"Be not the slave of your own past.
Plunge into the sublime seas,
dive deep and swim far, so you shall
come back with self-respect, with
new power, with an advanced experience
that shall explain and overlook the old."
--Ralph Waldo Emerson
Yes, indeed, BOTH Democratic presidential hopefuls were in Montana last weekend. I went with some friends from work to hear both Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton speak at the Mansfield-Metcalf dinner in Butte. We waited outside, shivering in the Arctic wind, for nearly two hours, and amused ourselves by taking pictures.
But when we finally got inside (and through security, where the security peeps made sure that our cameras and phones were truly cameras and phones, and that we weren't carrying any weapons), we found decent seats, grabbed the provided box lunches (courtesy of Costco) and sat in eager anticipation while the Civic Center filled to capacity.
When Barack Obama was introduced, the roar of applause and shouting was overwhelming and lasted for several minutes. Throughout his eloquent speech--he spoke of universal health care, improvements in the educational system, new tax requirements for wealthy individuals and corporations, the need for all people in this country to have equal opportunities to meet their basic needs, and his hope for CHANGE--he was constantly interrupted by further cheers and fervent clapping. We couldn't stay silent; we couldn't stay seated. We were inspired. Refreshed. Energized. Full of hope that, come November, we will have the chance to vote for a political candidate who cares about the same things we do, who has vision and compassion and determination . . .
GO OBAMA!!!!
All righty . . . that's my moment on the soapbox.
In other news,
I mopped my porch floor this morning and organized my cupboards and basked in the sunshine.
I'm in the process of putting together an Earth Day liturgy for my church, and I get to be the assisting pastor for the service! A little daunting but mostly exciting. I've gotten to meet with Pastor Jean several times this week and it's been refreshing.
The cats are going wild with the coming of spring and are constantly tearing around the house, knocking things off the shelves, and getting into places they're not supposed to.
Work on my thesis is going slowly. Good thoughts for creativity and motivation are much appreciated. :)
I opened the windows in my house today (first time this season!), and am reveling in all the fresh air!
I bought my first pair of of Danskos. I could rhapsodize over how much I love these shoes, but I'll simply say that they kick ass.
Well, the weather is gorgeous today and I'm about to take off for a hike up Mt. Sentinel for some exercise, Zen time, and journaling. Happy Saturday a todos!
In the midst of disjointedness and randomness and utter chaos, occasionally a bit of unexpected order creeps in. When it does, one should probably listen to it, right? All those big questions are out there--What do I do with my life? Where do I go? What's the next step? etc., with no answers forthcoming. One of things I am sure about, however, is that right now I need to be working on my thesis, and I have seven weeks (well, six now) to work at Adventure Life only 25 hours a week, with my mornings fully dedicated to writing and researching. This year, Lent begins earlier than it has in over a century, and lasts 40 days (or six and a half weeks). Times like these, I think the cosmos is telling me something. My academic discipline is going hand in hand with my spiritual discipline, and there's some mental and emotional discipline happening, too. I'm curious to see where this Lenten journey takes me, where I'll be by Easter . . .
One result of earlier discipline (from about two years ago, actually) is the recent publication of one of my essays in Perspectives: A Journal of Reformed Thought. Exciting!
Besides the discipline, though, I've been having fun skiing in the all the great snow we're getting this winter, hanging out with Beth and Britta, having time to cook and bake again--finally!--and simply enjoying the season. Of course, we need some pictures.
Once again Christa and I drove over to Bozeman for a weekend of good contra dancing fun! Three cheers for dancing three days' straight on a VERY slippery floor! Ah, Wintergreen. It is a wonderful tradition. Check out the link and you'll see a familiar face.
Oh, and of course I don't have any pictures of the actual dance, but I do have pics of the gorgeous place we stayed!
And then, of course, there's been tons of snow this winter, and thus tons of fantastic skiing. I have gone with co-workers, like my friends Moe:
and Julia:
This past weekend I went up the Rattlesnake with Beth and Britta, and it was stunningly beautiful:
And we skied the WHOLE TIME . . . except when the expanse of perfect packing snow tempted us too strongly, and we succumbed thus:
creating a voluptuous snow goddess to reflect all our own goddess-like qualities. Ahem.
Below, our poles (and skis, for that matter, but they're rather buried), waiting for us to return from our creative work:
Then we skied away, quite merrily, until Beth called out in a resonant whisper, "MOOSE!" We turned, and there she was, not 20 feet away, munching on the shrubbery.
Just in case I needed a reminder of why I live in Montana.
Okay, okay, I KNOW.
It's been a Very Long Time since I have updated my blog, and too many people refuse to cut me any more slack on this score.
So, family, Rachel, Jen: here you are. I hope the fact that I am blogging after a long hiatus fills all your hearts with joy. Yay!
And, of course, to make up for the lack of blogging, I will post dozens of pictures. It's the least I can do.
So, I woke up on the Monday before Thanksgiving (yes, we have to go back to Thanksgiving. I haven't blogged since then) to this:
8+ inches of gorgeous fluffy snow that floated straight down, piling up in deep drifts on branches, electric wires, cars, houses.
An absolutely perfect winter wonderland snowfall.
What else is there to do with such lovely snow except . . .
. . . go hunting? Oh, wait. No, I did not kill these deer. They were killed by my friend Peter, who then invited me over to enjoy some oven roasted stuffed deer hearts. Notice, the deer in this picture are lacking hearts. That's why they have large bloody gashes in their chests. Mmm, meat!
So some Missoula folk go hunting.
Midwestern folk, on the other hand . . .
. . . stay inside in their pajamas and make yummy food on Thanksgiving morning! Jen and Joe came to visit me for Thanksgiving, and we had a lovely four days together. Though we did very much enjoy cooking/baking and later devouring the fruits of our labors, I am enough of a Missoula girl after 2 1/2 years to take Jen and Joe to do what many other Missoula folk do . . .
. . . go cross-country skiing in the Rattlesnake Wilderness area.
The snow was perfect.
The sun was shining.
The cold winter wonderland days stretched on.
And I tried unsuccessfully to avoid skiing into trees and small shrubs.
I did successfully manage to look cute with my cross country skiing gear, though!
Jen and Joe succeeded in looking cute as well . . .
I do so like warm hats and fuzzy scarves.
Not to mention good friends.
And, of course, Montana.
(And having my own cross country skis, which I bought this weekend!)
December also brought fun things, though there were the not-so-fun things like final projects and presentations to prepare. Perhaps such things would not have been so not-so-fun had not I procrastinated most of the semester, but alas. Fortunately, Elsa procrastinated as well, so we spent a couple of long late nights sitting at opposite ends of the house, surrounded by papers and pieces of research, shouting encouragement to each other and occasionally meeting in the kitchen to do necessary tasks such as taking out the compost:
and drinking espressos made expertly by Elsa in the French press:
and making various kinds of food in the wee hours of the morning:
Happily, however, Elsa and I both finished the required projects, papers, and presentations, and managed to do them well. Ah, procrastination.
On December 15th, after enjoying our stress- (and schoolwork-) free existence, we decided to take a little tour of the local Humane Society. Just for fun. Just to see all the nice dogs and cats. Just to . . . LOOK.
53 minutes later I walked out of the Humane Society with a box that contained a 10-month old male black domestic shorthaired cat.
Elsa's cat, Olive, was not particularly impressed at first.
But everything's better after a meal . . .
Basil and Olive now get along quite swimmingly, though they have a tendency to tear through the apartment like wild pumas on the rampage, and get into places they're not supposed to, like the Recycling Cave of Death (where their food bag is located, though it is no longer located on the floor), and the kitchen table, the kitchen sink, the bathroom sink, my favorite plant, and on top of the DVD player. And, of course, Basil loves to perch.
Other recent exciting additions to the household are Beth and Britta, two very good friends who have just moved to Missoula! They are in the process of finding an apartment and jobs, and are currently crashing in my living room.
It is so good to have them here! Yesterday we combed the sporting good stores of Missoula for cross country skis, finally hitting the jackpot at Sportsman's Surplus. We also combed the thrift stores for beds (and books . . . and clothes . . . right-o). Today we went to church, transported the bed from the thrift store to my storage shed thanks to Than and his truck, ate burritos at Taco del Sol, and went cross country skiing this afternoon. The past few days (not to mention the past few months) have been very full. So begins 2008!
Let's go fly a kite
Up to the highest height
Let's go fly a kite
And send it soaring
Up through the atmosphere
Up where the air is clear
Oh, let's go fly a kite!
(Or, as the case may be, a hang glider! Unfortunately, it doesn't quite rhyme.)
Happy Birthday me!!! Granted, this was over a month after my birthday, but HANG GLIDING off Mt. Sentinel was my big birthday present to myself. Three cheers for jumping off mountains! Strangely enough, the hang gliding itself was not scary. The scariest part was those brief seconds just before we started running, when I was standing on the edge of a steep mountain slope, looking down . . . down . . . down at the Clark Fork River far, far, far below. After that, it was just RUN RUN RUN and there goes the wind lifting us up and now we're in the air, soaring above the golden autumn landscape like magic.
Golden-leafed archway above my street in October:
Lying in a carpet of leaves:
Other October happenings:
Big Brothers Big Sisters Halloween Party--here's me & Jade, and a close-up of Jade's sparkly hair:
Slipping into November . . .
A late birthday present from Mom & Dad: a gorgeous warm soft down comforter, for which I bought a beautiful duvet cover and then of COURSE I also had to buy flannel sheets for my bed, right? What's more cozy during a Montana winter than to snuggle between soft flannel sheets, beneath a comforter filled with toasty warm down? Mmmm . . . Well, with such a lovely bed, I had to rearrange my room in a more suitable fashion.
The rearrangement allowed for a new cozy reading space under one of my slanted ceilings:
Then, a mere handful of days after rearranging my room, I had to (sniff) leave it . . . to visit Tricia & Benjamin and baby Miriam in Toronto. Yay! In the midst of our busy season at work and an increasing pile of schoolwork, a week in Toronto was exactly what I needed.
I provided hand grips for Miriam (so THIS is why new moms cut their hair! Aha!):
We made lots of yummy food, including pizza:
I was very helpful in the cooking process:
We also made a triple-layer lemon cake with lemon curd filling and lemon cream-cheese frosting, which the three adults proceeded to polish off over the course of four days:
We did take a break from cooking one evening to visit Chinatown and have delicious dinner at a popular Chinese restaurant:
We also spent time watching the first four Harry Potter movies (vice! vice!), playing Blockus, laughing at Minuet's antics, and entertaining Miriam:
While I was there, Benjamin also put the finishing touches on the pan flute he was working on:
Tricia says that one of most common comments she and Benjamin get about Miriam is her alert look and big eyes. After spending a week with her, I understand why!
Chatting before naptime:
The 'alert look' once again:
Modeling the Moby wrap, which was my baby gift to the family (and I can now personally attest to the fact that it is a MOST useful gift, and that there is something deeply comforting and soothing about carrying a sleeping baby so close to your body):
We had a wonderful week, and now I am back in Missoula, enjoying a Saturday at home and looking forward to Thanksgiving, and Jen & Joe visiting from St. Paul!
Life is good. I slept in, had a nice fried egg on toast for breakfast, vacuumed, diminished clutter in the entryway, put up curtains on the hallway window, burned incense, took a long hot shower, and am now updating my blog. Tonight, I'm looking forward to eating fish tacos at the Old Post with Than & Kara, and then spending the rest of the evening contra dancing. A perfect Saturday!
Blessings to all!
