1,000 Words and Then Some

Today tastes like paper, sawdust, and dirt. Pleh.

Not even spotting random wildlife in the city could improve things.



Pleh.

What I Did With My Weekend . . .

Today tastes like raw chocolate-covered garlic. With bean sprouts. Crunchy, but ultimately disappointing and harsh.

Sheesh. It should have been a good weekend--Friday off work, a trip up to Aspendell in Greer, prepare the place for the semiannual Christmas party. Two of the tasks: Check the heating systems in the large and small cabin. No more arriving two days early in order to get the temp inside up above freezing! No more carrying water in 20 gallon jugs for drinking and washing dishes!! No more HOISTING 20 gallon jugs to flush the toilets twice a day whether they need it or not!!! Just flip a switch and start the fire for atmosphere. Ahhhh . . .

But no. Friday around lunch, my cell phone rang. My boss Hopalong was on the line, frantic. Where the hell was I?

Uhm . . . about four hours out of the city. Why?

Why didn't I TELL him I was gonna be gone?

But I did. Like two weeks ago, I told him I'd be out today. In fact, two weeks ago LAST MONDAY.

Nope, never happened. We'll talk about this Monday morning. Click.

Well, shit. I know I spoke to him, and my other two bosses (Atticus and Boo) and I could swear I talked to the other folks in the office because one of our buddies who was along to help prep the cabin had left his car in our parking lot. This should be no big deal--we're not big enough to be fussy about a car taking up a space, and he'd be taking up the same space my car would, so no problem, right?

So now, I'm concerned about the crucial conversation Hopalong and I are going to have come Monday, and I'm worried that no one else remembers my saying Shadowstalker is going to borrow my space for the weekend and thus, they'll have his car towed. So when he gets back to town on Sunday, he'll have no ride waiting for him, and no way to get to work Monday, and WTF???

Ick. Ick ick ick. Good thing there were plenty of seasoned rounds waiting outside to be split. I should take a photo of Hopalong some day, print out wallet-sized copies, and bring them to Aspendell for when I need a little more incentive to get out the axe and get going.

But it was lovely up in Greer, albeit somewhat breezy. The people we were for sure expecting all showed up in good time, and we got everything on the list done except for sharpening the kitchen knives. (Maybe an 8.5 x 11 headshot of Hopalong? Perhaps a picture of his shoulderblades?)

Then some folks we weren't expecting showed up. Gareth's cousin once removed and her husband showed up late Friday night. This isn't a bad thing, necessarily--they're easy to get along with, and hard workers to boot. The husband immediately set to work re-finishing the decks, and when we left on Sunday, he was replacing the downstairs toilet.

But I know a few of you will understand exactly what I mean when I say that it was just too many people. Neither Gareth nor I could unwind at all in the cabin.

So I took a walk.




This shrine is the place where we scattered Howard and David's ashes, and I understand there's a few other people memorialized here. I love this stump with its fan of roots around the saint. I think it's a perfect blend of pagan and Christian; an excellent marker for this family.

Sunday morning was uneventful; we were all leaving early save for Gareth's cousin and her family. And I'm glad they had some cabin time for themselves, since we had all of Friday. However, it has now become very clear that we need to shift the responsibility for the cabin calendar out of Most Excellent's hands; this is not the first time she's double-booked the cabin. It's a problem only because we call and check to see if there'll be company up there before making plans. It's a bit awkward to arrive and find others there, or be walked in on when you weren't expecting people.

So Sunday morning, we paked up and went off down through Whiteriver as we often do. It shaves about half an hour off the trip and doesn't send us through Phoenix and all the traffic to get to our home. Besides, the Salt River Canyon is really pretty as you wind your way down and down then back up and up.

And then it happened. 20 miles north of Globe, the engine revs went through the ceiling-vreeeeEEEEEE! Like when you have it in neutral and unthinkingly step on the gas. Except the truck was in gear. Uh-oh.

Took it out of gear, put it back in gear, step on the gas. VrrrrreeeeeeEEEEEEEE! Crap. At least we're headed downhill, let's milk this for a few more miles. So we coasted down the hill tapping the brakes, watching for a place to pull off the road before we start back up the hill on the way to Globe.

We were lucky, we found a pull-out that we could safely get to on the northbound side of the road, out of traffic. We were able to put the truck on a lovely level patch of utterly clear caliche to make life simpler for the tow truck driver. We had all our AAA info with us, no problem. Gareth's cell had just been pulled off the charger before we left the cabin, so he had power to spare.

Except we had no signal. None at all. Poot. Well, we're young and healthy, and it isn't summer, so we're not likely to die of dehydration before we can either walk 20 miles or get a ride. Off we go. (Yes, I could have claimed to be the frailer sex, and sat in the truck to wait for Gareth, but frankly, if it took him more then twenty minutes he would have returned to a bloody and frantic quivering heap of worry. Much simpler to walk and be there for whatever happened than to wait and imagine.)

So down the road we went, checking about every half-mile for signal, and high-fiving each other at every mile marker. Might as well celebrate, right? A little more than two miles along, a guy pulls off the road and asks if we'd like a ride to Globe.

Yes, please! we reply, and hop in. He explains he was visiting his brother on the San Carlos Rez, just east of Globe, and he lives up on the White Mountain Rez, which is up by Show Low. He was heading home, he saw us walking and thought we were taking pictures, but then he saw our truck. That's an awful long walk to take pictures, he thought, and turned around to see if we needed a hand. He told us the other week, he was making this drive and came across a fella walking with two kids, one 8 and one 12. The fella'd had two flat tires--one on the car AND the spare, so he'd given the guy a lift to get the spare fixed in Globe.

So once we'd been dropped off in Globe, we had signal, so we called AAA. We were thinking about getting a rental so we could take our stuff home, but the company we were connected to wasn't in the mood to try harder, despite their advertising. We were offered a car at the Phoenix airport. Gareth has more patience than I; he politely explained that if we could get to the airport, we would be able to get to our other car, and hence, would not need their services. The representative tried again, and offered us a car in Mesa. Gareth explained that this location was still about 120 miles from our current location. We needed someplace in Globe. Where we were. When she came back from putting him on hold for another fifteen minutes, he explained gently that we'd figure something else out, thank you, buh-bye.

This left us with some mighty unappealing options. We could call a friend to come and get us--120 miles out of town, one-way. We could call Gareth's mother and never hear the end of it. We could spend at least one night in Globe and call our respective employers to explain we were stuck and would be in as soon as possible, given that the truck was being worked on. Ewwww.

So we called one of the folks who had been with us on the trip and explained what was going on. We set up a provisional meeting place--the one McDonald's in Globe, which was just down the road from where the tow truck was supposed to be meeting us. Hey, it was gonna take her at least an hour and a half to get to Globe, might as well have a place to meet established. If she arrived and we weren't there, she was to call us. If we didn't answer, assume we were with the tow and would call as soon as we had signal to let her know where to go. Otherwise, we'd call when we returned with the truck and guide her to us.

Well, we got back to town with the truck before she arrived. We called, and sent her directions to the saloon nearest the Ford dealership because that was the nearest place where we could sit and wait. The dealership closes at 1:00 on Sundays; it was now almost 2:00.

So we went to have a beer. If the blue laws say we may, then who are we to argue? It was like being a kid again and tagging along to the pool halls with my father and grandfather. Check it out:



A pressed tin ceiling wayyyy up there, pool tables on the floor, and paintings of nekkid and semi-nekkid ladies on the walls. Too much fun. Established in 1902 and the only real changes have been the additions of two television sets.

So Mischief came and fetched us home again, and now we're dealing with the aftermath. Calling the towing company to get our keys over to the garage so they can get into the truck to fix the problem, and then next weekend we'll be back on the road for three hours fetching the truck back home from Globe (siiiiiigh). I have a blanket bee on Saturday that I've been anticipating since February, so that's not negotiable. That means Sunday will be eaten getting up and fetching the truck, so Saturday night's party will either be a quick show up, walk around once, then go home and to bed--or a no-go entirely.

After this weekend, I'm thinking the latter.

While Strolling on the Banks

Today tastes like the chocolate Coca-Cola cake my mother would make for birthdays if you begged specially. The old formula Coke, not the "classic formula" they came out with after the fiasco of new Coke. It's not the same, I've tried the recipie on my own, in nostalgic moments when I can conveniently forget that the recipe calls for three sticks of butter, and a cup of sugar on top of the half-sack of minature marshmallows, AND the Coke, AND the box of confectioner's sugar. Oh, did I forget the two cups of pecans?

Yup, it's a recipe out of Hell's Kitchen--nothing but sugar and fat. No redeeming virtues at all. But ever so yummy--carmelized sugar and chocolate in one gooey masterpiece, ready to go right out of the oven.

Did I mention it freezes well and microwaves beautifully? That would be why I'm out in the morning, walking for an hour before I go to the gym for my workout.

It may be spring when the swallows come back to Capistrano, but it's fall when the waterfowl come back to Phoenix. One hears that irrigation canals criss-cross the city, which made it possible to farm a water-hungry crop like citrus, and still nourish lawns and golf courses so people who move here from greener pastures to get away from winters and allergies can recreate what they left behind--moaning about the unbearable humidity and thier everlasting allergies.

But it's one thing to see photos, and another to live in a city that was laid out by Bradbury's golden-eyed Martians. Raised canals cut gouges through farmland turned suburbia, with parks and fields lying low beside them. In summer, when the monsoons have been niggardly with their moisture, the fields are irrigated--flooded--with water drawn from the canals, grass swaying under three inches of water soaking into the soil.

And having water available brings its own little ecosystem. In the winter, its common to see ducks going about their business on the canals, finding places under bridges where the current's surface flow eddies, dabbling after weeds that found cracks in the cement liner to grow, flapping out onto the banks to go to work on some grass humans planted in a backyard poking under the fence, or in a park.

So the school by my house had irrigated the soccer field over the weekend, and a little pond lay in the lowest spots. The ducks, bless their little webfooted hearts, had noticed water and grass--which meant that there must be worms and other good things. They were paddling about on the pond, oblivious to the skeletal goalposts and backstop sprouting from the surface like Excalibur.

Back Down From the Mountain

Woof. Why does sitting still for hours and hours make you tired??

We went up to Greer, First Consort Gareth, Lynchpin, Hub, Mischief, RagDoll, and I; for to prepare the cabin for the annual storyfest that serves as an antidote to the saccharine goo of Xcessmass.

We chopped a metric boatload of wood, spandified the place, prepared and served a four-course dinner Saturday with paired wines, and then got snowed on while we re-packed the cars and headed downhill.

I finally found a subject worthy of spending the last gasp of my cellphone's batteries on--



--an elk skull FC Gareth's Uncle D found in the woods. Clearly the elk had dropped of natural causes, so Uncle D cleaned the skull, and arranged it here, on the back porch under the upper deck by the door of the Tunnel to Everything.

Prayers and good wished for Uncle D please--he's having some serious health issues. In my family, we'd cite the punchline to an old joke, and say, "He's on the roof."* Thanks.



*Guy comes back from vacation, asks his brother/roommate what happened while he was away. B/R replies, "Oh, the cat died." Guy is crestfallen. Tells B/R that when there's bad news to share, you break it gently. "Se, you should have told me that the cat was on the roof. Then a couple days later, mention you hadn't seen her for a while and you were getting worried, a little. Then tell me, oh, you found the cat, and she had died. Get it?"

B/R is nodding his head all through this diatribe. "I got it." he says.

"So how's Mom?"

"Uhhhhhhmmmmmm . . . she's on the roof?"

(rim shot--ba-dum-bum-CHING!)

My Guardian Angel Smokes Borkum Riff

Today tastes like vanilla, cream, honey, and bourbon. And oddly enough, it smells like Grandfather’s tobacco.

I drive a convertible (in Arizona, eleven months of the year are topless weather, after all) and I finally understand the attraction for a dog when it comes to hanging its head out the window, ears flapping in the breeze, eyes slitted and nose pointed into the wind. If I lived through my nose, I’d be too distracted to drive. As it is, it’s great fun in orange blossom season.

Not so much fun driving past the cemetery. I can tell when it’s a “burn day.” And sometimes when I’m really hungry, it’s hard to tell the difference between that and the barbeque joint a few blocks away. My own personal Stephen King moment.

Right now though, we are paying the price for a warm wet spring with lots of lush plant growth with the inevitable summer wildfires. Mummy Mountain, in the heart of Phoenix, is burning from a lightning strike, and the streets look like San Francisco. I can barely see the purple hulk of Camelback Mountain, three miles away as I write this. It looks like a watercolor of a mountain—a sharp purple outline at the top, and then melty shades of purple, with soft trickles of dark veining and little pops of highlighting instead of the rich tight detailed crevices and sharp texture I can usually see.

So yes, while I understand that what I was smelling was a combination of burnt plant material, the mélange of perfumes from shampoo, deodorant, and cologne (oderant??), and hydrocarbons; it still combined in a sweetly nostalgic form that was like having my guardian angel riding shotgun on the way in to the city, bopping along to the alien surf music that is Blue Man Group and Logictrance.

Mindful Musing

This morning, my mother, the Dowager Empress Odie-Bird sent me a story she had enjoyed regarding one woman’s experience with anticipation—how we tend to believe that there is a better place than we are now, and how we overlook the pleasures of the moment we are in as we rush to get to the next minute, the next Big Thing. We spend our lives in the next five minutes, anticipating the destination rather than savoring the journey. Read the whole thing here (http://www.beliefnet.com/story/19/story_1915_1.html).

I took up yoga earlier this spring—what the hell, I already do the new yoga (knitting), so I might as well take up the old. As the seasons progressed, and the summer warmed up, I would go out on the porch first thing in the morning and right after I got home from work, and stretch in the hundred-degree plus heat. Even at six in the morning, the thermometer would read in the mid-eighties. Stretching was astoundingly easy. I was never this flexible, even as a kid. And the more I worked at it, the easier and better it got.

I had some Really Kewl Moments on the porch this summer—one of the best came on a July morning. The sprinklers came on, I was grounded and twisted, and along came a hummingbird in his little suit of lights. He hovered by the tree, watching the sprinkler spray and rotate, then he darted directly into the line of fire! Splash! He zipped up a foot, watching, watching, watching and hovering, then just as it came around again he ducked down into the spray again. Splash!

I stopped to watch him, wondering if he was dazzled by the sun and spray, or trying to drive the sprinkler off, but then, when that array turned off, he followed the spraying water over to the next head, and proceeded to dunk into the spray again and again. He was taking a birdbath on the wing; a kid flying through the sprinkler in a bright green swimsuit. (And what kind of swimsuit does a hummingbird wear? Speedos!!!)

Now, however, the season has turned and it’s getting chilly. (Yes, compared to the northeast, we’re relatively warm. However, the high temps are now nearing what the lows are in summer. Brrr.) I’ve moved inside where I can look out the back door, but the cold has seeped into my joints and in the morning I’m stiff stiff stiff. It’s hard to get out the mat and practice, especially remembering that a short time ago I was cooked spaghetti flexible and now I expect to hear breaking when I bend.

My ego wants to push, and insists that I make progress each and every time I go to the mat. When you had barely started, it insists, just weeks after you started, you were able to get your head to the floor. Now, when you do straddle bends, your head is level with your tailbone, and your hands just reach the floor! MOVE MOVE MOVE MOVE MOVE! (My ego would make an excellent aerobics instructor.)

But just as you have to learn to have the strength to contain your flexibility, you have to have the strength to contain your ego. It isn’t about having a set of calendar-perfect poses each and every time, it isn’t about being able to kiss your elbows and put your feet on your shoulders. It’s about being with and in your body, with all its imperfections, and being in the minute wherever you are, and having it be enough. Enough for right this minute—because that’s always where you’re going to be.

The Dowager Empress mentioned that this article moved her to practice mindfulness (just for a few minutes, she mumbled). But that’s all there is, is this few minutes, and the next few minutes, and the next few minutes. Just like practicing sobriety; just like knitting. All there is is the next few minutes, the next stitch, the next pose. Flow into it, be with it, be in it. Let the sweater take care of itself. And one day, your feet will touch your shoulders.

hops growing wild and fruiting on the vine in Greer. sometimes i wonder that no one yet brews "Greer Beer," or the low carb, low alcohol version "Greer Near-Beer." maybe they could start in Show Low, and brew "Near Greer Beer" and . . . right. 

you wanted cutesy-poo? could you at least say, "please?" 

since you asked nice, here's the cutesy-poo animal picture. everybody say 'awwww.'