene, and which thought is correct so I mumble something about wanting coffee and we file out of the store with him trailing behind. After the coffee he says he wants to go back, but when we get there the store is closed. We drive back to Tahoe, part of me releived the decision has been taken from my hands, and part of me a little sad that I couldn't have been that girl who just knows how to act.

Falling asleep to: Spiderman.

(There is something in Toby I always believe.)