Denver Days Day 40 Y2

My impressions of Denver, thus far, are predicated primarily on the view from a cab window and the expert care and handling of my daughter by medical professionals at the National Jewish Hospital.  The weather has shown all the highs and lows of a person diagnosed with bipolar disorder.  Our first day here, with the mountains standing in distant, but stately grace, the temperature was 60 degrees.  The next day, with occasional snow showers, the thermometer dipped below 30 degrees.  Today, my toes refused to warm up.  It’s been chilly  and overcast with blue relief against a stainless steel sky.  If our schedule permits, we hope to explore some of Denver’s wonders.  We had not fully calculated the effect of long days on our energy level.  However, we have mapped out visits to the U.S. Mint, a candy factory, the thirteenth step of the Capitol building (the travel guide reads, “Join the Mile High Club” -- stand on the thirteenth step of our Capitol building which is precisely one mile high), and possibly, visit Boulder.  I have been surprised, on this, my third visit to Colorado, at the changes since my last trip to twenty-five years ago.  It seems there is a little more sprawl, and a lot more vacancies.  The housing market was hit hard here the taxi-drivers tell me.  Those drivers -- from Ethiopia, Ghana, Russia, Pennsylvania (?!) and even Denver -- offer a wealth of statistical, political and social commentary.  However, through all the activities at the hospital, the rides through downtown Denver and my conversations with pleasant strangers, my eyes are drawn to the snow-capped mountains. From just about every vantage point, Pike’s Peaks asserts itself.  We have witnessed the newest in medical technology at the hospital. We have navigated the biways and highways of Denver’s interstates and surface roads. We have scouted the office towers of the downtown district. Through all of this, the Rockies stand constant in their majestic grace.  I believe that the closer we draw to the mountains, the more dwarfed we will be by them. That, of course, remains to be seen.  Tonight, I simply paused to catch the sunset over the mountains.