I have been thinking of what to say here for a few months now...and I am charging through this persistent resistance to say "it" - whatever it is in this moment, regardless of the words I've spun in my head up until now.
I am struggling between spilling over the moment, and coursing back to fish out all the things that have occurred since that night in the Newark airport, back in December.
This moment wins.
I just had a truly wonderful birthday gathering. I am beaming still, though I my body is now the only one inhabiting this house. I had 32 people celebrating me! They arm wrestled me. They hugged me and kissed me. They snuggled with me. They ate the 70 chocolate pancakes I made. They made oodles of delicious food and drink to share. They laughed with me. They filled me with gratitude for being alive, right here and now.
I turn now to reflection on the traveling life, for which this blog was created. The road trip is over. Yes, it's sad--but also right. The time was nigh to make a new home, to plant our roots where we've been itching to plant them: smack dab (who came up with that phrase!? it's spot on swell) in the middle of a community of people we've been getting to know and love for about 4 years now.
We arrived in California by plane for ostensibly one month, back in December, for family holiday time, a wedding in Yosemite, and some community events in the bay area. Once we got here, it felt so good, and so necessary, that we decided to stay.
We let go of our plans to drive southward along the east coast and visit places and people in the southern states for a couple months. Instead, we talked about flying back out on our return plane ticket in the spring, greeting 2 new babies (two friend expecting in May), and officially finishing off the road trip together with a balmy drive back across the country on Route 80.
Two weeks into our fabulous sublet in Emeryville, we got the call from our very generous and accomodating friends (playing host to our van and pod in PA), that they would be moving to Chicago at the end of February. I had just procured temporary employement, looking like it might become permanent employement, with a Fair Trade craft company in Berkeley. Adam was loathe to devote the time and energy it would take to drive back across the country by himself and then recover from it, having just gotten back in his work groove. So, we opted for plan C: Adam flew back on our return ticket to PA on a redeye flight, attended our friends' baby shower the following day, loaded the van and pod into separate trucks for the trip back to CA, dropped in on our old friend New York for a night, and flew back in one-way JetBlue style to CA. He stunned the shipyard crew with his millimeters to spare loading of the pod into the shipment container. It was an epic end-journey.
Now, the pod is back (I hugged it when I saw it), we have rented a fabulous flat in Oakland, I just celebrated my 27th birthday (a couple days early), and I'm off to my wonderful women's circle.
Three cheers for the incredible journey of life, and for delayed gratification.
Sunday, March 12, 2006
Sunday, December 11, 2005
oh, this traveling life
Just one of the many things we are attempting on this trip would be enough. For instance, a food tour. A national park tour. A visiting friends and family tour. A working/writing-only tour. A city sight-seeing tour. As do millions in America, we are multitasking.
I am weary of configuring and reconfiguring our plans. Tonight we are headed back to CA for a month for some more familiar multitasking between the bay area and Santa Barbara - plus a wedding in Yosemite in January. While I long for the ease of familiarity, I also feel in limbo between what I know and what I would like to know - not quite psyched up for either. Of course, we will still be traveling at home, as we have no permanent residence. So, perhaps it is really our very own place that I long for more than anything else. A home base. And yet I am disinclined to relinquish our vagabond life, in which daily life is more challenging, but also more provocative and refreshing. The pendulum has a longer swing between exhaustion and elation.
Enough of this contemplative circle of thought. How about some food?
I had my first Moroccan food in Northampton, MA back in November, before Thanksgiving covered us in our first road trip snow in Westford, MA. Tagine Kefta arrived 'neath a ceramic circus tent under warm lights in a small room crammed with tables, chairs and bodies. I reflected with delight that there are always new ways to have my favorite meat: lamb. Hankering for sweets post-kefta brought me to check out honey drops, bird's nests, and bourma. All variations of honey, papery dough, and nuts.
We have done a New York pizza tour of sorts. The thiner the crust and the more caramelized the onions, the better. I had a rainbow assortment of sushi the day after Thanksgiving with our friend Jon's family. My single contribution to the menu choices - sea urchin - was my least favorite. Both squishy and chewy and with a flavor my tongue could not decide upon, I understood why one of the characters on Lost threw it up though he was desperate for protein. Yes, we are addicted to another TV show. We anxiously await the moment when iTunes updates its show list with last week's episode. They are late. Is there some holiday break in prime time we don't know about? Bit torrent doesn't have it either.
By the middle of our 3-day stint in the fabled city of many a story (NYC), I had abandoned any semblance of dietary goodness. Two hot dogs and a surprisingly ubiquitous papaya drink late on Friday night were the clinchers. Since then I've been eating tons of pizza and corn bread and pancakes and toast (I've recently discovered that my digestive tract is fed up with the oldest domesticated grain and lets me know this every time I ingest it), and meat without regard to its life before my gastric juices.
I have learned not to listen to random people in bus stations when it comes to finding the right terminal, floor, and corridor. Luckily we had some minutes to spare while we careened around Port Authority, sweating in down jackets pressed into our backs by ungainly backpacks. Now we are in for the long wait: a flight delayed one hour, due to arrive in San Francisco at 1:45 am by our bodies. This is the first time in recent memory that battery life on laptops and iPods is of utmost concern. Not generally accustomed to 6-hour flights and all the attendant travel it takes to get oneself from Park Slope in Brooklyn to the gate at Newark's Liberty International, I was unprepared for this. Shoulda found out about that battery life law suit for my iPod earlier, before the chance to get a replacement for free expired.
While my state of mind is one of weariness and this blog seems like a lot of complaining, I have had a lot of exhilaration and glee since my last post. Since I can no longer see the beginning of this blog in my text editor, I will tell you about only one of those rapturous moments and leave the rest to arise in later posts: rounding the corner inside the traveling Bodies exhibit to see a vermillion, sea-creature spectacle of blood vessels - a human body comprised of nothing else but its circulatory system, suspended and encased in clear plastic. That was one moment in 2 hours of gazing intently at silicon polymer-preserved human bodies. Neither Adam nor I are much for museums, but this was a hearty exception.
Here's to a safe flight and to all who have helped us along our way.
I am weary of configuring and reconfiguring our plans. Tonight we are headed back to CA for a month for some more familiar multitasking between the bay area and Santa Barbara - plus a wedding in Yosemite in January. While I long for the ease of familiarity, I also feel in limbo between what I know and what I would like to know - not quite psyched up for either. Of course, we will still be traveling at home, as we have no permanent residence. So, perhaps it is really our very own place that I long for more than anything else. A home base. And yet I am disinclined to relinquish our vagabond life, in which daily life is more challenging, but also more provocative and refreshing. The pendulum has a longer swing between exhaustion and elation.
Enough of this contemplative circle of thought. How about some food?
I had my first Moroccan food in Northampton, MA back in November, before Thanksgiving covered us in our first road trip snow in Westford, MA. Tagine Kefta arrived 'neath a ceramic circus tent under warm lights in a small room crammed with tables, chairs and bodies. I reflected with delight that there are always new ways to have my favorite meat: lamb. Hankering for sweets post-kefta brought me to check out honey drops, bird's nests, and bourma. All variations of honey, papery dough, and nuts.
We have done a New York pizza tour of sorts. The thiner the crust and the more caramelized the onions, the better. I had a rainbow assortment of sushi the day after Thanksgiving with our friend Jon's family. My single contribution to the menu choices - sea urchin - was my least favorite. Both squishy and chewy and with a flavor my tongue could not decide upon, I understood why one of the characters on Lost threw it up though he was desperate for protein. Yes, we are addicted to another TV show. We anxiously await the moment when iTunes updates its show list with last week's episode. They are late. Is there some holiday break in prime time we don't know about? Bit torrent doesn't have it either.
By the middle of our 3-day stint in the fabled city of many a story (NYC), I had abandoned any semblance of dietary goodness. Two hot dogs and a surprisingly ubiquitous papaya drink late on Friday night were the clinchers. Since then I've been eating tons of pizza and corn bread and pancakes and toast (I've recently discovered that my digestive tract is fed up with the oldest domesticated grain and lets me know this every time I ingest it), and meat without regard to its life before my gastric juices.
I have learned not to listen to random people in bus stations when it comes to finding the right terminal, floor, and corridor. Luckily we had some minutes to spare while we careened around Port Authority, sweating in down jackets pressed into our backs by ungainly backpacks. Now we are in for the long wait: a flight delayed one hour, due to arrive in San Francisco at 1:45 am by our bodies. This is the first time in recent memory that battery life on laptops and iPods is of utmost concern. Not generally accustomed to 6-hour flights and all the attendant travel it takes to get oneself from Park Slope in Brooklyn to the gate at Newark's Liberty International, I was unprepared for this. Shoulda found out about that battery life law suit for my iPod earlier, before the chance to get a replacement for free expired.
While my state of mind is one of weariness and this blog seems like a lot of complaining, I have had a lot of exhilaration and glee since my last post. Since I can no longer see the beginning of this blog in my text editor, I will tell you about only one of those rapturous moments and leave the rest to arise in later posts: rounding the corner inside the traveling Bodies exhibit to see a vermillion, sea-creature spectacle of blood vessels - a human body comprised of nothing else but its circulatory system, suspended and encased in clear plastic. That was one moment in 2 hours of gazing intently at silicon polymer-preserved human bodies. Neither Adam nor I are much for museums, but this was a hearty exception.
Here's to a safe flight and to all who have helped us along our way.
Sunday, November 20, 2005
Memories of Maine
Maine is all memories now. Now that we are in a quiet whirlwind of moving on. We have made Haymarket Cafe in Northampton, Mass. a new workspace. It's warm and dimly lit with orangey hues and endlessly satisfying music. The smells tempt me up the stairs to the case of cookies and cakes, to the delicious hot chocolate and cardamom-heavy chai. Today I made my way through a melting chocolate banana oatmeal mound and the whipped-cream topped, wide mug of cocoa. I am listening, disjointedly, to the music of other cafe-goers, shared on their iTunes. The tables are fraught with laptops in this college-surrounded town. Adam is happy to see so many macs, not in the least part because bought Apple stock recently.
Our first night here we met new friends Emily and Bucky, burners who have shared their parking lot and kitchen and bathroom and outlet and lives with us for the past few days. We danced to psytrance at Tully O'Reilly's. We ate yet another of our thai curries, this one with kabocha squash and a strange consistency we attributed to our coconut milk's stint in the freezing weather. We played Stoner Fluxx, a card game that had us exchanging confused looks at every turn. We met their friends. We toured the store/yoga/massage studio center they're busily preparing to open. We were entertained by their two black cats, about as frisky as they come. We got transportation and cafe advice. We have marveled at the ease and comfort of finding community with strangers.
Though enjoying the new digs, I am missing my friends whose lives we shared for 5 weeks in the quiet of the northeasternmost part of this giant country. The size of the states here make me realize that California is much more like its own country than a mere state. I would rather be the governor of a smaller state like Maine or Massachusetts. Not that I have gubernatorial plans, just theoretically. The sheer variety of landscapes across the continent boggles my mind repeatedly.
I am remembering the brilliant white moon and stars, how I gazed up at them on my way to bed in K&K's front yard. The chill air brightened those nightly points of light and it never ceased to call me starward when the clouds were away. I remember seeing earth's unmistakable neighboring red planet slung below the full belly of the moon.
I remember how the hill across Lake Chickawaukie turned from maddening green to canary to bronze to brown. I remember running hard and fast up and down the car-less Pheasant Street, my breath visible in the impending dusk, seeing the bare trees on the hills beyond as if they were permanent mist coursing slowly among the last of the autumn colors.
I remember endless wheelbarrow loads of firewood, during hardly thought, but instead heard endless repeats of ridiculous versions of familiar songs--like Frosty the Snowman was a strange and dapper man...or something like that--until I pushed the needle to a new song on the vinyl of my memory.
I remember so many galleries and antique shops that they all became a blur of places I stopped seeing. I remember a rain jacket yellow house and an old red car parked in front, the kind you might picture James Dean riding in, cigarette in the corner of his tilted smile, forever announcing his iconic coolness. A "For Sale" sign hung in the window.
I remember smiling at the first bite of a molasses glazed donut, from Willow Street Bakery, thinking, "Well, here it is. The real donut I've been searching for." I remember being amazed at how short this long-awaited thrill lasted, and how long my hunger for such an odd choice for an obsession remained.
I remember laughing in the living room, the four of us, entertained at the end of the day by nearly anything. Jasmine's dreamed chicken-chase, or Kevin's sugar-infused non sequiturs, or my unintended innuendos, or Adam's dependable puns, or Kelly's latest thoughts on a name for the nutkin (and extended absurdity thereon).
I remember Adam saying, "You got to ride it!" incredulous as I dismounted from the tow truck's lift, having steered trogdor to its safe transport spot atop a flatbed in downtown Camden. I remember thinking perhaps we were cursed in our quest to get to Acadia when the same wire that kept us from going that first time disconnected yet again after a mediocre meal at the Chocolate Grill in a town midway to the famed island. I remember feeling vindicated as we persevered and a quick fix had us on our way.
I remember scrambling up Nurembega Mountain and feeling so small and large at once as I crested the top, gazing down at the fjord and towns spread out wide below me.
I remember the moon laying a jagged pool of white light down on the lawn in the quiet, wee hours of the morning, as I walked to the house for a drink of water. I remember seeing the big dipper through the small frame of the bathroom window, the house quiet and the sky filling the space around me.
I remember too many Raelin quotes to record or count or remember:
"Adam, I want you to laugh at the fire!"
"I JUST want to get a diaper, Juli." (while shrugging shoulders)
"You can't look at me."
"You can't put your [arm, face, hand] on my chair."
"I need to go to the co-op and the post office."
I remember smelling sweet potato chips as I walked down the street alone in the hard rain. I remember being filled with amazement as we sat in the packed Strand Theater, watching Evelyn Glennie bust out a heartfelt rhythm on plates and cups on the ground, on a snare drum in the middle of Grand Central, wild hair obscuring her vision, percussing with a Taiko group, in a huge warehouse on pipes and bannisters and walls. I remember the rapid gathering of pieces in my understanding of what she means by touching sound.
I remember lots of delicious meals and lots of laughter and lots of dishes and dog hair and hugs and heart-melting Raelin moments. I remember friendship and comfort and not wanting to say goodbye.
Our first night here we met new friends Emily and Bucky, burners who have shared their parking lot and kitchen and bathroom and outlet and lives with us for the past few days. We danced to psytrance at Tully O'Reilly's. We ate yet another of our thai curries, this one with kabocha squash and a strange consistency we attributed to our coconut milk's stint in the freezing weather. We played Stoner Fluxx, a card game that had us exchanging confused looks at every turn. We met their friends. We toured the store/yoga/massage studio center they're busily preparing to open. We were entertained by their two black cats, about as frisky as they come. We got transportation and cafe advice. We have marveled at the ease and comfort of finding community with strangers.
Though enjoying the new digs, I am missing my friends whose lives we shared for 5 weeks in the quiet of the northeasternmost part of this giant country. The size of the states here make me realize that California is much more like its own country than a mere state. I would rather be the governor of a smaller state like Maine or Massachusetts. Not that I have gubernatorial plans, just theoretically. The sheer variety of landscapes across the continent boggles my mind repeatedly.
I am remembering the brilliant white moon and stars, how I gazed up at them on my way to bed in K&K's front yard. The chill air brightened those nightly points of light and it never ceased to call me starward when the clouds were away. I remember seeing earth's unmistakable neighboring red planet slung below the full belly of the moon.
I remember how the hill across Lake Chickawaukie turned from maddening green to canary to bronze to brown. I remember running hard and fast up and down the car-less Pheasant Street, my breath visible in the impending dusk, seeing the bare trees on the hills beyond as if they were permanent mist coursing slowly among the last of the autumn colors.
I remember endless wheelbarrow loads of firewood, during hardly thought, but instead heard endless repeats of ridiculous versions of familiar songs--like Frosty the Snowman was a strange and dapper man...or something like that--until I pushed the needle to a new song on the vinyl of my memory.
I remember so many galleries and antique shops that they all became a blur of places I stopped seeing. I remember a rain jacket yellow house and an old red car parked in front, the kind you might picture James Dean riding in, cigarette in the corner of his tilted smile, forever announcing his iconic coolness. A "For Sale" sign hung in the window.
I remember smiling at the first bite of a molasses glazed donut, from Willow Street Bakery, thinking, "Well, here it is. The real donut I've been searching for." I remember being amazed at how short this long-awaited thrill lasted, and how long my hunger for such an odd choice for an obsession remained.
I remember laughing in the living room, the four of us, entertained at the end of the day by nearly anything. Jasmine's dreamed chicken-chase, or Kevin's sugar-infused non sequiturs, or my unintended innuendos, or Adam's dependable puns, or Kelly's latest thoughts on a name for the nutkin (and extended absurdity thereon).
I remember Adam saying, "You got to ride it!" incredulous as I dismounted from the tow truck's lift, having steered trogdor to its safe transport spot atop a flatbed in downtown Camden. I remember thinking perhaps we were cursed in our quest to get to Acadia when the same wire that kept us from going that first time disconnected yet again after a mediocre meal at the Chocolate Grill in a town midway to the famed island. I remember feeling vindicated as we persevered and a quick fix had us on our way.
I remember scrambling up Nurembega Mountain and feeling so small and large at once as I crested the top, gazing down at the fjord and towns spread out wide below me.
I remember the moon laying a jagged pool of white light down on the lawn in the quiet, wee hours of the morning, as I walked to the house for a drink of water. I remember seeing the big dipper through the small frame of the bathroom window, the house quiet and the sky filling the space around me.
I remember too many Raelin quotes to record or count or remember:
"Adam, I want you to laugh at the fire!"
"I JUST want to get a diaper, Juli." (while shrugging shoulders)
"You can't look at me."
"You can't put your [arm, face, hand] on my chair."
"I need to go to the co-op and the post office."
I remember smelling sweet potato chips as I walked down the street alone in the hard rain. I remember being filled with amazement as we sat in the packed Strand Theater, watching Evelyn Glennie bust out a heartfelt rhythm on plates and cups on the ground, on a snare drum in the middle of Grand Central, wild hair obscuring her vision, percussing with a Taiko group, in a huge warehouse on pipes and bannisters and walls. I remember the rapid gathering of pieces in my understanding of what she means by touching sound.
I remember lots of delicious meals and lots of laughter and lots of dishes and dog hair and hugs and heart-melting Raelin moments. I remember friendship and comfort and not wanting to say goodbye.
Wednesday, November 09, 2005
obsessions, hair, and fall
Today I drove through winding streets lined with cloud-strewn, bare branches of turning trees, watching the world prepare for winter. Many shops in these small towns were once houses, making a search for places of business a bit of a hunt. I spent far too long pondering the qualities of Claire Fontaine notebooks in a beautifully stocked art supply store on Main Street in Camden. There was an entire rack of my new favorite line of books with blank pages, and I think I touched nearly all of the notebooks on the circular rack in two passes round, testing out how flat the pages lay down, how springy the binding is when folded in half, how thinly the lines are printed, whether there were any without any lines at all (there weren't), whether it would be better to have fewer pages (so I can fill it up quicker and feel a sense of completeness sooner), or more (so that I feel quite substantial when I'm only half-way through), how large the pages should be, what color the cover is.
You can see that unless you have a fond obsession with notebooks (and pens, for that matter), as I do, this would be horrifying tedium. But this is my idea of fun. One of 'em, anyway.
I figured giving myself some leisure time browsing notebooks and pens (I did end up buying one horizontally lined, left-hand spiral-bound, green covered, 6x9 inch notebook at last) was a good way to take care of myself after having, only a few minutes beforehand, gotten a lot of hair tenacious ripped out of my skin. Not only that, the esthetician had a surprisingly difficult time getting the edges of the hard wax (a new kind for me) up so she could pull the whole strip off. Translation: prolonged pain where there is usually one quick rip and then a few seconds to recover for the next one. She was very cheery and apologized for whatever it was she was doing differently that created this rather awkward scenario. I usually give a tip, but decided it was perfectly fine not to.
I have perpetually mixed feelings about body hair. On the one hand, I'm theoretically pro-naturale. On the other, I prefer bare armpits to go with sleeveless dresses and most tank tops, and bare legs with skirts and most shorts. And I don't appreciate how socks feel on hairy ankles. On the other hand, sometimes I feel silly with bare armpits. It's like there's something missing. Especially if I have on an ass-kicking tank top and am doing something like, say, lifting weights, or standing with my hands on my hips, supervising meat-grilling. I like to feel burly. And as those of who who know me know, I have the biceps to back it up.
After at first joining the adolescent ranks of shaving legs and underarms, I swore off for years. It was a high school pact I made with three of my cohorts in Track and Cross Country. I hated shaving anyway, particularly under my arms. When one of those 3, still a dear friend, whom I consider to be more au naturale than I, told me she had her legs waxed recently, I was taken aback...and encouraged to try it out myself. It was sort of a wake-up call that I didn't have to stick with this hippie hair thing just because I had committed to it so long ago, or because it was part of my identity. I realized I was a little afraid to change in front of people who know me well. And I was afraid I would automatically be making some sort of blanket statement agreeing with mainstream TV-culture that it's gross to have hair and be a girl. I think the first time I had my legs waxed was just before our wedding 2 years ago. While the experience is rather unpleasant, at times more painful than I bargained for, the result of weeks with soft skin and no to very little sparse and soft hair is quite wonderful.
So now, I either grow it all out, or I have it waxed. No in between.
I think an Ani lyric is appropriate at this point (thanks danah!):
their eyes are all asking
are you in, or are you out
and i think, oh man,
what is this about?
tonight you can't put me
up on any shelf
'cause i came here alone
i'm gonna leave by myself
Well, this is interesting. I intended to tell you about the trees reaching toward the sky, the brilliant yellow maple next to stands of barren wooden arms, brown and papery leaves clinging tenaciously in the winds that sweep the world endlessly, moving the clouds about the blue, making a new glorious picture of the world every moment. I notice these things more when I'm moving through the land on wheels. When the scenery rushes toward me, over my head, into my eyes and heart, like dogs drink in scents with their plush, wet noses out the car window. Looking out the glass door at the lake and the changing face of the hill beyond (it's name is Dodge Mountain, but it looks like a hill to me), I get a just glimpse of that glee that surrounds me when I'm out in it, breathing the sharp, cold air, gazing at the brilliant stars, whose brightness tells me how cold it will be each night. These are some the things that will stay with me, in my bones, when we leave this beautiful place our dear friends call home.
You can see that unless you have a fond obsession with notebooks (and pens, for that matter), as I do, this would be horrifying tedium. But this is my idea of fun. One of 'em, anyway.
I figured giving myself some leisure time browsing notebooks and pens (I did end up buying one horizontally lined, left-hand spiral-bound, green covered, 6x9 inch notebook at last) was a good way to take care of myself after having, only a few minutes beforehand, gotten a lot of hair tenacious ripped out of my skin. Not only that, the esthetician had a surprisingly difficult time getting the edges of the hard wax (a new kind for me) up so she could pull the whole strip off. Translation: prolonged pain where there is usually one quick rip and then a few seconds to recover for the next one. She was very cheery and apologized for whatever it was she was doing differently that created this rather awkward scenario. I usually give a tip, but decided it was perfectly fine not to.
I have perpetually mixed feelings about body hair. On the one hand, I'm theoretically pro-naturale. On the other, I prefer bare armpits to go with sleeveless dresses and most tank tops, and bare legs with skirts and most shorts. And I don't appreciate how socks feel on hairy ankles. On the other hand, sometimes I feel silly with bare armpits. It's like there's something missing. Especially if I have on an ass-kicking tank top and am doing something like, say, lifting weights, or standing with my hands on my hips, supervising meat-grilling. I like to feel burly. And as those of who who know me know, I have the biceps to back it up.
After at first joining the adolescent ranks of shaving legs and underarms, I swore off for years. It was a high school pact I made with three of my cohorts in Track and Cross Country. I hated shaving anyway, particularly under my arms. When one of those 3, still a dear friend, whom I consider to be more au naturale than I, told me she had her legs waxed recently, I was taken aback...and encouraged to try it out myself. It was sort of a wake-up call that I didn't have to stick with this hippie hair thing just because I had committed to it so long ago, or because it was part of my identity. I realized I was a little afraid to change in front of people who know me well. And I was afraid I would automatically be making some sort of blanket statement agreeing with mainstream TV-culture that it's gross to have hair and be a girl. I think the first time I had my legs waxed was just before our wedding 2 years ago. While the experience is rather unpleasant, at times more painful than I bargained for, the result of weeks with soft skin and no to very little sparse and soft hair is quite wonderful.
So now, I either grow it all out, or I have it waxed. No in between.
I think an Ani lyric is appropriate at this point (thanks danah!):
their eyes are all asking
are you in, or are you out
and i think, oh man,
what is this about?
tonight you can't put me
up on any shelf
'cause i came here alone
i'm gonna leave by myself
Well, this is interesting. I intended to tell you about the trees reaching toward the sky, the brilliant yellow maple next to stands of barren wooden arms, brown and papery leaves clinging tenaciously in the winds that sweep the world endlessly, moving the clouds about the blue, making a new glorious picture of the world every moment. I notice these things more when I'm moving through the land on wheels. When the scenery rushes toward me, over my head, into my eyes and heart, like dogs drink in scents with their plush, wet noses out the car window. Looking out the glass door at the lake and the changing face of the hill beyond (it's name is Dodge Mountain, but it looks like a hill to me), I get a just glimpse of that glee that surrounds me when I'm out in it, breathing the sharp, cold air, gazing at the brilliant stars, whose brightness tells me how cold it will be each night. These are some the things that will stay with me, in my bones, when we leave this beautiful place our dear friends call home.
Monday, November 07, 2005
Today is not the best of days.
True, the sun was out.
But the quality of my experience had nothing to do with the weather.
It had to do with watching the van slide down hill a couple feet and many minutes of terror that Adam would flip the van trying to get up the slick lawn. You see, there was this idea. To use the van as a very large wheelbarrow so that the mountain of firewood would be a cinch to move to the back of the house here in Rockland. And it seemed good at the time, and it seemed like a 4-wheel drive vehicle would go down a slopey lawn and back with no problem. Kevin was a little doubtful, and it turns out he had good reason for that. The stress of the slide moment stayed with me for a few hours, really. I was without the structure I create for myself every day, having poured all this adrenaline and unexpected time into helping make sure the Adam and the van made it up to the front yard unharmed.
I retreated to the now level van, parked at an odd angle, to write a bit and to read. I'm reading The Opposite of Fate, by Amy Tan. It's a creative non-fiction book about her life as a writer. It's entirely fascinating and keeps me drawn in page after page. I felt a little better after a few chapters of a life far more outlandish and harrowing and grief-stricken than my own.
Then I made it to the post office to mail my absentee ballot overnight, since the Registrar's office didn't get the ballot out to me until yesterday. (Apparently all the voter deadlines for registration and requesting absentee ballots change when you're past the CA border). At the post office, the kind postal clerk told me that it's only guaranteed 2nd day. I asksed what could be done about this. She said nothing--Express mail is the fastest they've got. Something to do with the origin and destination zip codes made it impossible to guarantee overnight delivery. It was 4:30. I needed to get back home to start dinner. I grimaced and decided to hope for the best--why stop now when I've spent all this energy getting the damn thing here? There is a chance it will make it there tomorrow, she told me. Sigh.
Back home, I prepared my first ever stuffed, roasted chicken. It took a lot longer than I expected, partly because I misread the cooking time. Then the stuffing wasn't hot enough. I waited longer. The temperature guage poking out of the thigh (my cookbook said that was the place to put it) reaced 200 degrees. I decided to take the stuffing out and keep cooking it, so the chicken wouldn't get overdone. I carved the chicken with some difficulty, as I've done it all of 3 or 4 times in my life, mostly with raw chickens. Dinner was finally on the table nearly 2 hours later than anticipated. Then Kevin notices a slightly pink portion of his chicken leg. Adam gets this horrified look on his face. I can't believe the damn thing isn't cooked all the way. Adam points out the pink juice on the plate of chicken parts. Oh, for crying out loud! At some point I put a napkin over my head while everyone laughed about Adam's paranoia. Raelin came over to get under the napkin with me. That made me smile. I fought back the urge to give up and go to bed right then and there--cry myself to sleep.
Now I've had some chocolate and we're about to go to bed and watch our favorite distraction from life--Lost. May tomorrow bring some emotional tranquility and a better turn of events!
True, the sun was out.
But the quality of my experience had nothing to do with the weather.
It had to do with watching the van slide down hill a couple feet and many minutes of terror that Adam would flip the van trying to get up the slick lawn. You see, there was this idea. To use the van as a very large wheelbarrow so that the mountain of firewood would be a cinch to move to the back of the house here in Rockland. And it seemed good at the time, and it seemed like a 4-wheel drive vehicle would go down a slopey lawn and back with no problem. Kevin was a little doubtful, and it turns out he had good reason for that. The stress of the slide moment stayed with me for a few hours, really. I was without the structure I create for myself every day, having poured all this adrenaline and unexpected time into helping make sure the Adam and the van made it up to the front yard unharmed.
I retreated to the now level van, parked at an odd angle, to write a bit and to read. I'm reading The Opposite of Fate, by Amy Tan. It's a creative non-fiction book about her life as a writer. It's entirely fascinating and keeps me drawn in page after page. I felt a little better after a few chapters of a life far more outlandish and harrowing and grief-stricken than my own.
Then I made it to the post office to mail my absentee ballot overnight, since the Registrar's office didn't get the ballot out to me until yesterday. (Apparently all the voter deadlines for registration and requesting absentee ballots change when you're past the CA border). At the post office, the kind postal clerk told me that it's only guaranteed 2nd day. I asksed what could be done about this. She said nothing--Express mail is the fastest they've got. Something to do with the origin and destination zip codes made it impossible to guarantee overnight delivery. It was 4:30. I needed to get back home to start dinner. I grimaced and decided to hope for the best--why stop now when I've spent all this energy getting the damn thing here? There is a chance it will make it there tomorrow, she told me. Sigh.
Back home, I prepared my first ever stuffed, roasted chicken. It took a lot longer than I expected, partly because I misread the cooking time. Then the stuffing wasn't hot enough. I waited longer. The temperature guage poking out of the thigh (my cookbook said that was the place to put it) reaced 200 degrees. I decided to take the stuffing out and keep cooking it, so the chicken wouldn't get overdone. I carved the chicken with some difficulty, as I've done it all of 3 or 4 times in my life, mostly with raw chickens. Dinner was finally on the table nearly 2 hours later than anticipated. Then Kevin notices a slightly pink portion of his chicken leg. Adam gets this horrified look on his face. I can't believe the damn thing isn't cooked all the way. Adam points out the pink juice on the plate of chicken parts. Oh, for crying out loud! At some point I put a napkin over my head while everyone laughed about Adam's paranoia. Raelin came over to get under the napkin with me. That made me smile. I fought back the urge to give up and go to bed right then and there--cry myself to sleep.
Now I've had some chocolate and we're about to go to bed and watch our favorite distraction from life--Lost. May tomorrow bring some emotional tranquility and a better turn of events!
Wednesday, November 02, 2005
A day in the life in Maine
As you may have concluded, we are in Maine. Three and a half weeks have passed like water down the gentle creek that peeps out at me from the thick trees and shrubs on my occasional runs round the neighborhood. We didn't move the van from its level driveway spot at K, K & R's for a week when we first got here.
How quickly we transformed into domestic hermits after the constant movement of road travel and our one crazy night out in New York. To finally arrive here on the other side of the country, in our friends' driveway, after so many months imagining it! It put a broad smile on my face and butterflies in my stomach all day. And several days after, I kept stopping in my tracks to say, "We're in MAINE!" to whoever was at hand.
A typical day in the life here:
Wake up in the van well after sunrise. Open the back curtain a smidge to let the light in. Climb out of the layers of covers, pull on some PJs or yesterday's clothes, slip on the wool slippers I got recently with an unused birthday gift certificate, gather up my iPod (on which I record ephemeral thoughts as I drift off to sleep), glasses and clothes and emerge into the cold air for a brisk, blinking walk to the front door. Retreat to the bathroom for the normal stuff, come out and decide whether to eat or get exercise first. Decide to eat first. Make some scrambled eggs with fresh chard from the garden. On my more motivated days, I don my long stretchy pants and a short-sleeve shirt and hoodie for a stint in the basement with the weights, physioball, yoga mat, and foam roll we brought with us (see, we're using them!). Take a shower and rummage through the duffel bag of clothes in the basement for fresh duds. Read some email, write some email, read some blogs, check out what I have planned on my syllabus (without the structure of school or a job, I find I have to create schedules and deadlines or I end up having done I don't know what by the end of the day). Write my daily stream of consciousness journal for half an hour. Go upstairs for a peek at what's in the fridge and nibble on leftovers. Chat with Adam, Kelly, or Kevin. Play with Raelin for a few minutes (painting, reading books, drawing numbers on pieces of paper, stacking blocks, complete with narration "Raelin is painting dots...what are you doing, Juli?"). Do some reading (Artist's Way, Thunder & Lightning, Ballad of the Sad Cafe, or Bee Season). Do some writing (writing practice exercise, work on a short story I started back in Spring of 2004 in my one and only creative writing class, or write a blog). Make headway with some things on my to do list. Go upstairs and pile some leftovers onto a plate for lunch. Hang out with Raelin for a bit. Pet the dog and the cat. Go back downstairs and continue writing. Get distracted looking up a good name for a character on one of the many baby name websites I have bookmarked, and then resolve to use an asterisk and figure it out later. All of this work in the basement is to the tune of muffled Raelin and Kelly conversations, book reading, giggling, and the like, through the baby monitor Kevin keeps near his desk. That is unless I have decided to enclose myself in my own world to avoid my persistent urge toward distraction, in which case I put in headphones while I write. Start to smell dinner Kelly is cooking on the stove (or realize it's time to upstairs and make dinner). See the sunset across the lake on another break upstairs. Settle in at the oval table at the appointed moment for feasting. Dish up a delicious meal and talk about the day's events and ponderings and funny stories. Answer Raelin's periodic questions. "Are you talking?" is the favorite. Often my answer is, "No, I'm listening." Load the dish washer and wash the rest of the dishes. Pile up the napkins and placemats near the dog bowl while Raelin gets her nightly bath. Sit in the living room and chat or read with Adam and either Kevin or Kelly, whoever is not putting Raelin to sleep with bedtime stories. Say goodnight. Get ready for bed, gather up the various DVD-watching equipment, head out to the van for a snuggley episode of Lost, or an occasional Daily Show downloaded a week after it airs from bit torrent. Turn out the light and settle into the piles of covers. Depending on how cold the night is, put on hats and socks and long wool underwear.
What strikes me again and again is how easy it is to get used to a new place and a new rhythm. As if we've always been living in our van, cooking at "home" 6 nights out of 7, eating at the table with our friends, planning the next little outing when the rain breaks. Now that our time here is nearing an end, it feels like we haven't been here that long at all. We haven't eaten lobster yet. We haven't been to Acadia yet (more on that later). We have eaten delicious pork ribs and many other mouth-watering meals. We have been getting our work done.
The leaves on the hill across the lake are finally changing color to gentle amber-gold. On my drive to Warren (a little town a few miles away) to buy a leg of lamb for tonight's dinner I marveled at the color over and over again. It took a while, but ALL the trees are lellow now, as Raelin would say. Around every turn in the drive back to the homestead, leaves fly down from branches extended high above my head. The brilliant blue sky (a common sight for only the last 3 days we've been here) invited my gaze upward at the billows of small white clouds. New England has seeped into my heart and I will miss it (not to mention our wonderful friends who've made this far north place home) when we go!
How quickly we transformed into domestic hermits after the constant movement of road travel and our one crazy night out in New York. To finally arrive here on the other side of the country, in our friends' driveway, after so many months imagining it! It put a broad smile on my face and butterflies in my stomach all day. And several days after, I kept stopping in my tracks to say, "We're in MAINE!" to whoever was at hand.
A typical day in the life here:
Wake up in the van well after sunrise. Open the back curtain a smidge to let the light in. Climb out of the layers of covers, pull on some PJs or yesterday's clothes, slip on the wool slippers I got recently with an unused birthday gift certificate, gather up my iPod (on which I record ephemeral thoughts as I drift off to sleep), glasses and clothes and emerge into the cold air for a brisk, blinking walk to the front door. Retreat to the bathroom for the normal stuff, come out and decide whether to eat or get exercise first. Decide to eat first. Make some scrambled eggs with fresh chard from the garden. On my more motivated days, I don my long stretchy pants and a short-sleeve shirt and hoodie for a stint in the basement with the weights, physioball, yoga mat, and foam roll we brought with us (see, we're using them!). Take a shower and rummage through the duffel bag of clothes in the basement for fresh duds. Read some email, write some email, read some blogs, check out what I have planned on my syllabus (without the structure of school or a job, I find I have to create schedules and deadlines or I end up having done I don't know what by the end of the day). Write my daily stream of consciousness journal for half an hour. Go upstairs for a peek at what's in the fridge and nibble on leftovers. Chat with Adam, Kelly, or Kevin. Play with Raelin for a few minutes (painting, reading books, drawing numbers on pieces of paper, stacking blocks, complete with narration "Raelin is painting dots...what are you doing, Juli?"). Do some reading (Artist's Way, Thunder & Lightning, Ballad of the Sad Cafe, or Bee Season). Do some writing (writing practice exercise, work on a short story I started back in Spring of 2004 in my one and only creative writing class, or write a blog). Make headway with some things on my to do list. Go upstairs and pile some leftovers onto a plate for lunch. Hang out with Raelin for a bit. Pet the dog and the cat. Go back downstairs and continue writing. Get distracted looking up a good name for a character on one of the many baby name websites I have bookmarked, and then resolve to use an asterisk and figure it out later. All of this work in the basement is to the tune of muffled Raelin and Kelly conversations, book reading, giggling, and the like, through the baby monitor Kevin keeps near his desk. That is unless I have decided to enclose myself in my own world to avoid my persistent urge toward distraction, in which case I put in headphones while I write. Start to smell dinner Kelly is cooking on the stove (or realize it's time to upstairs and make dinner). See the sunset across the lake on another break upstairs. Settle in at the oval table at the appointed moment for feasting. Dish up a delicious meal and talk about the day's events and ponderings and funny stories. Answer Raelin's periodic questions. "Are you talking?" is the favorite. Often my answer is, "No, I'm listening." Load the dish washer and wash the rest of the dishes. Pile up the napkins and placemats near the dog bowl while Raelin gets her nightly bath. Sit in the living room and chat or read with Adam and either Kevin or Kelly, whoever is not putting Raelin to sleep with bedtime stories. Say goodnight. Get ready for bed, gather up the various DVD-watching equipment, head out to the van for a snuggley episode of Lost, or an occasional Daily Show downloaded a week after it airs from bit torrent. Turn out the light and settle into the piles of covers. Depending on how cold the night is, put on hats and socks and long wool underwear.
What strikes me again and again is how easy it is to get used to a new place and a new rhythm. As if we've always been living in our van, cooking at "home" 6 nights out of 7, eating at the table with our friends, planning the next little outing when the rain breaks. Now that our time here is nearing an end, it feels like we haven't been here that long at all. We haven't eaten lobster yet. We haven't been to Acadia yet (more on that later). We have eaten delicious pork ribs and many other mouth-watering meals. We have been getting our work done.
The leaves on the hill across the lake are finally changing color to gentle amber-gold. On my drive to Warren (a little town a few miles away) to buy a leg of lamb for tonight's dinner I marveled at the color over and over again. It took a while, but ALL the trees are lellow now, as Raelin would say. Around every turn in the drive back to the homestead, leaves fly down from branches extended high above my head. The brilliant blue sky (a common sight for only the last 3 days we've been here) invited my gaze upward at the billows of small white clouds. New England has seeped into my heart and I will miss it (not to mention our wonderful friends who've made this far north place home) when we go!
Sunday, October 09, 2005
Epic Night in New York City
The last time I was in New York City, I had only been on the earth 6 times round the sun. I have only tendrils of memories...
Looking through the heavy coin-operated telescopes from the top of the empire state building, down on an incomprehensible bumpy gray-brown landscape of concrete.
Getting a penny stamped with the emblematic pointed tower, which I later touched thousands of times back home in Oregon, as it hung on the end of a purple ribbon from the closet lamp.
Gaping at the world records displayed museum-like on the upper floors...a plastic case of fake fried chicken with the caption, "So-and-so ate 25 pounds of fried chicken in one sitting on December 18, 1980."...a newspaper photo, pinned to the wall, of a man (or was it a woman? I couldn't tell) with an enormous wad of cigarettes stuck in his mouth, with a similarly absurd description. I don't remember if I got into the Guinness Book after this surreal introduction to the genre, or whether I was enthralled because I had already gotten the bug.
Floating along the dingy Hudson on a dingy day and straining to see some recognizable part of the famous Statue of Liberty through all her scaffolding.
Playing tag and hide and seek among bunk beds and across hard wood floors, with kids whose parents baby-sat me one evening.
So, when I walked through the archway from the train tunnel and saw the white marble of Grand Central Station, I was at once transported to a childhood storybook and back again, blinking my eyes in wonder. "We're in New York!" I turned to Adam and nearly shouted, eyes wide with glee.
From the station (in which I could have wandered for probably an hour at least), we were led by grand overhead signs to the yellow taxi-lined curb. The air was hot and thick with dew. It called forth in us both the memory of our arrival in Bangkok 9 years ago. We chose a cab at random, climbed into the back, and gave him the address, realizing that knowing the cross street would have been helpful, but I figured he would get us there anyway. And he did--to the grimy, rain-drenched West 30th address of the Freak Factory.
Men slept under awnings and trash decorated the gutters. Women and men dressed in the Black Rock City garb cued up at the door, laughing and chatting. We showed our IDs and tromped up the dark staircase. Greeted by cheerful doorfolk dressed in black, we gave our name and were checked off a list, our hands duly stamped and wrists ribboned.
In we went to the din. Lights and sound streamed toward us, gathering us up into the scene. We surveyed the three dance floors, up stairs and down, navigated past great white fabric balloons that stretched from floor to ceiling, through strobing lights, and found ourselves face to face with Holly. A familiar face! Hugs were had all around as Kenny was just around the corner. They led us back stage, a bright room filled with people in various stages of donning and doffing costumes. We stashed our packs in the corner and cracked open the first of our 3 energy drinks. It was then when I felt we had really arrived. We had landed at that most desirous of destinations: a dance party 3,000 miles away from home, where two of our bay area friends would be inciting our bodies to shake and undulate in rhythm.
We moved out and into the dancing fray and began to stomp and sway and gyrate and groove and get into the beat and I looked around at all the people doing the same and smiled. It felt good to be dancing after so many days of driving. About 20 minutes into our first stint, I realized how crazy we were to think we could stay up ALL NIGHT after so many hours traveling. The morning train to Bethel was at 8:30 am. The party was to last till 6 am.
Somehow, we drifted between dancing and snoozing in corners (no chill space) and standing still gazing at the festival of wonderfully freaky people, in whose company we feel so comfortable, for 6 hours. Women in ripped fishnets and feather-festooned hair danced on platforms in front of the DJ station. My favorite was the couple who performed their own personal Capoeira dance with each other. When Kenny came on at 2:30 or so, I found myself mesmerized by Holly's feat of vibration and I smiled broadly, as with eyes closed I brought my feet down again and again in sync with Kenny's beats.
At one point during the second of these cyclical activities a light shone in my face and a voice told me, "Gotta stay awake!" I got up and stared at two large men in uniform, with flashlights. "Are you serious?" I came back, incredulous. "Yes, you need to stay awake!" came the untoward reply. Dismayed, we arose from our bench behind an apparently not-so-stealthy cloth balloon, and stared at the dance floor, wondering how we could manage until the appointed hour of departure.
Somewhere around 3 am we decided to get some air and went for a brief walk around the neighborhood. We passed Penn Station and found a clean bathroom at a bar. We avoided an angry, drunk Irish dude who brandished his Celtic tattoos and threatened an African American guy who was minding his own business. When the angry one pulled out a knife, we crossed the street. While it was all just talk, we felt a brief thrill of danger and felt our night in the big city was certainly following its reputed form.
5 am came and we were amazed--how had we lasted? We were too zombified to really think about it. Holly hugged us goodbye. We braced ourselves for the last hour, wondering where we might go to eat and wait out the hours between sunrise and sleep. Holly's form appeared a few minutes later, and relief washed over me as she offered us the floor of her friends' house for our much needed slumber. Kenny chimed in, "I mean, we could all 4 try to sleep on the double futon, but..." Smiling, we heartily accepted the floor and made our way out to the drizzly street to find a cab.
We made a bed of baby's sheepskins and cardboard, throw pillows and t-shirts. Holly wrote a note to her friends, letting them know who was sleeping on their floor, and would be tottering to the bathroom in the early hours of the day.
At 9:30 I awoke to pee and greeted a freshly showered Kenny in the hall. He had just come from the party. With bleary eyes I met Catherine and her 3-year old, curly towheaded daughter, Sophie. Catherine warmly invited us to continue our slumber in their bed, as the family had all risen. We gratefully accepted.
At noon, we rose and officially met Catherine and Blake, our incredibly friendly hosts, and their two daughters Sophie and Lila. Sophie crowed about her superman Hallowe'en costume, fed me sunflower seeds and cashews from glass jars lining wooden shelves, and Lila pranced along the top of the couch against the window, looking out at the rain streaming down the grass, filling the crevices in the stone patio.
We spent the next few hours ensconced in the rainy warmth of Brooklyn and the world of new and familiar friends. We took the umbrellas we bought just days before and watched them turn inside out at the merest gust as we marched down the street, in search of a burrito. We stopped at a cafe so Kenny and Holly could get their daily caffeine. Not being a coffee drinker myself, and having just had tea back at the house, I just stared at the monstrous and fluffy pastries in their case, trying not to salivate, and swearing these looked a fair sight better than the pastries back home. But knowing looks can be deceiving, and saving room for real food, I refrained from temptation. I gazed around at the cafe-goers, trying to understand what makes New York feel so different from the West coast. It was many small things, which crept into my mind and sent the sensation of new and exciting down to my finger and toetips, but didn't reveal a single, conscious answer.
Back at the house, we ate our burritos with forks and knives, as they fell open immediately. Satiated, we bid goodbye to Holly and Kenny. We chatted around the hour with Catherine and Blake, and felt at home in a far away place. The hour came for us to embark on the adventure back home, to our van in the parking lot of a tiny Connecticut train station. Before we left, their housemate arrived with fresh-caught tuna and disappeared again. It was the best sashimi I've tasted. Blake laid it out in pieces on a green plate with wasabi soy sauce for dipping.
Everyone waved and hugged goodbye and we were invited to come back next time we came to the city. We made our way to the subway station and after a couple tries, found ourselves on the Manhattan-bound R platform. I kept my eye on the map inside so we wouldn't miss our transfer stop at 14th and Union Square. The difference between the two stations was that of rich and poor. I suppose even public transportation follows the money from Brooklyn to Manhattan. We gawked at the lamborghinis being shown on the main floor of Grand Central, found some chocolatey cheesecake for the train, and bought our return tickets.
The ticket agent slipped a receipt under the grate and there was some confusion as to whether it was ours or the woman who'd come before us, still at the counter near our elbows, waiting. The agent grew impatient and yelled, "Sign it! Sign it!" Taken aback and living up to the infamous New York attitude, Adam came back with a sarcastic agreement. Something like, "Okay, okay, give me a minute, GEEZ!"
I read the train schedule and determined we were bound for tunnel 21. We arrived early and asked if the train already boarding was the right one. I wasn't convinced until I heard the announcer say "South Norwalk," our transfer point, which I originally thought was just an accented way of saying, "South Newark."
In our van at last, we tried our luck with hotels but the hour was late and we weren't up for a drive or dealing with people anymore. So we holed up and slept at the train station, hoping we wouldn't get rousted. At nine the next morning, I woke to see Adam's finger on his lips and a whispered, "shhh, the police are here." A few breathless moments wriggling on clothes without shaking the van ended in relief: they left us alone. We quickly broke camp (which mostly consists of tying back curtains, shoving bedding toward the rear door, and plunking various objects behind the back seat), and made for The Roos's house. We spent a 1/2 hour or so getting to know Hans's brother Mark, his wife Linda, and their 14-year old son Kyle. We ate a decent omelette breakfast at packed Jacqueline's in Bethel, made disapproving eyes at the party who stole our table, and made off for the final stretch toward Maine!
Looking through the heavy coin-operated telescopes from the top of the empire state building, down on an incomprehensible bumpy gray-brown landscape of concrete.
Getting a penny stamped with the emblematic pointed tower, which I later touched thousands of times back home in Oregon, as it hung on the end of a purple ribbon from the closet lamp.
Gaping at the world records displayed museum-like on the upper floors...a plastic case of fake fried chicken with the caption, "So-and-so ate 25 pounds of fried chicken in one sitting on December 18, 1980."...a newspaper photo, pinned to the wall, of a man (or was it a woman? I couldn't tell) with an enormous wad of cigarettes stuck in his mouth, with a similarly absurd description. I don't remember if I got into the Guinness Book after this surreal introduction to the genre, or whether I was enthralled because I had already gotten the bug.
Floating along the dingy Hudson on a dingy day and straining to see some recognizable part of the famous Statue of Liberty through all her scaffolding.
Playing tag and hide and seek among bunk beds and across hard wood floors, with kids whose parents baby-sat me one evening.
So, when I walked through the archway from the train tunnel and saw the white marble of Grand Central Station, I was at once transported to a childhood storybook and back again, blinking my eyes in wonder. "We're in New York!" I turned to Adam and nearly shouted, eyes wide with glee.
From the station (in which I could have wandered for probably an hour at least), we were led by grand overhead signs to the yellow taxi-lined curb. The air was hot and thick with dew. It called forth in us both the memory of our arrival in Bangkok 9 years ago. We chose a cab at random, climbed into the back, and gave him the address, realizing that knowing the cross street would have been helpful, but I figured he would get us there anyway. And he did--to the grimy, rain-drenched West 30th address of the Freak Factory.
Men slept under awnings and trash decorated the gutters. Women and men dressed in the Black Rock City garb cued up at the door, laughing and chatting. We showed our IDs and tromped up the dark staircase. Greeted by cheerful doorfolk dressed in black, we gave our name and were checked off a list, our hands duly stamped and wrists ribboned.
In we went to the din. Lights and sound streamed toward us, gathering us up into the scene. We surveyed the three dance floors, up stairs and down, navigated past great white fabric balloons that stretched from floor to ceiling, through strobing lights, and found ourselves face to face with Holly. A familiar face! Hugs were had all around as Kenny was just around the corner. They led us back stage, a bright room filled with people in various stages of donning and doffing costumes. We stashed our packs in the corner and cracked open the first of our 3 energy drinks. It was then when I felt we had really arrived. We had landed at that most desirous of destinations: a dance party 3,000 miles away from home, where two of our bay area friends would be inciting our bodies to shake and undulate in rhythm.
We moved out and into the dancing fray and began to stomp and sway and gyrate and groove and get into the beat and I looked around at all the people doing the same and smiled. It felt good to be dancing after so many days of driving. About 20 minutes into our first stint, I realized how crazy we were to think we could stay up ALL NIGHT after so many hours traveling. The morning train to Bethel was at 8:30 am. The party was to last till 6 am.
Somehow, we drifted between dancing and snoozing in corners (no chill space) and standing still gazing at the festival of wonderfully freaky people, in whose company we feel so comfortable, for 6 hours. Women in ripped fishnets and feather-festooned hair danced on platforms in front of the DJ station. My favorite was the couple who performed their own personal Capoeira dance with each other. When Kenny came on at 2:30 or so, I found myself mesmerized by Holly's feat of vibration and I smiled broadly, as with eyes closed I brought my feet down again and again in sync with Kenny's beats.
At one point during the second of these cyclical activities a light shone in my face and a voice told me, "Gotta stay awake!" I got up and stared at two large men in uniform, with flashlights. "Are you serious?" I came back, incredulous. "Yes, you need to stay awake!" came the untoward reply. Dismayed, we arose from our bench behind an apparently not-so-stealthy cloth balloon, and stared at the dance floor, wondering how we could manage until the appointed hour of departure.
Somewhere around 3 am we decided to get some air and went for a brief walk around the neighborhood. We passed Penn Station and found a clean bathroom at a bar. We avoided an angry, drunk Irish dude who brandished his Celtic tattoos and threatened an African American guy who was minding his own business. When the angry one pulled out a knife, we crossed the street. While it was all just talk, we felt a brief thrill of danger and felt our night in the big city was certainly following its reputed form.
5 am came and we were amazed--how had we lasted? We were too zombified to really think about it. Holly hugged us goodbye. We braced ourselves for the last hour, wondering where we might go to eat and wait out the hours between sunrise and sleep. Holly's form appeared a few minutes later, and relief washed over me as she offered us the floor of her friends' house for our much needed slumber. Kenny chimed in, "I mean, we could all 4 try to sleep on the double futon, but..." Smiling, we heartily accepted the floor and made our way out to the drizzly street to find a cab.
We made a bed of baby's sheepskins and cardboard, throw pillows and t-shirts. Holly wrote a note to her friends, letting them know who was sleeping on their floor, and would be tottering to the bathroom in the early hours of the day.
At 9:30 I awoke to pee and greeted a freshly showered Kenny in the hall. He had just come from the party. With bleary eyes I met Catherine and her 3-year old, curly towheaded daughter, Sophie. Catherine warmly invited us to continue our slumber in their bed, as the family had all risen. We gratefully accepted.
At noon, we rose and officially met Catherine and Blake, our incredibly friendly hosts, and their two daughters Sophie and Lila. Sophie crowed about her superman Hallowe'en costume, fed me sunflower seeds and cashews from glass jars lining wooden shelves, and Lila pranced along the top of the couch against the window, looking out at the rain streaming down the grass, filling the crevices in the stone patio.
We spent the next few hours ensconced in the rainy warmth of Brooklyn and the world of new and familiar friends. We took the umbrellas we bought just days before and watched them turn inside out at the merest gust as we marched down the street, in search of a burrito. We stopped at a cafe so Kenny and Holly could get their daily caffeine. Not being a coffee drinker myself, and having just had tea back at the house, I just stared at the monstrous and fluffy pastries in their case, trying not to salivate, and swearing these looked a fair sight better than the pastries back home. But knowing looks can be deceiving, and saving room for real food, I refrained from temptation. I gazed around at the cafe-goers, trying to understand what makes New York feel so different from the West coast. It was many small things, which crept into my mind and sent the sensation of new and exciting down to my finger and toetips, but didn't reveal a single, conscious answer.
Back at the house, we ate our burritos with forks and knives, as they fell open immediately. Satiated, we bid goodbye to Holly and Kenny. We chatted around the hour with Catherine and Blake, and felt at home in a far away place. The hour came for us to embark on the adventure back home, to our van in the parking lot of a tiny Connecticut train station. Before we left, their housemate arrived with fresh-caught tuna and disappeared again. It was the best sashimi I've tasted. Blake laid it out in pieces on a green plate with wasabi soy sauce for dipping.
Everyone waved and hugged goodbye and we were invited to come back next time we came to the city. We made our way to the subway station and after a couple tries, found ourselves on the Manhattan-bound R platform. I kept my eye on the map inside so we wouldn't miss our transfer stop at 14th and Union Square. The difference between the two stations was that of rich and poor. I suppose even public transportation follows the money from Brooklyn to Manhattan. We gawked at the lamborghinis being shown on the main floor of Grand Central, found some chocolatey cheesecake for the train, and bought our return tickets.
The ticket agent slipped a receipt under the grate and there was some confusion as to whether it was ours or the woman who'd come before us, still at the counter near our elbows, waiting. The agent grew impatient and yelled, "Sign it! Sign it!" Taken aback and living up to the infamous New York attitude, Adam came back with a sarcastic agreement. Something like, "Okay, okay, give me a minute, GEEZ!"
I read the train schedule and determined we were bound for tunnel 21. We arrived early and asked if the train already boarding was the right one. I wasn't convinced until I heard the announcer say "South Norwalk," our transfer point, which I originally thought was just an accented way of saying, "South Newark."
In our van at last, we tried our luck with hotels but the hour was late and we weren't up for a drive or dealing with people anymore. So we holed up and slept at the train station, hoping we wouldn't get rousted. At nine the next morning, I woke to see Adam's finger on his lips and a whispered, "shhh, the police are here." A few breathless moments wriggling on clothes without shaking the van ended in relief: they left us alone. We quickly broke camp (which mostly consists of tying back curtains, shoving bedding toward the rear door, and plunking various objects behind the back seat), and made for The Roos's house. We spent a 1/2 hour or so getting to know Hans's brother Mark, his wife Linda, and their 14-year old son Kyle. We ate a decent omelette breakfast at packed Jacqueline's in Bethel, made disapproving eyes at the party who stole our table, and made off for the final stretch toward Maine!
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