Moving day

Today I helped friends pack boxes and carry furniture and it was almost sweet, because it was not Brad and me who moved house. We have moved into and out of a number of houses, apartments, condos and the Airstream in the four years we have been partners. Oh, and there have been storage units of various shapes and sizes, too, across three different states.

How has this convoluted, exhausting but adventurous series of domicile relocations come to pass in so short a span of time? After all, we're not gypsies, traveling nurses, hippies in a van or even people who travel lightly. We love the chance to explore different horizons but love do so with our toys, tools and fabulous changes of clothes.

The official date for the beginning of our relationship is the opening ceremonies for the Whistler, B.C. winter Olympics in February 2010. That fall I had finished the process of applying to six MFA programs in creative writing and waited with no patience to hear back from admissions. As winter deepened, the connection I was building with Brad became even more entangled. We talked about where we might end up if I got accepted to any of the schools, and what we might do otherwise.

Each of us had separately considered leaving Taos for new opportunities, so when the door to graduate school for the next year's entry closed, we were still determined to find a new home. Brad had been in New Mexico for nearly seventeen years, and I'd spent twelve there with a few breaks for travels. We loved the land, our communities and indeed most of what we did there, but we still felt compelled to go explore.

The spring before we left, I had two weeks with two great friends skiing in Utah on spring passes at Snowbird. We camped out in various rooms in KOD's house, and he is a generous and lovely person who has become kin since Brad introduced us. One afternoon just before we drove back to Taos, we were at the bar and I met this gal from Jackson. Our conversation meandered to my town hunt and she suggested it would be an amazing place for a couple who follow the seasons and benefit from tourism.

So, we chose Jackson, Wyoming. That's four years together, three years here and counting the moves:

1. Brad into Mack's rental in Taos
2. Brad and Mack to Wyoming with the 1962 Airstream - dividing up goods between trailer and storage
3. out of the Airstream and into an apartment the next fall

Repeat steps 3 and 2 in reverse, then 2 and 3 again, then move Mack to Taos and Brad into a house in Jackson. That's a great deal of back and forth, over the hill (our storage unit is in Idaho, and we have one in NM, too), in and out of a 20' trailer, and then into and out of whatever winter housing has the least expensive to most habitable ratio.

We have done this because we wanted an adventure, cannot live in the aluminum bread box of a house in the winter, but also because Jackson has a lack of affordable housing. We'd rather pay $600 a month for our rent and utilities and live doing a delicate tiny home dance than share our space with multiple people in a small house. Much of our summer is given over to work anyway. When I have free time I am on my bike, at the pool, in the library, or buzzed from caffeine at the coffee shop.

We spent the past winter apart: I went to Taos and found a two bedroom house I could loved and could afford. I turned my kitchen table - a work bench made from a door and some 2"x4"s - into an art workspace and fell in love with having my own home again. That may be the next adventure, a home base where we can create, grow a garden, renovate the raggedy Airstream, and have fun making a baby. For now, though, I don't have to move anywhere until September, and I can't be happier.

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When I grow up, nope, part one

What did you want to do as a child when you looked into the unimaginable future? Who did you dream you might become, and what did you do in this other part of your life? Did you look forward with bright anticipation for what you saw ahead, or did your imagination and experiences lead you toward darker possibilities?

I saw so many branches on the path in front of me that I had no certainty, only guesses about where my life would be at 20, 30, now. I wanted to be: a mermaid, scientist, artist, jockey, Solid Gold dancer, explorer, archaeologist, writer, Ayla from Clan of the Cave Bear, an environmentalist, chef and a teacher. All of these professions and passions seemed compatible and possible, minus the jockey idea, which got squashed early on because they are petite and I was 5'10" by age twelve.

I didn't know then that in parts of our American culture people are supposed to follow one trajectory. I have never been able to do that, either to my benefit or detriment. Instead, I have followed my will,curiosity  and the need to survive. Some of the job choices I have made have been a success, others a failure. Most of the time I've ditched the duds fast, and I knew what I didn't want to be when I grew up, right away.

I adopted vegetarianism for some ten years, and a little longer if I add my sophomore year of high school, before I headed to vegetarian intolerant Belgium (that's changed in the twenty years since I've lived there). Still, I worked as a kitchen bitch for many years, notably the winter I spent coated in grease and gagging over blood as a grill cook. I'm not sure how I landed that job despite extensive experience in restaurants, since I had little way to gauge how well prepared the slabs of steak and chicken breasts were.

There remains not the slightest portion of doubt in my mind that working in a call center is one of the circles of hell - and I don't even believe in hell other than as a metaphor. I had a morning shift, which meant I got to hound parents getting their kids ready for school, workers on their way out the door, the deceased, and elderly folk who didn't quite understand what I was not selling them. You see, I was supposed to obtain the client's agreement for a free trial of x y z product, but if they didn't cancel it in time they would be charged for the experience. It could have been a great deal, but my conscience reminded me that it verged on a scam.

I slung cocktails at a skeevy downtown bar in Albuquerque during one of my stints in college. Imagine if your waitress wore tank tops instead of a bra, and refused to shave her legs. Yes, that's me, ashamed to help people get drunk in a bar, and ignoring you if you didn't tip me the first time I brought you your drink. Then I'd ride my bike the several miles home at three a.m., until the night I got hit in the head with a full beer bottle thrown from a moving car.

A necessary responsibility on a multi-day river trip is as the groover attendee. The rule on the river is pack it out, and that means everything. The set up includes a heavy duty plastic bag, lime, sawdust, a roll of toilet paper, hand sanitizer and a large ammo can. The original rig lacked the improvement of a toilet seat, thus, the groover. I've been the gear boater on numerous commercial trips and that includes setting up and dismantling the groover, plus stashing it on your boat, as far as possible from where you sit. Hot days are miserable and odiferous.

And that's just some of the jobs I had in my early twenties.

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Merry marry

Today* marks the one year anniversary of the Supreme Court ruling to strike down Proposition 8 and the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA). What a wonderful moment in an American history evolving to expand freedom, equality and to the deepen the American dream: life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. I give thanks to the brave people who risked their lives and overcame their fears to pursue this basic human right and to the United States government for standing up for them. Not only in support of the plaintiffs, but for all those who desire to live their life able to express their love relationship with all the rights and responsibilities afforded to any legally married heterosexual couple.

I know this subject inflames many of the people in my community and family, both in agreement with my stance and heartily against. A person can only decide for themselves how they feel about such an important, even sacred matter. I am not interested in persuasion, only celebration.
Brad and I nestled in bed tonight and watched an HBO documentary about the case. We will be married this fall, happy with the right to choose to spend our life as a team, as a family by choice, and hopefully some day as partners in co-creation. Already, we love, play, laugh, live, eat meals and share holidays. In September we will join under the hallowed heavens in a mountain meadow, in front of our friends and families, say "I do" and then figure out the rest of our nows together.

I cannot imagine if someone told me I could not make this choice as a consenting adult. Once upon a time, I'd never have chose to get married, partly because it never seemed relevant before, and because
I always knew I'd never marry if gays, lesbians and bisexual folk couldn't do so as well. The latter reason is no longer valid and the person who asked me to marry him was the one to whom I wanted to say yes. And so I will, and be grateful for the opportunity, and for those who have helped it become a right for all.

*or it would have been but I posted 37 minutes late

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Favorite things

I love making lists, and though they're usually punch lists, I discovered another love at a creativity workshop this spring. Facilitated by Julia Cameron, she had us create lists of things we love, amongst other prompts. This is the perfect blend of appreciation and the joy of organization. This morning, soaking up the erratic bursts of sunshine through an overcast sky, I made a list to celebrate my favorite things and activities as a child. What did you love to eat, play, do as a seven year old, at thirteen or seventeen?

• the colors blue and silver
• roast beef slathered in made from scratch gravy with roasted potatoes, carrots and onions
• watching the farm report alone at 5:30 a.m. and then cartoons with my siblings on a Saturday morning: Thunder Cats, Smurfs, Transformers and GI Joe
• reading anything I could get my hands on at the library or through the bookmobile
• spending my summer vacation learning how to do front and back flips off the high dive at the Hide-Away-Hills pool with friends
• climbing as high into the canopy of trees as I dared
• making forts and using them to play cowboys and indians - and the cowboys were always the bad guys
• riding my ten speed on the gravel roads of our neighborhood
• throwing mud (and rock) balls across a foundation that got dug out and never built into, making the pit a perfect battle ground
• experimenting with food to come up with new recipes, like adding Tang to anything

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Play, play, play

When was the last time you jumped rope? Not at the gym, your body sleek with sweat, aiming for a strong core, or to burn calories, but just to have fun? The rope slaps asphalt, you struggle to keep time with the rhythm of the two people on either end, and there is this rise in your heart rate, yes, but also of this part of you that feels ten years old. I mean a happy ten year old.

Tonight I skipped rope in the boat house yard of the raft company where my man works. He called me away from the blank screen to drink beer with the crew. I had just sat down to write this blog post, only I'd already been staring at white page - no lines even to break the surface - for ten minutes with no clue as to what I'd write. It seemed an optimal time to find inspiration out in the world, outside my head.

The guides, all guys except one rookie female, had just finished a splash gear de-funking project and there were festive yellow and blue jackets strung on throw rope like pennant strands across the parking lot from tree to trailer. After the gear had been hung in the shed, the idea to jump with the freed rope inspired a few of the men to pick up the ends and spin it round and round.

We took turns jumping into the huge cycling loop, doubled, then tripled up until there were five adults inside the spinning rope. We were all laughing hard, focused on the rope as it blurred past. I feel bliss when I'm at play, and more so when I'm at play with adults. Fun only, don't be so serious!

The throw rope we used had already been demoted to clothes line status, but its original purpose was to provide a rescue tool in the case of swimmers at risk in a river setting. This dynamic rope, able to stretch and recoil, is stuffed into its bag until the rare occasion when it is needed. I say rare because ropes on the river can pose a greater risk that a help, so they are employed as a last ditch assist.

The last time I saw someone with a throw bag in hand was during our early June run on the nearby Gros Ventre, with Brad as guide, Kali, Sarah and me paddling, two other rafts and a safety kayaker in our party. The river's flow that day was 4,000 CFS (cubic feet/second, imagine each CFS as a basketball size portion of tumbling water), which means that this body of water sprawled and moved with increased speed. Sort of like the wallflower who has learned how to breakdance and finds his courage to windmill in the center of a loud, appreciative crowd.

We left our cars at the takeout, drove the cracked road to Slide Lake, unloaded and pumped up the rafts with a hand pump, slathered on sunscreen and then bundled ourselves into layers of neoprene, splash gear and dry suits in case we were dumped in the frigid snow melt swollen river, then buckled helmets and cinched down PFDs (personal flotation devices). I felt excitement and anxiety in the need to bounce and then to find a secluded bush so I could empty my bladder. The group buzzed from the thrill and the mild terror at how fast and furious the water moved below the bridge. We would have to enter from the calm lake and then paddle hard across the current to reach the right side, since there was a nasty hole on the left.

Our boat launched and made it beyond the bridge, then around a bend to the first set of rapids. We were second in line and paddled hard in unison to Brad's commands to "all forward," or "left back," or "keep going!" When the lead boat headed into and on top of a rock, one that easily sits ten feet above the surface when the volume is average, we all turned to gape. We ended up spun around after the next wave, ducking as we skimmed beneath the willows that normally crowd the shore, but made it safe to an eddy.

I held onto a clump of willows and Brad had his throw rope in hand in case the crew of the lead boat went into the drink and swam. Given the temperature of the water, the velocity of the flow, and the unknown obstacles - hidden or visible - to swim that day would have been a risky experience.

Everyone made it through that rapid and had a quick cheer before heading downstream. We made it through the next few miles, too, and within a half an hour were at the takeout, done with the run.
Nothing tastes quite so good after an effort like that as a cold beer and we passed around cans of cheap tall boys to share. I love how an adventure can scare you, but it also charges your being with this vitality, so you become 110% alive. I love to play like a kid, but that's another way I love to play, play, play.

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Single track spills

For the better part of my life I considered myself clumsy, prone to accidents, often unaware of where the edges of my body end and the ground rises, the corner cuts, gravity grabs a hold without mercy. The combination of a exuberant nature and a mind that strays from the present moment does encourage clumsiness. As a child I buzzed with excess energy, waking on Saturday mornings in time to watch the farm report at 5:30 a.m. Even on the rare occasions when I succeeded in whining until my mom's resistance fell and she let me stay up past bedtime, or when I sneaked my way into the midnight hour, I still managed to learn about combines, pests and heard snippets of the Farmer's Almanac before the sunrise.

I discovered, when I learned how to downhill ski at the age of 24, that my body and mind can align with great results when I am physically active. I ran cross country and track through junior high and high school, and rode horses as a tween and young teenager, but there was a definite gap in recreation during my early twenties. The extent to which I moved my body included sporadic hikes, cruising on my bike around town, and dancing whenever I had the chance. Add a sport that requires balance, quick movements - both proactive and reactive - and a developed proprioception, and suddenly I became active, athletic and sometimes even graceful.

I found a passion for cross country mountain biking on a four day, 103 mile bike ride in Canyonlands, Utah on the White Rim trail in April 2010, at age 33. I bought my poppy orange Haro 29" hard tail, Maryjane, the week before that trip, and spent the time in between trying to figure out how to shift and slide my cleats into and out of the clip-in pedals. More often than not, I ended up on the ground with the bike still attached to my feet, and the image is as painful and embarrassing as the reality. The ride became a crash course - often literally - in basic mountain biking skills, even though it's on a jeep road and vast compared to single track. Just like day one of skiing, during which I fell dozens of times, biking on dirt, over rock and through sand made me fall in love from the first.

Over time I've made considerable progress in both. There is something delicious about the beginner experience, even more so when you arrive later to the learning opportunity. As an adult, being a newbie can evoke numerous fears, such as appearing foolish or inept, the potential for injury, or getting left behind in the dust. But to dare to try, to be vulnerable, to open to a new part of self, that can transcend fears and lead to the type of success that enhances other parts of one's life. If nothing more, it's freaking fun to play on skis, on a bike, whatever your game of choice happens to be, and to notice and benefit from new skills, small victories and even the defeats.

The best part of living in the Airstream in the middle of Jackson is that I can be on single track within 5-10 minutes, and I'm warmed up from getting there by the time I hit the dirt. This morning I rode pavement the mile and a half from home to the trailhead at Cache Creek. This Bridger-Teton National Forest area includes access for hikers, bikers and equestrians. There are miles of intersecting trails and they vary from easy to challenging as they wind up a narrow valley, parallel to or crossing over Cache Creek, through forest and across open meadow.

I've become familiar with the rocks, roots, twists and turns, climbs and downhill sections in this area over the last three summers. I started riding there as a relative beginner and feel confident to say I've reached an intermediate skill level. I rode Hagen as it meanders above the creek, minus the Staircase where I will probably always have to push my bike up the steep incline, and continued on, sweaty and breathing hard.

On the return route, however, I dared to try to ride up and over a foot high root that has been a nemesis. One attempt to ride over it instead of lifting the bike resulted in an instant hematoma on my elbow when I approached it with speed, then hesitated and slammed to earth with force. This time, bike and rider toppled over the bank. I am grateful that the spring melt has subsided and that only my right foot plunged into the creek.

I hauled Maryjane and me back onto the dry side of the path and laughed as I removed my shoe and squeezed water from my red and yellow zia socks. Attempts that lead to humorous outcomes rather than disaster must always be hoped for. One of these rides I'm going to make it over the massive root, no bruising or creekside encounters necessary.

When the way I live life seems awkward, when I fear to risk, when failure frequents my attempts, I remember the steep climb I used to walk and now ride, or the fluid movement as I pedal through tight turns when before I creeped through them at a snail's pace, and how I now enjoy the switchbacks that used to make me panic. To achieve success requires trial and error, again and again, until you succeed and then reach the next challenge. So I get back on the saddle, clip into the pedals, and enjoy being here, in the trees, under the sky, alive with the world.

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Summer soulstice

Welcome, summer! I'd have greeted you with the dawn, but instead I hauled several bags of laundry to The Missing Sock, stuffed half our entire wardrobe into two machines, and sat, my eyes following the clothes as they spun in a soapy bath. That is a sight as hypnotic as the streamers of a bonfire, but much more domestic, more like gas flames in a hearth. I long for a true bonfire, flames licking the sky in gold, blue and red. Something wild, on the edge of control, a worthy celebration for the day of the longest light.

In the town of Jackson, the summer solstice is celebrated by a street corner festival that consists of live music, theater and performance. You can, of course, visit one of the nearby vendors and indulge your need for food and drink. While the general ambiance strikes me as tame, the taiko drummers make my heart beat faster, my body move with the rhythm and I feel as if I could run painted through the hills, with a howl for the sun, the moon, the long day exploding from my lungs.

The children in the front of the crowd dance before the troupe of Japanese style ensemble drummers. I do not see any adults who dance, and the tween girl next to me dismisses her father's suggestion to go and dance by the stage. Already, she refuses to stand out as different, a giant 10 year old, she says, next to a bunch of little kids. I sympathize, since my own movements were subtle, almost covert.

How to be free in the expression of one's soul, when you live in a town that has whitewashed over what is fundamentally a wild nature? I rode my cruiser home from the Town Square (if that title doesn't explain the nature of Jackson Hole, I don't know what does) and sang and danced in the yard to a Hare Krishna tune by Krishna Das. I felt my spirit lift, and for the first time in my tidy up, grocery shop, cook and organize day, the meaning of the Solstice flows through me.

Summer means plants in growth, play outside with the late sunset, drink greyhounds and wear as little clothes as is possible. This far north and at 6,300 feet in elevation, that includes jackets and scarves at night, but I still wear sandals then. The theme of bare skin reminds me that a soul feels wonderful when allowed to be itself. On the longest day of the year, there's plenty of time to bare my soul. Strip away fear, dismantle my inhibitions and shame, let the grass tickle my soles, and dance because I am moved to do so.

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Hard work

I missed yesterday's post, hung over from the day's hard work like after an all-night bender. Yesterday I landscaped for 10 hours, lost in four packs of multicolored johnny jump ups, pots of pink zinnias and scarlet geraniums. I wheeled compost from point a to b in an endless round of shovel, push, dump and repeat. I spread compost in a thin layer across the ground, dusted it across the top like cinnamon on coffee.

Last fall I promised myself (after a welcome layoff from another landscaping job) that I would only landscape in future as a favor to a friend or by the grace of having a yard to call my own. In this case, I get to help friends with a huge gardening project and take care of my own needs. Spring end into early summer, since most of my work follows a seasonal flow, tends to see a meager income. So, enter hard work doing whatever I can get my hands on, until the real summer tourist season in Jackson arrives on the Fourth of July.

There's a group of people, world over, who follow the tourist patterns as farmers do the growth cycle of plant and season. I became a part of this work force when I got a job at a ski area at twenty four. After, I became a raft guide, then a massage therapist. This cycle means make hay while the sun shines, and hope I've set aside money for the lean in between, aka the "off season." Work hard, long hours and six or seven days a week, eighth months out of the year, and repeat. I am a third of the year retiree and the rest a workaholic.

The first job I ever officially held was as a busser in the local, Hide-Away-Hills restaurant. I'd had others before, babysitter, odd job do-er, and working alongside my dad with his moving company, but this marked the first occasion I started to pay into social security and income taxes. Even though my dad, Al, has always reminded me to "work smarter, not harder" up to now I have lived by his example rather than his words. Al, who has surely driven various tractor trailers more than a million miles during his career, who has made his living humping (moving term for carry) household items up and down stairs, in and out of houses since his 30s, who has dealt with every weather, road and human condition, who taught me the Midwestern work ethic.

Here's something to consider: working hard, though it is an ideal in some parts of the world, and must be done simply to survive in many places, has helped me to survive, but not really thrive. I don't abhor hard work, there can be a rugged satisfaction in doing it, but most of this effort has been for the benefit of other people's business. If I give a large portion of my time and energy to a project, I'm ready for it to be work that is an expression of who I am, that reflects my vision.

For now, I've committed to a summer in the role of worker bee. I will give massages, landscape, cater, and play as hard as I work. And I will reserve some of the sweetness of the summer for this blog, which reflects the work I make a central role in my life and livelihood.

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Happy birthday

I know and love quite a few people who are gemini by birth, as determined by astrology and sun signs. I find it true more than less, since it is at least an interesting frame through which to interpret the world. The people I know who were born from late May to late June dance to the rhythm of the twins, changeable, intense and humorous. Today marks the birthday of a cousin, Jenny, and a friend, Germaine, who has reached sister status. To celebrate Brad's birthday two weeks ago, we barbecued, drank tequila and ate the german chocolate cake that I mixed from scratch and baked in the toaster oven in the Airstream.

The tradition of honoring a birthday fascinates me. I opt for the month-long celebration, and this period includes the month preceding and after. I have had incredible birthdays - four years ago Brad gifted me an ultralight flight over the Taos Gorge, through which the Rio Grande wanders deep below the mesa - and horrendous September 6s - my 22nd confined to the close quarters of Greyhound from Los Angeles to Seattle.

I know what appeals to me, besides the opportunity, the excuse, to have fun with friends and to eat cake and ice cream. The candles, especially the beeswax ones I hoard, brighten the day, too. It's the opportunity to revel in one's self, a shout out that you have made it this far, with the potential you will be around after another revolution of the earth around the sun. The older you become, the more successful in your mission to collect years, so when I turn 40 in a few more, I am going to feel flasher than a rockstar.

There's another aspect of birthdays that hides under the surface of things. A birthday is a sort of "x marks the spot," a treasure map to tell you where you have come from and where you want to head. A New Year's party, for you, a day to step away from the past and its stories, into the limelight of the now. The transition from the age you were yesterday to now creates a liminal zone, a shift that energizes your life with potential. Like the earth after lightening strikes, or the water below the falls, or the seed as it splits open, you become charged. Who you were and who you are becoming in this new self as you are free to decide split apart, an isolated bit of fission which could alter the course of your life.

We often forget that this ability to change direction exists within us in every moment. It's not just with the addition of a year to our present age, or when the ball drops in Times Square, that we may choose another perspective, story or attitude. I change my mind from want/hope/dream to be a writer to a person who in being herself, writes. So, happy birthday to me. I look like a writer and I write like one, too.

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Les Grands Tetons

You have perhaps noticed my fascination with the Grand Tetons. They have reigned larger than actual size in my imagination since the first time I saw them, twenty years ago. As a francophile (a lover of French things), my first view of them caused me to exclaim "merde, they truly are Les Grands Tetons." These mountains rise to 13,000 feet, the tallest of which is the actual Grand (13,770 feet), and their peaks are often snow covered in June, so their outline is illuminated by reflective white. Does this image evoke breasts, especially if you were some 19th or 20th century trapper? My sex-on-the-brain seventeen year old eyes thought yes.

Though I grew up traveling around the east coast and midwest, and had even spent my junior year of high school on a student exchange in Belgium, that post graduation road trip introduced me to the west. I left Ohio with my two best friends, Sarah and Jenny, in my parent's rusted station wagon. The engine lasted until Grand Island, Nebraska, where it overheated and left us stranded a day while it recuperated at the local auto shop.

From there we continued west and north, until we eventually rounded that particular bend in the road and the Grand Tetons loomed above us, my first spectacular view of the Rocky Mountains. We hiked a day in the Tetons, then drove north into Yellowstone. Jellystone offered close encounters with bison who dwarfed the car when they bumped up against it, or when they wandered through camp, plus geysers, hot springs, and the Fire Hole River, where we swam in snow melt made comfortable where geothermal water flowed into it.

The friendship we'd had did not last much beyond the road trip - after we left the northern Rockies we headed south to the Grand Canyon, then into New Mexico to see the southern end of the range - and too many miles in the car in so short a time left cracks in the foundation of our relationship. I regret this, as I regret all the actions in my youth that lead to the suffering of myself or others.

On a positive note, I did discover two regions of the west that I fell in love with and made my home. Taos, Tetons, a long term love affair with the Rocky Mountains. Last Sunday I hiked in Grand Teton National Park, past Jenny Lake, beyond Hidden Falls and Inspiration Point into Cascade Canyon. From the Kudar, it's a half hour drive to the trailhead, and easy to pack for the hike: water, snacks, warm clothes in case of rain or snow and bear spray. I'm mentally prepared to use the spray in self-defense, but if I actually encountered a bear I think I'd freeze.

It was a delight to see other animals there, marmot, pika, porcupine, what I think was a badger, and a fox with her mouth full of bird, who passed me on the trail a foot away. The hike brought peace of mind, sore feet and felt like a sweet Sunday in my version of church. I walked, I reveled in the wildlife and beauty, and each step formed a prayer of gratitude and joy at the perfection of the moment.

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Airstream office

The simplest thing for me to do now, day #2 out of a daily succession of blog posts, is to allow myself to start slow, though not too slow. I didn't post yesterday, so through that failure I've created a challenge: publish one entry in the morning, another in the afternoon, and be sure to inform people at some point today that I have a blog up and running. It's part of the experiment, but I will not excuse myself; every day I publish a piece, no matter what else happens.

I repeat a mantra to take small steps in daunting circumstances, like this open-ended commitment to write via regular blog authorship. Or to apply my own usual stride, but reduced to one foot in front of the other, methodical, intentional and fluid. A long journey begins with the first, then second paw print on the soil, mine was Coup de Grace and this.

I think some context will help you to know a little bit about the path I walk. Many of you reading this know me, or at least do so through the intricacies of connection, but I live so far away from most everywhere that details will make this dot to dot picture more cohesive, concrete and real. I want to reach the heart of everything I write about, and place and home are part of that.

I sit cross legged on the bench in my office, which also happens to be the entry, dining area, spare bedroom, and general storage. This space blends into the kitchen so seamless you'd be hard pressed to identify where one begins and the other fades. I estimate the entire square footage of these two spaces totals 84 ft. Still, the roof arches overhead, pale light filters through the yellow and fuchsia curtains I stitched on the sewing machine in this same space, and the rain on the aluminum shell makes music with the background thunder.

I bought this funky, mostly intact 1962 Tradewind Airstream seven years ago from a friend who was moving from northern New Mexico to California. The story of its meanderings and how it left Taos and returned years later will be told another day, but I bought it in the hope it would be a step toward my dream to buy land and build a home. Though this has yet to be, the purchase remains a blessing. 

I've lived in it in the boat yard of a raft company in Taos I worked for, in several friend's yards (thank you, Sora and Pete), and when I moved into #77 Calle Martinez it transformed into a writing and stitching studio, held parties and sheltered friends as they wandered through their own story.

After Brad became a part of my life, I helped him replace Airstream plumbing that had been transformed into a Frankenstein themed collection of garden hoses and random copper pipes. I knew Brad planned to stick around when he told me he was selling his turquoise Tacoma for a larger truck, and that one of the perks of the v8 was towing capacity. He proposed this winter with a ring, but the day we installed the tow package on his truck and test drove the trailer around the neighborhood said the same thing.

Repairs made on the Airstream sparked travel lust, and when my attempts to get accepted into a MFA writing program met dead ends, it seemed a good time to leave Taos. We wanted to explore a different landscape, seek opportunities, and grow in our relationship in a new environment. Four years ago, minus a few weeks, we held a yard sale, sent the furniture to storage when we didn't sell or find a babysitter for it, bought sleeping pills for the car phobic cat, and gave thanks again that the title had arrived just in time for our departure.

We left NM and headed north, spent a few nights in Kevin's driveway in SLC, and arrived to late June rain and snow in a part of Wyoming that had just recorded snowfall around 700 inches. We hooked up the travel trailer at the Kudar, a motel and rv park established in the 1940s, and settled in for our first summer of cohabitation in the Airstream. We already had work lined up, and the transition from a weak economy to one fueled by a steady parade of tourists proved easy.

For a writer/massage therapist/ski instructor/occasional landscaper & catering server and her fiancé, a raft guide/snow cat operator, we lead an atypical, pseudo posh life here in this small town east of the Grand Tetons. Our Jackson (Hole) summer home sits in the heart of town, half a minute walk to the recreation center, an easy bike ride to the library and Moo's ice cream, and most important, a quick ride to mountain bike trails. Our set up is serviceable and homey, and though we appear to be Hole hillbillies when our laundry dries on the line or look like petty thieves with our fleet of bikes, we remain content.

It's the start of the summer season, and that means some three million visitors will filter through Jackson over the next three months. When I'm not at one of my myriad jobs, or en route navigating traffic, I'll be under the EZ up typing the latest blog entry, or lounging in the thrift store lawn chair storming my brain for the next story. This is life, craft and work, in a vintage trailer, rooted down in this small town just across the river valley, east of the Tetons.

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Coup de Grace

Here's the thing: I have this wish that some day a certain combination of circumstances will come together and the planets align, once I've exercised until I have a washboard belly to envy, when I hold down a real, consistent job and after I've earned a master's degree in writing (to add to the bachelor's degree that I've been saving for a special occasion)... and then I will be struck by Grace with her wicked bitch slap and voilà, I am set free to write. 

I like to think of this happening on Happy Crush Your Fear Day, (CYFD) when I'm no longer petrified to expose the oddest parts of who I am, to risk success or failure, or to piss off Grace's alter ego, Perfection. That bully has pinched me on the sly every time I've even dared to hope I've found a good start to introduce this blog. Today, my first official day celebrating a happiest of CYFDs, I imagine a revamped Miss Imperfection who cuts her hair with garden shears, pushes a safety pin through her nostril, and crams a doughnut into her mouth as slaps me on the shoulder and says "now you're free, kid." Free to succeed farther than the boundaries of my wildest dreams, free to fail spectacularly, free to write about any and everything, without censor.

One story I've told myself must be true is that some day I will be a writer, after I'm whole, healed, brave, better, other. As if through idle dreams, self-help schemes and practiced apathy I can transform leftover excuses piled one on another into something palatable, even though the ingredients are stale, rotten or have sprouted primordial fuzz. I can't wait for a coup de Grace, for my inner censor to down a few shots of tequila, a Tuesday, permission, or even inspiration. By the grace of my own choice, because I decide, I am a writer.

I offer you my words, adventures and everything before, between, sideways, above and below. This blog is a work in progress, process that trumps product, and an experiment through words, images, and sounds. I will add new content every day, as I explore the world through my own point of view and attempt to travel beyond.

I am grateful for your interest, your feedback and hopefully your participation as well.

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