I arrived under a blue sky like underwater, short thoughts and long feelings running loose inside me. To visit a mining town that others toil in, is one of the dirtier forms of entertainment, travel, curiosity. I’ve never been inside a mine for longer than I liked or for any other reason than excitement. Miners, I salute you, but I am not worthy of the dirt between your nails and your calloused fingertips. And I’m thinking this, luxuriously, from a distance, years later, while walking through a golden Saturday night in Paris with a cute buzz buzzing through my marrow, head tingle to toe tingle, and now I’m writing it in a little cozy notebook my mama gave me, all the while simmering blissfully in one of these orange gaslight puddles that bathe Paris’ wealthy stone, a writer in a city that does all the writing for you. It is less than unlikely that I can hold a candle to you in this lifetime, miner men.