How nerdy is it to have a subscription to the Smithsonian Magazine? Well, doesn't matter because Moses is the one who subscribes so either way you answered, I am still cool. The coolest. Ha.
Not the point, however. The point is the back of the magazine. The awesome part where they carry advertisements for weird crap that will transform you into a modern day Indian Jones without the guns and violence. You think I kid? Here's a sampling:
- Fisher Space Pen
-Authentic Artifacts and Coins
-Wireless Weather Station
-Athena Pheromones ("biologist's pheromones increase affection")--you know Indy was all over this
-Wold Discovery Box (Includes over 50 fossils, insects, marine life and minerals)
-Publish Your Book Now!
-Voyages to Antiquity
-Turkey Tours (the country not the bird)
-Upton Tea Imports
-European Beret (probably for the girl, not for Indy because he had the hat)
-David Morgan Unique Items of Lasting clothing (felt fedora, red check flannel, and messenger bag shown)
-World's Fastest Wrinkle Remover (even Indy ages)
-a Cell Phone That's a Phone (as in that's all it does)
-Gorilla Glue
No kidding, that's all in the back. Plus a bunch of other similar crap. I love it all. Yes, please, send me on a Voyage to Antiquity dressed in David Morgan's clothes, where I will write my self-published book with my space pen while smelling like Athena's pheromones. I can hardly wait.
Thursday, October 21, 2010
Sunday, September 12, 2010
My Funny Brother, My Roomy: Imogene Pass Run 2010 Race Report
Let me begin this tale with the most important fact: I beat my previous Imogene time by almost 45 minutes (whatever 6:26 minus 5:45 is). Brussel sprouts! I TORE IT UP!!!!
Okay. Now that that's out in the open, we can move on. Or back to the beginning. Whatever. Moses and I did not want to go to this race. Did not want to make the six hour drive, did not want to get up at O' dark thirty on race day, did not want to stagger 17.1 miles for hours on end at high altitude. We began exploring excuses for not going early last week. In fact, if you had asked me last Wednesday whether we were actually going to go, I would have said, I doubt it. But. Thursday afternoon I got an e-mail from my brother titled "Pain & Agony" which said: "Have you thought of any good excuses to get out of running on Saturday? I'm thinking about cutting off a toe." Jerk. Making me laugh like that. I knew then that we were going because all of the sudden I wanted the chance to hang out with my brother and his wife, his in-laws, and friends--you know, the cool fit kids. (Every year, my brother's wife's family organizes the trip to Telluride for a big group of people).
So we deposited the various living things that we are responsible for at their respective weekend destinations (kid to school, then friend's house, then grandparents, dog to kennel, and plants to fend for themselves) and hit the road Friday morning. And you know what? It was okay. By the time we got to Cortez, Colorado, I was kind of into it. And by the time we started the climb into the San Juan Mountains, I was mentally there and glad we got out of town for the weekend. That last hour and half into Telluride is just gorgeous. I think it's nearly impossible to regret being there.
We pulled into town and found out that we'd be sharing a room with my brother and his wife. "You guys get the bunk beds," said my brother. Okay, I guess that's fair because last time we got the master suite with the jetted tub. We deposited our beer at the main house and headed over to our assigned condo where we met one of our house mates who, upon learning that I was my brother's sister, said "Oh, that's wonderful! He is SO funny. I mean really, really funny. I mean the whole way up here--SO FUNNY!" Yes, I know, you think he's funny now, you should have seen him when he was 8 and blew up that egg in the microwave. That evening we had a great dinner, and great conversation with great people, and my brother continued to be his funny self, fueled by a not insubstantial amount of beer. (Don't worry, at about 8:30 that night, he switched to Gatorade to get ready for the race. Yeah, I know. Instantly switching from beer to Gatorade is apparently his superpower).
We hit the sack early in anticipation of our early wake-up the next day: my brother and his wife in their bed and Moses and me in our bunk beds. "Goodnight, Kerry." "Goodnight, Lisa." "Goodnight Mary Sue Ellen." "Goodnight John Boy." Do you know how old I was the last time I shared a room with my brother? 12. As is my pre-race norm, I failed to sleep at all that night and laid there running the race in my head over and over again and trying not to think about my nervous tummy because I didn't want to be the bad roomy who had to get up to pee a million times in middle of the night.
The alarm went off at 4:30 a.m., Colorado time. That would be 3:30 a.m., Arizona time. That would be (mom, close your eyes for a sec.) really fucking early. And guess what? My brother is a morning person. Brussel sprouts. How can he be funny first thing in the morning after all that beer and Gatorade? My brother's wife was sick, and therefore not running, but still got up early so she could see everybody off and shuttle gear from the start to the finish line because she's awesome like that.
We had breakfast and slept-walk our way through the obligatory pre-race ritual: get on an over-heated, crowded school bus in the dark, ride some impossibly long time with bus full of impossibly fit people to the start, get off in the freezing cold and head immediately for the toilet line and then proceed to hurry up and wait. My sister-in-law's mother asked me how I was doing and then gave me a great pep talk about running my own race and just relaxing and reminding me that I already know I'll make it because I've done it before. This woman could talk me into anything (she's talked me into entering Imogene three times and I think the only reason she couldn't talk me into running it instead of going to a work conference last year was because I didn't see her before I left for the conference). The state department should hire her to negotiate peace in the middle east, she is that good.
Pep talk in mind, I decided she's right, I'm just going to run/hike/walk/crawl my own race and I'm not going to worry about anything else or how I'm doing compared to anybody else. I'm just going to finish and it doesn't matter what happens and I will make it because I've done it before. And that's what I did. Moses took off at a faster pace, and that was fine. I quit trying to keep up with him (at this point we were both walking) and it the end this was much better for both of us (Moses finished in under 5 hours). I prefer to suffer alone. I didn't worry that I had to stop running and start walking less than half a mile into the race. I found my pace and stuck to it. And it worked.
That said, about 5 miles into the race, I spotted my brother on the side of the road. He had a leg cramp and had to stop to stretch. I didn't stop because I figured he'd be fine and there wasn't anything I could do to help him anyway and I kind of suck as a sister. And also two years ago when were hiking Mt. Humpherys?, he totally left me to die. In the rain and hale. Also some lady had already stopped and was offering him pickle juice. (Apparently pickle juice is supposed to be the magic potion that instantly cures muscle cramps. My brother said it just made him want to vomit). After a swig of pickle juice, my brother caught up to me. We chatted briefly about the merits of pickle juice and hiked together for a bit. And then on the next hill......wait for it.......I DROPPED HIM. Because he had a leg cramp but, whatever. I didn't see him again the rest of the race and briefly toyed with the idea that I might have beat him in the whole thing but it turns out that he passed me somewhere along the way and neither of us noticed. Probably when I was in the port-a-potty-at-the-top-of-the-mountain. Regardless, for a brief shining moment, I was in front. Hah! Other than that, I was running my own race and not worrying at all about what everybody else was doing. Really.
The uphill part was predictably hard. Really hard. And steeper than I remembered. I did a better job of managing my liquid and food intake and although my heart and lungs were working overtime, I did not get altitude sickness. I just kept moving and that seemed to be the key. The top was beautiful. I took a few minutes to soak in the view and a volunteer snapped my picture at the summit sign. I then assessed my physical state. And, brussel sprouts!, I still had legs. Not only would I finish this stupid race, but I would finish it strong. At the 12 mile mark, I realized that I was going finish substantially better than two years ago and I hunkered down for the remaining five miles. I even finished early enough that my family and friends were still at the finish line by the time I got there. Sweet.
Post-race, everybody took the traditional gondola ride for late afternoon coffee and then we headed back to the main house for dinner, where half of Flagstaff joined us. We even had the winner of the whole shebang at our party because we were so cool. He finished the race in something like 2:19--I cannot even fathom how this is physically possible. I was a little disappointed that he just looked like a normal guy--it seemed like he should at least have had a super-suit.
Overall, I finished ahead of 83 other people. Last time, I finished ahead of 9 people and that was only because Moses let me walk across the finish line first. This really just means that I improved from "pathetically slow" to "slow," but I'll take it. I'm glad we ended up going and we'll probably do it again. We are constantly asked why we would ever endeavor something like this race, and honestly that's still a hard question for me to answer, even with the great experience I had this year. I think it comes down to the intense sense of satisfaction that comes from doing something really challenging, something that is so far outside of normal everyday life that its outcome is not at all predictable. There's also something great about taking on that challenge with a bunch of other people--whether you know them or not--and being part of this thing that was hard and scary and fun all at the same time. Or maybe the answer is really just the classic "because it's there" and also, now, "because I can." (And maybe also "because my brother might get a leg cramp and I will drop him on a hill.")
Okay. Now that that's out in the open, we can move on. Or back to the beginning. Whatever. Moses and I did not want to go to this race. Did not want to make the six hour drive, did not want to get up at O' dark thirty on race day, did not want to stagger 17.1 miles for hours on end at high altitude. We began exploring excuses for not going early last week. In fact, if you had asked me last Wednesday whether we were actually going to go, I would have said, I doubt it. But. Thursday afternoon I got an e-mail from my brother titled "Pain & Agony" which said: "Have you thought of any good excuses to get out of running on Saturday? I'm thinking about cutting off a toe." Jerk. Making me laugh like that. I knew then that we were going because all of the sudden I wanted the chance to hang out with my brother and his wife, his in-laws, and friends--you know, the cool fit kids. (Every year, my brother's wife's family organizes the trip to Telluride for a big group of people).
So we deposited the various living things that we are responsible for at their respective weekend destinations (kid to school, then friend's house, then grandparents, dog to kennel, and plants to fend for themselves) and hit the road Friday morning. And you know what? It was okay. By the time we got to Cortez, Colorado, I was kind of into it. And by the time we started the climb into the San Juan Mountains, I was mentally there and glad we got out of town for the weekend. That last hour and half into Telluride is just gorgeous. I think it's nearly impossible to regret being there.
We pulled into town and found out that we'd be sharing a room with my brother and his wife. "You guys get the bunk beds," said my brother. Okay, I guess that's fair because last time we got the master suite with the jetted tub. We deposited our beer at the main house and headed over to our assigned condo where we met one of our house mates who, upon learning that I was my brother's sister, said "Oh, that's wonderful! He is SO funny. I mean really, really funny. I mean the whole way up here--SO FUNNY!" Yes, I know, you think he's funny now, you should have seen him when he was 8 and blew up that egg in the microwave. That evening we had a great dinner, and great conversation with great people, and my brother continued to be his funny self, fueled by a not insubstantial amount of beer. (Don't worry, at about 8:30 that night, he switched to Gatorade to get ready for the race. Yeah, I know. Instantly switching from beer to Gatorade is apparently his superpower).
We hit the sack early in anticipation of our early wake-up the next day: my brother and his wife in their bed and Moses and me in our bunk beds. "Goodnight, Kerry." "Goodnight, Lisa." "Goodnight Mary Sue Ellen." "Goodnight John Boy." Do you know how old I was the last time I shared a room with my brother? 12. As is my pre-race norm, I failed to sleep at all that night and laid there running the race in my head over and over again and trying not to think about my nervous tummy because I didn't want to be the bad roomy who had to get up to pee a million times in middle of the night.
The alarm went off at 4:30 a.m., Colorado time. That would be 3:30 a.m., Arizona time. That would be (mom, close your eyes for a sec.) really fucking early. And guess what? My brother is a morning person. Brussel sprouts. How can he be funny first thing in the morning after all that beer and Gatorade? My brother's wife was sick, and therefore not running, but still got up early so she could see everybody off and shuttle gear from the start to the finish line because she's awesome like that.
We had breakfast and slept-walk our way through the obligatory pre-race ritual: get on an over-heated, crowded school bus in the dark, ride some impossibly long time with bus full of impossibly fit people to the start, get off in the freezing cold and head immediately for the toilet line and then proceed to hurry up and wait. My sister-in-law's mother asked me how I was doing and then gave me a great pep talk about running my own race and just relaxing and reminding me that I already know I'll make it because I've done it before. This woman could talk me into anything (she's talked me into entering Imogene three times and I think the only reason she couldn't talk me into running it instead of going to a work conference last year was because I didn't see her before I left for the conference). The state department should hire her to negotiate peace in the middle east, she is that good.
Pep talk in mind, I decided she's right, I'm just going to run/hike/walk/crawl my own race and I'm not going to worry about anything else or how I'm doing compared to anybody else. I'm just going to finish and it doesn't matter what happens and I will make it because I've done it before. And that's what I did. Moses took off at a faster pace, and that was fine. I quit trying to keep up with him (at this point we were both walking) and it the end this was much better for both of us (Moses finished in under 5 hours). I prefer to suffer alone. I didn't worry that I had to stop running and start walking less than half a mile into the race. I found my pace and stuck to it. And it worked.
That said, about 5 miles into the race, I spotted my brother on the side of the road. He had a leg cramp and had to stop to stretch. I didn't stop because I figured he'd be fine and there wasn't anything I could do to help him anyway and I kind of suck as a sister. And also two years ago when were hiking Mt. Humpherys?, he totally left me to die. In the rain and hale. Also some lady had already stopped and was offering him pickle juice. (Apparently pickle juice is supposed to be the magic potion that instantly cures muscle cramps. My brother said it just made him want to vomit). After a swig of pickle juice, my brother caught up to me. We chatted briefly about the merits of pickle juice and hiked together for a bit. And then on the next hill......wait for it.......I DROPPED HIM. Because he had a leg cramp but, whatever. I didn't see him again the rest of the race and briefly toyed with the idea that I might have beat him in the whole thing but it turns out that he passed me somewhere along the way and neither of us noticed. Probably when I was in the port-a-potty-at-the-top-of-the-mountain. Regardless, for a brief shining moment, I was in front. Hah! Other than that, I was running my own race and not worrying at all about what everybody else was doing. Really.
The uphill part was predictably hard. Really hard. And steeper than I remembered. I did a better job of managing my liquid and food intake and although my heart and lungs were working overtime, I did not get altitude sickness. I just kept moving and that seemed to be the key. The top was beautiful. I took a few minutes to soak in the view and a volunteer snapped my picture at the summit sign. I then assessed my physical state. And, brussel sprouts!, I still had legs. Not only would I finish this stupid race, but I would finish it strong. At the 12 mile mark, I realized that I was going finish substantially better than two years ago and I hunkered down for the remaining five miles. I even finished early enough that my family and friends were still at the finish line by the time I got there. Sweet.
Post-race, everybody took the traditional gondola ride for late afternoon coffee and then we headed back to the main house for dinner, where half of Flagstaff joined us. We even had the winner of the whole shebang at our party because we were so cool. He finished the race in something like 2:19--I cannot even fathom how this is physically possible. I was a little disappointed that he just looked like a normal guy--it seemed like he should at least have had a super-suit.
Overall, I finished ahead of 83 other people. Last time, I finished ahead of 9 people and that was only because Moses let me walk across the finish line first. This really just means that I improved from "pathetically slow" to "slow," but I'll take it. I'm glad we ended up going and we'll probably do it again. We are constantly asked why we would ever endeavor something like this race, and honestly that's still a hard question for me to answer, even with the great experience I had this year. I think it comes down to the intense sense of satisfaction that comes from doing something really challenging, something that is so far outside of normal everyday life that its outcome is not at all predictable. There's also something great about taking on that challenge with a bunch of other people--whether you know them or not--and being part of this thing that was hard and scary and fun all at the same time. Or maybe the answer is really just the classic "because it's there" and also, now, "because I can." (And maybe also "because my brother might get a leg cramp and I will drop him on a hill.")
Wednesday, September 1, 2010
I've been thinking about:
1. Imogene. It's one week and two days away and my prospects are bleak. Busy summer means not a lot of training means ohmygoodnessI'mprobablygoingtodieonamountaininColorado.
2. Wow, I didn't blog the entire month of August.
3. Holy cow, it is already September.
4. Holy cow, the weather is already turning cold.
5. Holy cow, my baby started second grade two weeks ago and he's brilliant.
6. I can't believe how attached I am to my dog. I expected to feel some mild affection for him, enough to tolerate all the necessary dog care, but I really thought my affection would be more of an off-shoot of Garion's affection. Not so. He follows me around everywhere I go and sleeps on my feet and I can no longer imagine life without a dog. 6 months--that's all it took.
7. My neighbors have chickens. Based on my understanding of the zoning ordinances and my extensive knowledge of chicken physiology, they are Outlaw Chickens. I can see them from my office window and hear them clucking around all day and I am COMPLETELY jealous. Maybe I will just get chickens and not tell Moses, and, probably, he wouldn't even notice. I'd keep them on the side of the house where he never goes and when they cluck and squawk, I will just blame the noise on the neighbor's chickens!
8. Last weekend we went camping with good friends and I absolutely love having friends who understand the very important skill of social reading--sitting around in proximity to other people while reading and not having to engage in conversation because it is not necessary to talk all the time.
9. Despite a ridiculously late start, I managed to grow tomatoes this year. Yay!! I cannot make them turn red. Boo!!
10. I am reading a book to Garion in which the main character pseudo-swears by saying "brussel sprouts!" I like this. I am going to adopt this.
11. Brussel sprouts! I'm only a couple of months away from 35 and therefore only 5 years away from 40 and, brussel sprouts!, this life thing is going too fast and I would like my money back please.
2. Wow, I didn't blog the entire month of August.
3. Holy cow, it is already September.
4. Holy cow, the weather is already turning cold.
5. Holy cow, my baby started second grade two weeks ago and he's brilliant.
6. I can't believe how attached I am to my dog. I expected to feel some mild affection for him, enough to tolerate all the necessary dog care, but I really thought my affection would be more of an off-shoot of Garion's affection. Not so. He follows me around everywhere I go and sleeps on my feet and I can no longer imagine life without a dog. 6 months--that's all it took.
7. My neighbors have chickens. Based on my understanding of the zoning ordinances and my extensive knowledge of chicken physiology, they are Outlaw Chickens. I can see them from my office window and hear them clucking around all day and I am COMPLETELY jealous. Maybe I will just get chickens and not tell Moses, and, probably, he wouldn't even notice. I'd keep them on the side of the house where he never goes and when they cluck and squawk, I will just blame the noise on the neighbor's chickens!
8. Last weekend we went camping with good friends and I absolutely love having friends who understand the very important skill of social reading--sitting around in proximity to other people while reading and not having to engage in conversation because it is not necessary to talk all the time.
9. Despite a ridiculously late start, I managed to grow tomatoes this year. Yay!! I cannot make them turn red. Boo!!
10. I am reading a book to Garion in which the main character pseudo-swears by saying "brussel sprouts!" I like this. I am going to adopt this.
11. Brussel sprouts! I'm only a couple of months away from 35 and therefore only 5 years away from 40 and, brussel sprouts!, this life thing is going too fast and I would like my money back please.
Tuesday, July 27, 2010
How to Cross-Train for Imogene in 25 Easy Steps:
1. Hop on your bike and pedal down to the elementary school where your child is attending summer camp.
2. Sign child out and watch him take his sweet time moseying down the longest school corridor known to man and wonder if he'll make it to the end before you start going gray.
3. Place bicycle helmet on child.
4. Place your 50+ pound child on the back of your xtracycle:
5. Realize you must start the whole ordeal home by pedaling up hill. With 50+ pounds of wiggliness on the back of your bike.
6. Start pedaling.
7. Realize there is much uphill between school and your home.
8. Give a very sincere "thanks!" to the mom getting out of her car to pick up her kid who said to you "you're my hero!"
9. Realize you are only about 25% of the way up the first hill and have not even passed the school grounds yet.
10. Hope the mom with the compliment is already inside so she does not see you collapse.
11. Make to top of hill! Huzzah!
12. Realize top of hill is immediately followed by another hill (that is just so Flagstaff).
13. Get off and walk and make child walk too (it's good for him, builds character).
14. Resume riding when the hill is not so steep.
15. Realize that "not so steep uphill" is still uphill.
16. Wonder if you are too young for an exercise-induced heart attack.
17. Wonder if you are burning enough calories to work off all that ice cream.
18. In light of potential calorie consumption, keep going.
19. Despite a severe lack of oxygen, try to hold up your end of your child's conversation about..........something. Realize grunting will placate child and give up on conversation.
20. Confront the steep hill leading to your home and wonder who's dumb idea it was to buy a house at the top of a hill.
21. Get off bike and walk up the hill and make child walk too (it's good for him--builds character).
22. At child's urging, get back on bike to ride the last 100 ft of flat road at the top of the hill to your home.
23. Get off of bike.
24. Die a little.
25. Go make dinner.
2. Sign child out and watch him take his sweet time moseying down the longest school corridor known to man and wonder if he'll make it to the end before you start going gray.
3. Place bicycle helmet on child.
4. Place your 50+ pound child on the back of your xtracycle:
5. Realize you must start the whole ordeal home by pedaling up hill. With 50+ pounds of wiggliness on the back of your bike.
6. Start pedaling.
7. Realize there is much uphill between school and your home.
8. Give a very sincere "thanks!" to the mom getting out of her car to pick up her kid who said to you "you're my hero!"
9. Realize you are only about 25% of the way up the first hill and have not even passed the school grounds yet.
10. Hope the mom with the compliment is already inside so she does not see you collapse.
11. Make to top of hill! Huzzah!
12. Realize top of hill is immediately followed by another hill (that is just so Flagstaff).
13. Get off and walk and make child walk too (it's good for him, builds character).
14. Resume riding when the hill is not so steep.
15. Realize that "not so steep uphill" is still uphill.
16. Wonder if you are too young for an exercise-induced heart attack.
17. Wonder if you are burning enough calories to work off all that ice cream.
18. In light of potential calorie consumption, keep going.
19. Despite a severe lack of oxygen, try to hold up your end of your child's conversation about..........something. Realize grunting will placate child and give up on conversation.
20. Confront the steep hill leading to your home and wonder who's dumb idea it was to buy a house at the top of a hill.
21. Get off bike and walk up the hill and make child walk too (it's good for him--builds character).
22. At child's urging, get back on bike to ride the last 100 ft of flat road at the top of the hill to your home.
23. Get off of bike.
24. Die a little.
25. Go make dinner.
Thursday, July 22, 2010
I Wish It Would Never End
Summer in Flagstaff is like homemade vanilla ice cream. You know, the kind you make in one of those old fashioned ice cream makers with the ice and the rock salt? And somebody has to crank and crank and crank while the cream mixture freezes? And when it is done you end up with a sweet, slightly salty, confection that is perfect in its creamy simplicity? That kind of homemade ice cream. The cranking part is winter. Over and over and over you shovel and pile on sweaters, and curse snow and although you know that, in theory, there is a season called summer that does not require wool socks, you are pretty sure it is never, ever going to happen. But eventually it does....and oh man, is it good. It is warm and sunny and everything smells like pine trees and you can wear your Chaco sandals everywhere to everything because in Flagstaff they pass for dress shoes (this is the sweet part). And then just when it starts to get a touch too hot, and fans are not quite enough to take the edge off the afternoon heat, the thunderstorms come and they are cool and dramatic and beautiful (this is that bit of salt that cuts the sweetness perfectly). And then there are just all the amazing things happening here in the summer. Like concerts in the park. The city books local bands to play in the park on Wednesday evenings. For free. And there are arts and crafts to keep kids entertained and everybody comes with their blankets, and dinners, and fallen brownies, and sits around with friends and family to shoot the breeze and listen to some live music. Last night it was reggae. My friend's dad remarked (with a dash of sarcasm) "wow, I wish the music was a little more political." And even though you'd think all that social justice would be a little for a heavy for Wednesday evening, it was okay. Because people were dancing, and kids were playing soccer, and the day's storm clouds were just starting to move along and there was an incredible rainbow over the whole thing. And that is just about as good as summer gets.
Tuesday, July 20, 2010
Imperfect Blogging and Fallen Browinies
Ugh. My blogging has so ground to stunning halt. I am constantly thinking of things that I want to write about, want to share, but this particular time in my life seems to be one of immense busy-ness. And I do not love the busy-ness. I love having nothing to do. I crave time to play in the river at my mom's house (hi, Mom! I think busy-ness or no, we're coming your way this weekend). I crave time to read, to camp, to hike (without a time goal, damn Imogene training), to go somewhere just for the fun of it, or to have NOTHING to do for a whole weekend. And also to have twice weekly visits from the laundry fairy. Anyway, I was reading one of my favorite blogs, Walk Slowly, Live Widly this evening and she posted about imperfect blogging. And I think that's it. If I want to blog I should blog and forget about making every post a try for the World's Best Blog Post Ever. Of course, even imperfect blogging takes time so I am probably kidding myself, but I apparently need to kid myself about regular blogging or growing my hair on a rotating cycle of approximately six month intervals. Since I have presently given up on growing out my hair, I will work on more regular blogging. In six months when I've failed at regular blogging, I'll switch and start working on growing out my hair again.
So. Onward. This is what we've been up to:
As mentioned in my last post, Moses and I celebrated our 10th anniversary in May by heading to Moab. I got Moses a spiffy camera so that he could pose with it and make faces at me while I photographed him with my less-spiffy camera.
Moses also went to D.C. for a week to sit in hotel conference room and read grant proposals and then took Garion to Utah for a few days of field work. He's been busy too.
The first week in July we headed to Washington state to visit Moses's mom, step-dad, and assorted siblings, nieces, and nephews. This was the first time Garion had met many of his cousins and shenanigans ensued.
Here's a sampling of the cousins (notice the 2-year old totally doing his own thing off to the right--that is the totally adorable part of 2-year olds):
On the way home we went to visit Moses's oldest brother who lives with his wife near Lake Shasta. We visit them because they have a boat. Oh, and also we like them. And they gave us Harley. Garion would have ridden the inner tube thingy all the way home to Flagstaff if he could have.
The drive from Flagstaff to Washington took us approximate 3 days each way. Ohmygoodness. Garion and Harley were champs for the most part. This was on the way home after about a week of not enough sleep because it stays light until 10-freakin'-p.m. in the Pacific Northwest:
Between the traveling, Garion's attended Invention Camp (he invented a mind-reader), swimming lessons, and summer FACTS (basically a place to park your kid for the summer if you work) and that all requires dropping off and picking up and for some reason that is all more onerous in the summer. Seriously, why do we not have teleporters yet?
Tomorrow night we are going to the Wednesday evening Concert in the Park (yay for Flagstaff in the summer!!) We're meeting some friends and several other families and engaging in some sort of pot luck dinner. My assignment was dessert. I made peanut butter cup cupcake brownies and they sank. I think though that if I make everybody consider them from this highly artistic angle they will not notice:
As in, "yes you may have a brownie but only if you hold it over your head at this precise angle to look at it before you eat it."
So. Onward. This is what we've been up to:
As mentioned in my last post, Moses and I celebrated our 10th anniversary in May by heading to Moab. I got Moses a spiffy camera so that he could pose with it and make faces at me while I photographed him with my less-spiffy camera.
Moses also went to D.C. for a week to sit in hotel conference room and read grant proposals and then took Garion to Utah for a few days of field work. He's been busy too.The first week in July we headed to Washington state to visit Moses's mom, step-dad, and assorted siblings, nieces, and nephews. This was the first time Garion had met many of his cousins and shenanigans ensued.
Here's a sampling of the cousins (notice the 2-year old totally doing his own thing off to the right--that is the totally adorable part of 2-year olds):
On the way home we went to visit Moses's oldest brother who lives with his wife near Lake Shasta. We visit them because they have a boat. Oh, and also we like them. And they gave us Harley. Garion would have ridden the inner tube thingy all the way home to Flagstaff if he could have.
The drive from Flagstaff to Washington took us approximate 3 days each way. Ohmygoodness. Garion and Harley were champs for the most part. This was on the way home after about a week of not enough sleep because it stays light until 10-freakin'-p.m. in the Pacific Northwest:
Between the traveling, Garion's attended Invention Camp (he invented a mind-reader), swimming lessons, and summer FACTS (basically a place to park your kid for the summer if you work) and that all requires dropping off and picking up and for some reason that is all more onerous in the summer. Seriously, why do we not have teleporters yet? Tomorrow night we are going to the Wednesday evening Concert in the Park (yay for Flagstaff in the summer!!) We're meeting some friends and several other families and engaging in some sort of pot luck dinner. My assignment was dessert. I made peanut butter cup cupcake brownies and they sank. I think though that if I make everybody consider them from this highly artistic angle they will not notice:
As in, "yes you may have a brownie but only if you hold it over your head at this precise angle to look at it before you eat it."
Sunday, June 6, 2010
A Decade
Last week, Moses and I celebrated our 10th wedding anniversary. Ten years has the peculiar quality of seeming at once to be a really long time-as in, wow we've been married forever--and also a very short time--as in wow already?, that went fast. When we were preparing for marriage, we wrote letters to our future selves talking about what our expectations for marriage were and what we were feeling at the time. I confess that I was more than a little relieved to discover that we chose a crappy pen to write these letters and the ink has faded to illegibility. Thankfully we were better at choosing partners than choosing writing instruments. We were 24 when we got married. Last week we both had the same reaction when considering our 24-year-old selves: "24? What were thinking? We knew nothing, we were idiots, we had no idea what we were getting ourselves in for. We were still in school, for crying out loud. Our combined annual income was just over a tenth of what it is now. Did anybody try to warn us? Were we just not paying attention?" Thankfully our 24-year-old selves seemed to have stumbled into a pretty good life-I think that after 10 years we can officially count ourselves as in for the long haul.
I've been wanting to write something that reflects on ten years of marriage, what it means and what I've learned. On our eighth wedding anniversary, I posted our wedding vows and the ones that I would take had we written our own-after being married 8 years-and I hold true to those.
Well, I try. I don't manage it everyday, but I think I get there more days than not.
It turns out that, for me, our 10th anniversary was not so much a time to reflect on the deeper truths of marriage, but simply a time to revel in the years we've had together, and that is difficult to express. Then, today, we had a virtual conversation (Moses is traveling, thus the text messages, not that we haven't been known to text message across the living room) that sums it up nicely:
M: Flight from NC to DC delayed
K: Sorry about your flight. Miss you already.
M: I love you. Equal parts teq (tequila), tripsec (triple sec), lime, sweeten to taste, add ice wait 1 min.
In case you missed it, that conversation was about how draining it is to deal with a 7-year-old chatter-box non-stop all day without someone to deflect the 7-year-old's attention. And Moses got it, and he made me laugh, and that's what's great about 10 years.
I've been wanting to write something that reflects on ten years of marriage, what it means and what I've learned. On our eighth wedding anniversary, I posted our wedding vows and the ones that I would take had we written our own-after being married 8 years-and I hold true to those.
Well, I try. I don't manage it everyday, but I think I get there more days than not.
It turns out that, for me, our 10th anniversary was not so much a time to reflect on the deeper truths of marriage, but simply a time to revel in the years we've had together, and that is difficult to express. Then, today, we had a virtual conversation (Moses is traveling, thus the text messages, not that we haven't been known to text message across the living room) that sums it up nicely:
M: Flight from NC to DC delayed
K: Sorry about your flight. Miss you already.
M: I love you. Equal parts teq (tequila), tripsec (triple sec), lime, sweeten to taste, add ice wait 1 min.
In case you missed it, that conversation was about how draining it is to deal with a 7-year-old chatter-box non-stop all day without someone to deflect the 7-year-old's attention. And Moses got it, and he made me laugh, and that's what's great about 10 years.
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