Overdue Update! Car Trouble, Seven Pictures, Knowing What You See

Also at http://ulteriorharmony.org/?p=697 
I'm still alive, and I'm in Berkeley! I was offline for four days of the ferry from Haines to Bellingham, then some serious driving, some wonderful hospitality, and catching up with dear, dear friends whom I haven't seen in way too long. Interesting that when I was in England last fall, I found myself telling people it wouldn't be so long until the next time I saw them (it had been three years that time). And now in the Bay Area, I've been saying the same thing to my friends here. Conceptually, AZ feels so much closer to everything/everywhere. My car has come down with a bunch of fairly serious issues. I'm so glad I caught it yesterday and so grateful that my friends have a mechanic they trust who is taking care of the issues today. In my first post from the road, my lesson 2, in part, was not to over-worry about noises or smells my car may or may not have been emitting, so it's interesting that the rider to that lesson now is to follow intuition. When the road pavement was washboarded and it sounded like a blown-out tire, I was glad to recognize that there was no need to worry along those lines. On the other hand, taking my car to the mechanic this morning because "it might be nothing but it's a specific noise that happens in a specific context that wasn't happening until last night" may have averted a breakdown in the middle of nowhere.
I'm sitting here with the atlas and trying to figure out the best route from here to Bryce Canyon, where I want to stop on my way to Tucson, preparing my spirit for the next reach. 
In WA, OR, and CA the past four days have been full of torrential rain, with some thunder and lightning. Very different driving than in AK, very different flora. It was sweet to see my first palm tree a little ways north of Sacramento, my first prickly pears on the 405 west of Sacramento.
So much is different, of course. My conception of how many miles I can cover in a given time changes depending on the roads--the "220 miles = ca. 5 hours" based on Homer-to-Anchorage algorithm is gone. Stop-go traffic for over four hours in the Seattle area on Friday; three hundred miles in less than five hours on Saturday morning. 
Different, too, being in an area with fruit trees everywhere, and produce stores everywhere. I'm so habituated to there being maybe three places in town where produce is available, and that's all for about seventy miles. 

With all the friends I've visited, it's been as though no time had elapsed, although we hadn't seen each other for seven years. This gives me some hope and good feelings about preserving the precious friendships I just drove away from in AK. There is something so grounding about these enduring friendship connections: that they exist, that they continue even with nothing physical supporting them. As I pay attention to my own relationship with, orientation toward, connection with, the outside world, recently I've often become aware of being on autopilot; of looking at things and simply not knowing what I'm looking at. Without labeling, without judgment, I've been using my gift of language to put words, very very simple words, to what I'm seeing, using them as little mantras to bring myself to the present. Also, of understanding what I'm seeing to compare it to what I've seen elsewhere; to acknowledge and understand how one place differs from the next place. It is deepening my engagement with this transition, so that I'm inhabiting the place in which I currently am, rather than just blowing on through lost in my head.

Here are some pictures of what I've been seeing.
Snowy conifers from the boat:

 Snowclad mountains in the distance; snows receding in the foreground:

 Ketchikan--still in AK but a whole different climate. Mountain and ocean right there together--land at the dock and the road goes straight up. Some of the town hewn straight through native rock:

 Crocuses and buds in Ketchikan:

A standard view at an opening between two stores in Ketchikan's front. Many big generic touristy stores; many businesses closed; Ketchikan is bigger than Homer but evidently much more seasonal and dependent on the tourists on the summer cruise ships and ferries. There were a couple stores with the strident label "We are staffed by natives of Ketchikan and are open year round to serve our community," with a strong implication of all the negatives of these affirmations. Not everyone loves the tourists!

My camera didn't come out for those three days of driving and visiting. This is Cafe Borrone in Menlo Park, which I never visited when I lived there but is now the place where I reconnected with two lovely friends. 

And this is the view from my friends' porch. Oh, I spent so many hours here when I lived in Berkeley. Oh what dear friends, how good it is to see them!

More soon when I'm back on the road! And more awareness around seeing. I always hear what I'm hearing, so it's interesting to be paying more attention to seeing like this! Anyone else?

Fragility and Friends

Welcome to the third year of Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing at PLU in Tacoma. Here we are, all together again. There is such a euphoria to seeing all these people again, many of them people we haven't seen in a year, although a lot of sharing goes on via Facebook.

My flight was a red-eye, so between that and my meds I was falling off my chair for the opening night readings, which killed me as both faculty readers are wonderful writers as well as great readers of their work.

Staying in the dorm rooms, and this time we're back in the dorm of our first year, which is conveniently located half way between the places we mostly frequent. Last year it was being renovated--seems like there's always some renovation going on here--and we were in a dorm so far away from everything that you either had to sprint a lot or pack everything for the whole day.

I don't know how the students manage two to one of these rooms all year. I'm using the second bed for my wardrobe, shown above. That random scatter of clothes is quite evocative of how I'm feeling. Put together but in bits. Put together on top of something shattered. A lot of the time I'm managing to be my old excited insightful self of these residencies. But then I have to go hide for a while.

Friends, I am fragile. And buoyed and sustained by my wonderful friends in Anchorage with whom I stayed for the days before I left. They reminded me of life and life's affirmations. They shared with me the makings of good salads and the rightness of food in the belly. They took care of me.

I am fragile. The definition--true definition--of lost is as the opposite of find--. of findable, even. If you know where you last saw something, even if you never find it, it's not truly lost. Well, during the days in Anchorage, moving back and forth between people's houses, I lost my phone.My iPhone, with everything on it. At first I was in disbelief. The old Ela never lost things, let alone something as important as an iPhone. But there it was, or rather, there it wasn't. No denying that, and I lacked the very faintest notion of how I might have lost it. I remembered pulling it out to share pictures. I don't remember putting it back in its very own pocket of my vest, but the latter is such a reflex action (to avoid losing it) that I could have done so on autopilot. And it's not at that house. We looked intensely. Not a clue. But there it was--no phone, on the verge of a trip. A new iPhone was out of the question by over $600. So I'm now learning my way around an Android. I'm not especially techie and I don't want to talk about that on here because I think many of my readers also are not techie. Just that's the story. Later the same day, I became convinced I'd lost my car keys. I turned my purse inside out several times, we scoured the very short distance between my having them and not; finally Phil, who was there, scoured my purse again and there they were in the back pocket (which I hadn't checked) where I'd put them for safekeeping.

It feels a lot like how I've heard the aging process (in people's 60s/70s/80s) described...it is the aging process, just thirty years too early. I cannot trust myself. When I'm out of comfort zone, living out of car and visiting with friends for a couple nights, moving from one thing to another, I can't trust myself with the most basic of things. And I panic. I didn't with the phone, it was just too bizarre. Panic I did with the keys, though. And there's always more travel in my future. I seem to live from trip to trip.

Sorry if this sounds like a bit of a "dear diary" blog post. I just wanted to be real about fragility and how it comes to us or presents itself within us when we're not expecting it.

Getting Found From the Woods, or Back On Meds

Okay! As promised, here's the story about my adventure in the woods--was it really just yesterday? It really was. Time is doing strange things here. I seem to say that a lot. 

Something else I hear myself say a lot is how much I love being in the woods: being surrounded by trees, the way the light dapples and refracts (that word again). Well. I learned some lessons in the woods yesterday, both about being in the woods and, because I can't help it, metaphorically.

I went to Sandy Creek Park, which is a pretty, nicely kept park that appears self-contained. There is a lake with a bridge over it, a beach, children's play areas; over the bridge, some camping areas and some trails around the lake. Had I turned left on the lakeshore trail, I would have made a gentle sweep around the park area. I turned right. I hadn't paid attention to know that in that direction, the lake went off way past the boundaries of the park, almost out of sight, not self-contained at all.

I learned yesterday that being in thick woods for several hours with no clearing becomes claustrophobic. I really was a tunneling worm, although for extra dimension, a little bridge was where I rejected that paragraph of a book review I was writing in my head, and that upward draw was where I composed those nice sentences for the next essay, so that the sentences will always be colored by that part of the trail and, if I hike the trail again, various sections of it will be redolent of whatever sentences I was working on there.

Even so, after a while I was suffocating and really wanted a clearing. After longer, I was tired and ready to be done. Remember, I started the day so tired I could barely get myself out of bed. I kept going and kept going, thinking "it's a lake; surely I'll get back to where I started eventually!" Or at least to another exit from it and a trail back through the park.

When I was sooo ready to be done, I found this big, beautiful bridge. Perfect timing! This was obviously going to take me to a grand exit. 

Wrong. It led to a disused trail and a locked cattle gate. I climbed over the gate into a cul-de-sac with a mixture of grand houses and trailer homes. I asked some folks who'd just pulled in to their property where I was and how to get back to the park. They said I'd have to go back the way I came, several miles--safer than going along the highway. It was 6 pm at this point and I'm not in AK now with 20-hour days! I mentioned that, and they said I had at least a couple hours of daylight. It's much darker in the woods, I almost wailed. Yes, fair point, it is., they said. They absolutely did not want to help me out, even by talking to me. 

So, the best I could do was plan to go back the way I'd come as near to running as possible on my tired, blistered feet. Yes, I cried. I put a sad text on Facebook but more importantly, texted my friend with whom I'm staying to let her know I'd no idea when I'd be home. She called back immediately to say get back out to the road, find out where you are, and I'll come pick you up and take you back to the car. Wow, really? Wow. Okay, then. 

This time, though, I got a different answer from the cul-de-sac. A couple just heading out on their own walk saw me, asked if I'd come from the trail, and said of course they'd take me to my car! Apparently it wasn't the first time they'd rescued a lost crepuscular hiker who faced dashing back through the woods for miles. And it was a long way. Several minutes down the highway. I am so grateful to that couple. They were unconditional warmth and kindness.

So, obviously, the first lesson learned is "Look where you're headed for." Don't assume the lake is commensurate with the park. I had hiked almost halfway around it, seven or eight miles, but that left probably another ten. 

But the second lesson has to do with the two different cul-de-sac encounters. After that last excursion off my meds, I was describing to my psychiatrist how blessedly soon after getting back on them I resanified. "You're so lucky," she said. For many people, the meds don't work so quickly after those sins of omission and sometimes don't work as well forever after. Then she looked me in the eye and held the contact. "Don't take it for granted," she said. Similarly, I have blundered off road or off trail or on unknown trail so often all my life. Somehow or another, I've been rescued, picked up, brought to safety. Last night, though, for some time it looked like my only option was hike back the way I came, in darkness, with no guarantee I'd be able to follow the trail let alone notice the side-trail up to the parking lot. Don't take it for granted that I'll be rescued. But do be grateful that I'm so lucky.

Does it resonate?

Approaching Connectedness; Approaching Gratitude

Of course, I left out a lot of important things from my previous post. I need to reassure everyone who leaped up and contacted me in alarm that I haven't gone back to carrots and lettuce already--that was a misleading suggestion. I also left out some of why it's all even worth it. But rather than go back and edit, here's a whole new post.

What's missing from my previous post--so much more beyond the surface tension of my illness.

There are so many things going on outside of myself. There are so many things going on inside of myself that I need to offer to other people. Even the times I've been in extremis with these health conditions, I've always been able to recognize that what I've lost has been connection to a larger reality. At this point, connection to that reality is melting in, slowly.

I had a hair-raising, horrendous drive home with the non-functioning car heater, ice, dark, anxiety...perhaps I'll tell the rest of that story next time. At home the water pipe had frozen where weasels or squirrels had damaged the insulation. Frozen and burst, so that a thousand gallons from our newly filled tank ran out, right under our cabin, eighteen feet from an erosive bluff. Phil is an incredible one-man-band, but crawling under the house when it's close to zero, popping up again to pour water into a suspected leak...you really need more than one set of eyes and hands for that.
 What about in Anchorage? I was there all weekend, at the gracious hospitality of wonderful friends who care, as a verb, and whose own lives are so rich, broad, deep, giving and receptive both. Just to notice these friends and how they are; to hear what they've been doing with their lives, what they've been observing, brings me to a broadened awareness, which contains hope.

I got to see our friend Tom at the viewing of his and Jeanie's film, a starred offering at the Anchorage International Film Festival. It's the first time I've seen their film since Lucas died, which lent some special poignancy to the experience. Tom's graciousness and poise was beautiful to see. Some people had come up from Homer specially to see the film, including people with whom I'd been acquainted but didn't yet have names for. Meeting them in Anchorage in support of beloved Tom and Jeanie, and having the "I've seen you around everywhere, we were both in such and such...but what is your name?" conversation revealed long tendrils of connectedness.

Getting to meet online acquaintances is another special delight. By a wonderful serendipity, I got to spend time with Cinthia, together with Lynn, with whose friendship I've been blessed a few years now.

 Cinthia felt like a kindred spirit right off the bat, from love of the outdoors to averseness to cold (I know, what are we doing up here?) to intensity about writing; even to food preferences (helps me to think through my return to posting recipes on here again).

Lynn, of course... what can I say? Her blend of tenderness and passion, her unmatched observantness... 
Oh, and we laughed a lot, all three of us together. Always a good sign.

Meanwhile back home...the two of us and Fido the camera on the right...

I don't feel proud to have driven him nuts over the past...year? two years? more?--to have justified the Cockney Rhyming Slang appellation of "trouble and strife" for "wife."
There's still a lot of work to figure out how to get done all my work, and write, and do things with Phil--from chores around our small but high-maintenance homestead to more recreational activities. But now at least we can have the conversations.



I've been so scared. I've been protecting myself (to death, some would say). Having propelled myself out of the tailspin--with help, ultimately, from the distasteful ultimatum--I'm less protected. I feel a lot that terrifies me into my guts. I also see a lot of joy and hope; a lot to look forward to. I begin to feel connected outside of myself, to be able to send those huge and convoluted webs inside me into the wider world.

Turning the Corner: Two Magic Potions, No More Soft-Pedaling

I've turned the corner!
- Memory: mostly back online
- Klutziness: diminished; some good predictive/evasive actions (but one big spill tonight)
- Energy: much better
- Breath: fine now

And my pen, my flagstaff, has been busy today.
All this clarity and increased energy has been helped by more calories and some quiet space, but it's--I've--received an additional quantum push from this magic potion:

Source: The Raw Food World

I've been hearing about Marine Phytoplankton and its amazing benefits for years. Plankton, whale food, tiniest plant organisms, are the ultimate, direct, bottom-of-foodchain source of those omega fatty acids for which people eat fish oil. Omega oils are so crucial for brain function (and are strongly recommended for people with things like bipolar, schizophrenia, and any depressive or psychotic tendencies). Plus, as an oceanic entity, it's going to be full of thyroid-supporting iodine and other trace minerals So, of course, this is a very expensive product! Out of my range...until recently it was on sale. Last Tuesday, I started taking just four drops with green powder in the mornings, and noticed a sharp difference by the next day. If you've ever had green juice, or wheatgrass, or one of those potions that give you a clear, ringing, bright energy that makes you feel positive and eager to engage with life, this stuff provides that feeling with an additional sense, physically felt too, of acuity in the brain.
I'm still noticing that increase in clarity and energy. Probably also helped me to step over the hurdle of these last couple days.
Holds Unbarred
I'd been panicking about the scale these last few days, distracted from what really needs to happen with the scale. That was the last holdout. I was eating more, but still backing off from my quantity-commitment, still scared to move forward. Then this morning, my therapist brought up the very real possibility I won't make the psych's ultimatum, and that she won't give me grace, and things will change very much. Up until now, I had not let myself imagine that scenario, even as I continued unable to ensure it wouldn't happen. I've been so afraid to move from where I am/was. Now I'm afraid not to get away/there soon enough.
So today, I ate more than I thought possible. (For perspective, I should confess that Phil, while very pleased, did not think it was a phenomenal amount.) I ate close to what I ate in treatment, quantity-wise; to where I'm lightheaded and it hurts. And I'll try for a night-time snack too, like I had to there. At least I can choose my food, which makes it far less unpleasant. Have some chocolate! Eat more honey (which I love, but quit eating when I quit beekeeping)! Actually eat some of those raw energy bars you always make and then stash in the freezer! 
I've got 'til Friday. Wish me luck. A birthday in the family and a packet deadline this week too. Big week!
Friends
The other 'magic potion' mentioned in the title is made of friends. Friends right here in town. Friends with whom I'm in touch via email and Skype. Friends on Facebook. Friends off the grid and out of range but still in heart connection. 
The umbilicus of gratitude.
This past Saturday, I Skyped in to a get-together of classmates from my school years in England. Most of us have known each other since age four or five, or even younger. It was so lovely to see five beautiful women in a room on the other side of the world, all so recognizable as their much younger selves, all enjoying each other and renewing shared stories now decades old.
My friend Rachel told me that her strongest association between me and food is a date with an almond in it. Yes! I was raised on those, I told her; also a pecan in a date. That's the candy my grandparents in Israel would give me, and I've offered it to my cousins' kids there now.
I Facebook posted this picture to Rachel today:

Yes, little almonds, big medjool date. You see the heart of it, though.
I ate the pecan one (!!!! first pecan in a long time) and left the almond one for Phil--sharing even when cramming=expanding, generous bigness.

Springtime in Anchorage; Levels of Sharing

While I was taking this photograph, I heard rapid, scuffling footsteps coming up behind me.

Before I could whip around, a gentle voice said, "Would you like a photo with you in it?" I said "Oh, no, thanks" with a big smile before even really considering the question; before registering the lanky man about my age pushing his stroller full of sleeping baby. Friendly place, kind people everywhere.  
But this picture's probably better without me in it. I wish the picture could capture the salty, boggy stink of the mudflats. A slight change of angle, and you can see downtown Anchorage, breast to breast with the wilderness.

I knew that if I drove due west from the internet cafe I'd parked myself at, I'd find a park and a branch of the Coastal Trail, to take a late lunch (carrot, lettuce, spirulina shake) and to look at spring springing, enjoy the sunshine.


The willows are lasciviously pussied out--

 The dogwoods are putting out, although I couldn't get a non-blurry picture.

Hungry moose had eaten much of the life out of many trees, but the scars are like artwork. 

Patches of snow amid the sunshine, birches still sleepy, the moss underneath them almost greener than the budding angiosperms. 

I spent yesterday evening with my wonderful friend Lynn. The air in her light, spacious home was resinous-resonant with balm of Gilead--she'd harvested a bunch of cottonwood branches over the weekend, and they had leafed out and budded on her table, were shedding their sticky buds with that wonderful, mystical, healing balm. 

Lynn had been reading my blog, and had some concerns and questions, both about my situation and about her own process as a writer and figuring out how to become more comfortable with putting "personal stuff" out there. Obviously, I don't have the answers to that question, but as I discussed yesterday, there are issues I'm feeling compelled to write about. It's a mutually reinforcing process, I'm finding: as a writer, everything in life is potentially material for my writing, so writing about intense personal experience might help me to write my best. On the other hand, writing my best about my personal life might actually give me insights that help me to live my life the best I can. Even better, they might strike chords, inspire, or otherwise be helpful to other people. 


The fact that so much of what I've been sharing here had been a surprise to Lynn, whom I've known for three years, also brought home to me a discrepancy between how I present myself in different social groups. Since Phil was the draw that brought me to Alaska, many of my friends are originally friends of his. Lynn had been friends with Phil for at least a decade before I ever came on the scene. Phil is the most expansive, generous, out-there guy you could meet, but he's also very private, and doesn't gossip, or talk about personal struggles much. I've always been someone people entrust with secrets, and have always proven that trust, but I've also always been willing to converse about just about any subject in my experience or imagination, which is probably why people often describe me as "innocent". But around friends who were originally Phil's friends, and even beyond to some degree, I've been very quiet--"mysterious," Lynn said--about what's going on with me, why I'm always going to Anchorage for appointments, etc--I've tried to be more like Phil in terms of my level of disclosure. I wear baggy clothes.


So that's another issue opened up by the last month of frank posts! I'm still processing--so grateful to Lynn for the conversation opening all that up. I'd love any of your thoughts on that too.


Another springtime thing: I went into an ethnic clothing/images/incense store like I just adore, and looked at more hats! So many beautiful hats, and the guy said he invented the fleece lining so many of those hats feature, which I love so much.

I've wanted a "rainbow" hat for years, but have never found one that both fit my small head and was actually warm enough. The rainbow hat pictured above could have been made specially for me, and I think I might have bought it even if it hadn't been on sale.


I also adored this idea--a Ganesh made of leaves. Might have to go back and buy some as gifts.

First time in a month I don't have a logo at the bottom of the post!
Tomorrow, Phil is coming home. I may take a day off posting--I want it to be "his" day. But sending love nonetheless.

Hallowe'en Pics

Perhaps it was appropriate that I spent my first ever night as a blonde with such an intimate gathering of close friends--there were just seven of us (a magic number)?

The "witch's brew" in my left hand is dandelion wine I made two or three years ago, which was rough when I first poured it off, but has matured into something rather delicious.
Once again, as on so many holidays, David and Olga hosted us in their beautiful house--this time in their guise of "Pimp-daddy and Mini."

What? I'm riding my broomstick, and that's Ozzy Osbourne, aka "Oddly," aka Royce.

 Amy (Phil's daughter) and Leslie (her mom) are such a wonderful team.

And Amy as Audrey Hepburn was really just as stunning as she always is anyway.

 Meanwhile, "Joanne does Costa Rica," complete with lipstick on the teeth--Leslie has such a talent for taking an idea and taking it beyond.

 Phil was somewhat costume-shy: he whipped out some scarily gothic dentist tools and brandished them a bit (thankfully, I was getting my make-up done at that point), and he wore the flag for maybe 90 seconds: otherwise, he was innocuously white-shirted and black-trousered, but of course, he was the life and soul nonetheless.

 To use up the tomato slime from those eyeballs I shared yesterday, I made a slimy salad with "lice" converging to suck on the blood pool.

 Gosh, that sounds so gross! But it was really delicious, in fact. It's kelp noodles and shredded romaine lettuce and some avocado, with a pumpkin seed-spirulina-pesto dressing with lots of lemon zest and black pepper. Without the ghoulish decoration, it would be great any day.

I didn't manage to think up a ghoulish explanation for the hazelnut pear frangipane...

 ...although I'm sure I could make the pears out to be something gross if I used my imagination. This was adapted from the almond-pear frangipane in Everyday Raw Desserts by Matthew Kenney. I used hazelnuts Phil brought back from Oregon instead of almonds, and made a cashew-coconut crust instead of just cashews. I was really impressed with how pastry-like the crust turned out, and the overall effect was elegant and delicious.

Unfortunately, I had an upset stomach all yesterday and still do today. Perhaps that's what prevented me from being able to confirm that "blondes have more fun:" for me, the jury's still out.

Do blondes have more fun?
I hope you had a wonderful, fun Hallowe'en--Happy All Saints Day!

Back Home--Lessons (and Pictures) from the Trip

We're home! Not quite grounded yet, but the weather is beautiful here, we've been planting seeds and are gradually catching up on life.

First lesson: don't get caught empty-handed! This is a blogger lesson along with everything else: I'm disappointed to have blogged so little during the trip and to have been without my camera at so many picture-worthy moments. I should have made sure I was familiar with the camera-netbook interface before we left, had some posts up my sleeve for gap-times and generally been more prepared. And then, to arrive home and have blogger be out of action for the first day with this post _way_ overdue???

Finally, then--
I learned that rattlesnakes are well-camouflaged in the arid, tough soil of the desert, but can choose the trail itself as their lair.

 I learned how to paint ceilings, and perhaps how not to have an extremely painful neck by the end of it. How did I manage to miss out on painting pretty much my whole life up to now?

 I learned that you can hug a saguaro: you just have to wait for the right time in its life...

 ...and I wore shorts (or unzipped my zipoff pants) for the first time, I swear, in over two years! That's what happens when you live in AK...

I also learned that my exercise tolerance has improved markedly: I'm so happy and grateful for this. Plans definitely afoot for getting in shape (more on this soon) so that I can feel fit to be seen in shorts should the opportunity arise again.

I learned that I needed to be better prepared with food things. The baked yams and avocado held me mostly for our first two days of travel, but for our return journey, a similar strategy went bad. The dried goods went moldy because we hadn't had enough sun to dry them here--reinforcement of my recent decision to acquire a dehydrator...

...but I also learned that with a few requests and lateral thinking, I could get a very satisfying meal out after long hikes. (This was from La Salsa in Tucson--minus cheese and sour cream and plus their eponymous salsa, it was a hearty and nutritious bowl of veggies and black beans, with some brown rice that I didn't really get to.)

I learned that I love the topography and flora of Arizona--it feels so familiar and 'right' to me. It reminds me of Israel and that welcoming warmth and repelling prickliness, straight to my soul.

Heather leads the way

I learned that whilst good exercise is great preparation for a trip, I don't so much need very heavy, hard, muddy, grueling exercise at the very end of a long trip when there's unpacking and unloading to do too.
But that's what we got!
Our wonderful, gracious friend with whom we stayed in Anchorage when we flew home had an old apple tree that she wanted cut down. Phil decided to try to transplant it instead! With the root wad and all, the fully mature tree probably weighed several hundred pounds and it was all we could do to load it into the truck along with our luggage and Anchorage purchases.

Then, we had to roll it down our path, sitting on plywood with rollers (old pipe) under it that we had to keep switching out.

 Phil dug a big hole, and getting it into the hole and off the plywood, and getting the tarp out from around it, was challenging to say the least. The ground was mucky with decomposed kelp that we harvested (smells just like salty manure) and at one point, when tugging out the tarp, I slid all the way into the hole, under the tree!

 So, fingers crossed, the tree may survive. Phil put a cage around it so that the moose and bunnies don't dispatch it immediately. Oh, and you can't tell from the light, but this digging, tugging, heaving, mud-wrestling operation all took place around 10pm, at the end of a very long day of traveling. 

I don't mean to sound grumpy and I'm glad we got the tree moved. Just maybe next time we won't combine it with a long, tiring trip, OK?

The most important thing I learned, though, was how good it feels to spend time with friends and loved ones, to share their lives and what's important to them.

It was so good to see David and Heather...

 ...and David's brother John--and their other brother and sister-in-law (my bad no camera). We weren't the most skilled workforce but it felt so good to help with their house.

 I finally met one of Phil's oldest friends, who drove down from Montana to visit with us in Oregon. He's the same one whose wife is the potter who made us those beautiful bowls I pictured a while back and it was definitely past time that we should get to meet in person and that he and Phil should catch up.

 And of course, we had a great visit with Phil's mom.

So, now we're planting our gardens and I'm slowly catching up with work and writing. I'm so grateful that my writers' group met yesterday, our first day back: it felt grounding and familiar to be back among them. I'm hoping to feel more caught up by the end of the weekend.

How long does it take you to feel caught up after a trip? How do you implement the lessons that you learn from each trip?
much love

Gratitude for Hand-Made and for Mass-Produced Objects

One of Phil's oldest and dearest friends lives in Montana. I've still never met him, although we've enjoyed a few long phone conversations together. His wife, whom I also haven't met, and who is lively and talented like him, is a potter, amongst many other things. Phil commissioned some bowls from her, and they arrived with us recently.

 They are so beautiful, and each one is both unique and congruent with its fellows.

 There were plates to go with them too. The postal service was unkind to two of the plates, and we are sticking them back together in the Japanese Zen tradition of breaking a new cup on purpose and sticking it back together so that it is always unique.

We live in a physical environment of such staggering beauty, and tend toward utilitarianism. I have a beautiful mug but drink out of mason jars endlessly. So these bowls are a precious reminder that even utilitarian items can be a locus of beauty. As products of nature ourselves, we can create beauty, just as nature does. And yes, nature creates ugliness too. But just as my experience of life heightens,when I pay attention to words I choose, make them the most beautiful that I can produce (or when I read or listen to someone else doing likewise); being surrounded by beautiful objects even in mundane tasks is uplifting, too.

I sometimes get a little down on myself around this area. I am more inward- than outward-looking, and being 'handy' doesn't come naturally to me. Creating food and gardening are my only exceptions to that--exceptions with which I'm well pleased, of course.

But as we move toward making our cabin a more comfortable and copacetic living space, I find myself very grateful for mass produced items that allow me to get there without overreaching myself. Since we moved the dominating futon out of the cabin, we've appreciated the space, but lacked a comfortable sitting spot. Now, thanks to the excellent advice of Phil's daughter and her mom, who have all the smarts when it comes to design and remodeling, as well as an intimate knowledge of the Ikea catalogue, we have two Poang armchairs in our life and space. They're small and light...

 ...and they have a natural rocking motion to them...

...and I put them together in less than thirty minutes each!

Yes, little unhandy me--I did it! And so far, they haven't collapsed at all!

There is no way that I could have made as comfortable and convenient a pair of armchairs from scratch, all on my own. And certainly not in less than thirty minutes.

So, I find myself grateful both for the artists among us who create things of beauty that give us pause through our days as we feel that beauty, that art, that integrity of intention; and for the technology that allows even a non-carpenter like myself to assemble two armchairs to enhance our living space. I guess it's a lot like my stalwart preference for making everything from scratch, but genuine appreciation of high quality prepared foods that can be purchased in a pinch.

I'm up to my elbows in the 'turn little side room into kitchen' project, with wonderful help and advice from the two awesome ladies mentioned above, and yesterday we hiked our socks off at Captain Cook State Park with our friend Terry.

We hiked twelve miles, saw some awesome rocks and other cool things, had to put a serious schlep on the return leg to elude the large high tide (we were confined to that ice shelf that you see in the background and it was quite exciting). I can barely believe that I could do this--I don't think I could have done such an arduous hike even a month ago.
Some more pics from that in my next post, together with an energy bar recipe that I made for myself and am pretty pleased with.

Do you appreciate man-made beauty? And mass-produced furniture?