A veiw from the other side

Well, they talked me into it: I visited the other side of the Door! I didn't spend much time there, only one week, but it was fantastic! Right after last week's posting (about all the things that happened on Sep 30th), Tom grabbed me and practically dragged me to the room where the Door actually opens. Oh, of course, I've seen it open a couple times, but I usually find something else to do when they're opening it...something far away. This time, though, Tom said he had something really interesting to show me: a native artefact that he claimed he couldn't bring through to this side. Well, he was right, sorta. What he wanted to show me was how they throw a party, a real party, but I didn't know that, not at first.

When we got to the room, and closed it off, sealing out the real world, he pulled me right over to the dais, so I was practically sitting right on top of the platform as the Door opened. I've never been anywhere near that close, and the wind rushing through as the atmospheric pressures balanced almost knocked me off my feet. Anyway, the Door opened, Tom headed through, and I just stood there waiting for him to show me whatever it was he was all excited about.

I could see him there on the other side waiting. There were a few natives standing around with him. (I must say, they look pretty fierce even though Tom says they look scarier when they're dressed for battle. Nothing like the picture, but I've got nothing better to show. I need to bring the camera next time.) As the charge on the capacitors started draining, and the connection to the other side was weakening, I made a decision: Go for it! I leapt up to the Door itself, feeling all the hairs on my arms stand up, paused a moment (it might have looked like I stumbled, but I didn't!), then almost fell through the Door. I only had a moment to glance back over my shoulder to see the whole thing collapse, and I was trapped! Stuck on the other side for at least a week, or at least until they could build up another charge to get the Door open again. At that point, my only hope was that Tom could get me back to reality. Later, that changed.

I could go on and on about my experiences over there, but I'm running out of space to get this posted. More next week!