Mentally Dragging Anchor

Neon Memes • Foreground: Robed in the traditional saffron, two monks stand barefoot on stones in a waterway, gazing through a trademark golden frame (or so it seems, anyway) at a complex topped by giant pine cone–shaped structures. Foreground: Dusk paints violet both an ancient stone keep and the tor over which it towers, while the adjoining loch shimmers like lilac taffeta. Foreground: An inselberg―"island mountain"―dominates the surrounding desert, rising almost a quarter of a mile high, its sandstone grandeur glowing like almost-new copper, a yam fit for an Aboriginal god. Foreground: The world's largest river by volume curves and recurves and then recurves again through a rain forest, defining an immense cornflower serpent of water in the verdure of the vegetation. Background: A few days ago, the mail delivered the 2009 travel catalog from National Geographic Expeditions (888-966-8687), and I flipped through the thing. Its 100 pages showcase more than four dozen cruises, ranging in price from a paltry $2,695 to $56,950 and ranging in destination from Antarctica to Zanzibar. A Baedeker of globe-girdling possibility, the catalog enchanted me―till I reflected on dismal probability. ―Bryan A. Hollerbach, Managing Editor