from the train

i took this from the train window on the way from clermont-ferrand, france to marseille. there is a lot to see at the brief stops if you watch closely- even cliche, but quite real: french families and friends saying hello and goodbye, clothing drying on the line,


and just before the train picks up real speed (also when it's slow on certain tracks) it's easy to note vegetation and architecture, sometimes even people sunbathing near a river. kelly and i had our coach all to ourselves on this leg of the journey. the trains -long winded french ones especially- are remarkably hot in the summer time, making seats and coaches with other people virtual saunas. trains stop in just about every small town with a station on the way, so the trips take a long time, particularly when you have to change trains- this journey to marseille was around 10 hours.
we had a short layover in nimes, about 4 hours down the road from this image. there, we ate pizza and smoked our cigarettes while we watched passersby (a man with a caged bird at a nearby table) and suffered mild heat stroke.
there's not really much to see in this photo except the feel of fleeting glimpses which are so common from these kinds of windows.
"nothing" is often my favorite thing to see- photos like this make me feel, imagine, and remember something more than something more descriptive. this stop was only 15 minutes or so outside of clermont; the sun rose as we made our way from this small station to the next.