i was laughing, and you were there, too.
and so were the dogs, the sweet one and the evil one, but both seeming so sweet tonight, with their brown eyes pleading for us to take them home.
but we don't, we can't, instead we play round upon round of Sequence in the basement. sequestered for the moment, by necessity or choice, i can't really tell. maybe a little of both.
we're called for dinner, christmas dinner, and we look at each other. you roll your eyes a little, and i wrinkle my nose. you are my family, and i am yours. and the rest is the rest.
no one else cares for that way of thinking. but it doesn't matter much, because we are each other's family. and the rest is the rest. we make do. you smile and dutifully haul garbage and loads of christmas presents to cars. i smile and try to limit my use of four-letter words.
but in the basement we play Sequence and smile for real and the "fucks" are flying right and left and in between plays we make up rude lyrics for christmas songs.
it's church time, and i let you fight that battle alone. i would go; i brought a brown shirt and skirt and even pantyhose. but you say you won't go; don't want to go. whispering. i can't hear what you are saying, but it goes pretty well. i am not necessarily even christian, you tell me. let's keep that to ourselves for right now, i say. you did. in the hour we're alone, we laugh a lot. and vent. and when they return, we are okay, because we had our own hour of family time.
i am in the spare bedroom reading a book on the bed. my niece walks in, and somehow i start a game of beanie baby basketball with her. soon we are standing on the bed chucking beanies all over the room, off the walls, we giggle and make up rules as we go. i'm not sure grandma will appreciate us throwing beanie babies at her wall, i say, but we don't quit. when we go upstairs my niece announces that she is ahead, 23-20. grandma didn't care at all that we were throwing stuff against the wall; instead she congratulates britta and smiles at me. and i smile back for real.
we play dice for small prizes. i have my eye on a card game and a book. my six-year-old niece is excited beyond belief because a Hannah Montana CD sits on the prize table. i roll doubles on my first two tries and nab the card game and the book. i roll doubles again and again and again. it's almost embarassing. i choose more prizes, an ice scraper, a necklace, a DVD. my niece is looking more concerned with every roll. finally, she scores the Hannah CD and every one else gets a few prizes, too. you are sitting next to the prizes. i ask you to choose for me after a few rounds, hoping you will choose something you want. because even when we play individually, we are still a team. you choose all things you think i will want most and hand them across the table to me. typical.
it snows for the drive home, making the roads treacherous, but the scenery is beautiful. we've always enjoyed driving together. we stop in to see more family. in the ten minutes we're inside, our dog, the sweet one, eats two slabs of roast beef and sixteen christmas cookies that got sent home with us. we laugh. we weren't going to eat the food, anyway, we only took it to be polite.
more family for dinner again, but at least we don't need to watch our mouths with this family. this side of the family is decidedly more crude. our christmas tree looks pretty and the snow keeps piling up outside. it would be a perfect night to stay in by ourselves, just our own little family, but the rest are here, too. it works out okay anyway. we walk the dogs out in the snow and everything has somehow turned out all right.
but we're glad it's over, happy to be back to our simple little life, where we are each other's family, and the rest will always be the rest.
12.26.2007
12.12.2007
my trip home
the years have gone by
the winters are warmer, but it doesn't feel like it this year
so are we; age mellowed us all a bit
no one skates on the Mill Forte ice rink; maybe there are no kids left in town
maybe they are all inside doing things that were probably not invented yet when i was that age
mom and dad don't really work anymore, but they don't seem old, either
today mom and i go to super one to pick up the bags of donated food for the foodshelf. mom volunteers there on wednesdays. there are only five bags to pick up. they look a little sad sitting in the big box that could easily hold ten times that many. i think about seeing a similar box at a store in saint paul. i ignored it, too. we drive to gilbert. i have never been to the foodshelf. mom introduces me to everyone. she seems to be the youngest person there, by far (she's 61). "you look just like your father," an older man tells me. i hear that a lot up here. his hands shake noticeably from parkinson's disease. "tell your dad the big truck is coming next week," he adds. i didn't know this, but apparently my father comes here too. when the truck comes from duluth, he helps unload it. looking around, i can see why. dad is in awesome shape compared with most of the volunteers, but it just doesn't seem like a very dad-like thing to do. but what do i know? mom talks a little about what kind of stuff they get....things like day-old bread from super one and the italian bakery, and the weird items like a bunch of starbucks frappaccinos they got once. she talks about the people who come....some who are mentally ill, drug-addicted, just needy or down on their luck. i only cry when she tells of the ones who are illiterate; the ones who can barely fill out the paperwork, but try so hard to hide it. i don't think she notices. mom is very matter-of-fact, but not very judgemental. the meth-addicts' kids need to eat, too, she says without batting an eye. indeed.
we meet my aunt and uncle for dinner at a restaurant out in the country. on a blustery wednesday night, the place fills up almost to capacity. it's nice to see all the business. it's nice to see the snow-covered pines along the highway.
5 days ago
in a different town much smaller than even this one, my husband and i sit in the back of a small theater. the elementary school children are putting on a play, and we have paid five dollars a piece that frankly we don't have right now and we don't even know a single soul in town. still we sit there, me with my gloves on for the whole performance, smiling at each other and the kid who wasn't paying attention on stage and the microphones that only worked about half of the time.
what if? we ask each other, mostly silently, but sometimes out loud, too. i like it here because it's snowy and cold and beautiful, and i can wear my brown hat everywhere and still fit in. or at least not stand out. five days after i got married i took a huge chunk out of my wedding ring climbing those rocks down by the shore, and as good as if it were a piece of me i love this place where i left it and somehow it is the home where i've never actually lived.
i stay up very late, which has always been my nature, and i revert very quickly back to it when i'm away from greg. and tomorrow we will talk for hours about what we did while we were apart, and even though it was really nothing at all, it was also everything. then maybe we will finish rocket, who we carved out of wood 5 days ago in the home that we wish could be ours. i carved one side of rocket's head and greg carved the other; neither of us are woodworkers but we made it work, and the prettiest part is the front, the middle, the place where my part and his part meet.
and that was my trip home.
the winters are warmer, but it doesn't feel like it this year
so are we; age mellowed us all a bit
no one skates on the Mill Forte ice rink; maybe there are no kids left in town
maybe they are all inside doing things that were probably not invented yet when i was that age
mom and dad don't really work anymore, but they don't seem old, either
today mom and i go to super one to pick up the bags of donated food for the foodshelf. mom volunteers there on wednesdays. there are only five bags to pick up. they look a little sad sitting in the big box that could easily hold ten times that many. i think about seeing a similar box at a store in saint paul. i ignored it, too. we drive to gilbert. i have never been to the foodshelf. mom introduces me to everyone. she seems to be the youngest person there, by far (she's 61). "you look just like your father," an older man tells me. i hear that a lot up here. his hands shake noticeably from parkinson's disease. "tell your dad the big truck is coming next week," he adds. i didn't know this, but apparently my father comes here too. when the truck comes from duluth, he helps unload it. looking around, i can see why. dad is in awesome shape compared with most of the volunteers, but it just doesn't seem like a very dad-like thing to do. but what do i know? mom talks a little about what kind of stuff they get....things like day-old bread from super one and the italian bakery, and the weird items like a bunch of starbucks frappaccinos they got once. she talks about the people who come....some who are mentally ill, drug-addicted, just needy or down on their luck. i only cry when she tells of the ones who are illiterate; the ones who can barely fill out the paperwork, but try so hard to hide it. i don't think she notices. mom is very matter-of-fact, but not very judgemental. the meth-addicts' kids need to eat, too, she says without batting an eye. indeed.
we meet my aunt and uncle for dinner at a restaurant out in the country. on a blustery wednesday night, the place fills up almost to capacity. it's nice to see all the business. it's nice to see the snow-covered pines along the highway.
5 days ago
in a different town much smaller than even this one, my husband and i sit in the back of a small theater. the elementary school children are putting on a play, and we have paid five dollars a piece that frankly we don't have right now and we don't even know a single soul in town. still we sit there, me with my gloves on for the whole performance, smiling at each other and the kid who wasn't paying attention on stage and the microphones that only worked about half of the time.
what if? we ask each other, mostly silently, but sometimes out loud, too. i like it here because it's snowy and cold and beautiful, and i can wear my brown hat everywhere and still fit in. or at least not stand out. five days after i got married i took a huge chunk out of my wedding ring climbing those rocks down by the shore, and as good as if it were a piece of me i love this place where i left it and somehow it is the home where i've never actually lived.
i stay up very late, which has always been my nature, and i revert very quickly back to it when i'm away from greg. and tomorrow we will talk for hours about what we did while we were apart, and even though it was really nothing at all, it was also everything. then maybe we will finish rocket, who we carved out of wood 5 days ago in the home that we wish could be ours. i carved one side of rocket's head and greg carved the other; neither of us are woodworkers but we made it work, and the prettiest part is the front, the middle, the place where my part and his part meet.
and that was my trip home.
10.31.2007
The Maass Family Travel Journal Goes First Class
Okay, so maybe flying coach isn't exactly what most people consider first class, but for us here at the Maass Family Travel Journal, air travel is positively luxurious. We will arrive in California in about two hours, with no car breakdowns, no all-out-I've-been-driving-all-damn-night-so-quit-pissing-me-off fights, and no gas station meals on-the-go. We are not really used to such stability in our travel plans. You may recall last December we flew to Maine, and to add excitement to the journey we failed to give our departure time so much as a glance until it was so late Greg had to play NASCAR driver on the way to the airport, where we arrived just in time to miss our flight. Which was just as well, because it was a nonstop to Minneapolis which would have gotten us home quickly, and by 5pm, so we actually would have had a decent night's sleep before work the next day, and that's just not a very "Maass" way of handling things. So instead we got to fly to Detroit and try to stand by for several flights, finally landing seats on the 11:30 pm flight home. Where excitment is lacking, we seem to have a knack for generating our own.
Well, not only are we traveling by air this time, but we are staying in some palatial digs. No, I don't mean the big tent. Even more palatial....a nine-bedroom beach house in San Diego. Right on the ocean. With a hot tub. The flip side of all this is that we will be sharing said digs with many family members. I haven't lived with blood relatives in many years, and it's been over four years since my parents, my brother, and I have all been together in the same place, much less the same house. It's been 27 years since we and our cousins were all together (yeah, I was 2, so I don't remember it so well, but mom says that's the week I got toilet trained, so apparently memorable for her). My cousin Tara is getting married, so we are all getting together for a first-class celebration. Some of this fanfare probably has to do with the fact that my aunt Carol has colon cancer. I don't know many details about it, because information is routinely withheld to "protect the children." (The youngest of whom is pushing 30, but that's just the way we do things in my family.) Anyway, this is going to be a PARTY.
So, we'll see how this all goes. Technically, there is a little room for error (adventure) in that Greg, Long-Legs Bunny and I are actually flying into Vegas on Saturday, renting a car and spending some time camping in the desert. So stay tuned, intrepid readers, we will update you soon.
Well, not only are we traveling by air this time, but we are staying in some palatial digs. No, I don't mean the big tent. Even more palatial....a nine-bedroom beach house in San Diego. Right on the ocean. With a hot tub. The flip side of all this is that we will be sharing said digs with many family members. I haven't lived with blood relatives in many years, and it's been over four years since my parents, my brother, and I have all been together in the same place, much less the same house. It's been 27 years since we and our cousins were all together (yeah, I was 2, so I don't remember it so well, but mom says that's the week I got toilet trained, so apparently memorable for her). My cousin Tara is getting married, so we are all getting together for a first-class celebration. Some of this fanfare probably has to do with the fact that my aunt Carol has colon cancer. I don't know many details about it, because information is routinely withheld to "protect the children." (The youngest of whom is pushing 30, but that's just the way we do things in my family.) Anyway, this is going to be a PARTY.
So, we'll see how this all goes. Technically, there is a little room for error (adventure) in that Greg, Long-Legs Bunny and I are actually flying into Vegas on Saturday, renting a car and spending some time camping in the desert. So stay tuned, intrepid readers, we will update you soon.
9.09.2007
The Maass Family Travel Journal Volume 213: Goldy Goes to Richardton, North Dakota
Last month Greg, Goldy, Long-Legs Bunny, and I took a short little vacation to Montana. The four of us have been on many adventures together. Goldy is our sort-of junky gold Grand Am, and Long-Legs Bunny is our stuffed bunny who is obsessed with maps and traveling to new states and countries. When we go on road trips, we all have our roles to play: Greg does a lot of driving, I keep us laughing, Long-Legs Bunny holds the map and flips to new pages when appropriate, and Goldy gets us safely where we need to go.
Things work well that way, so we assumed that this trip would be no different. And it wasn't, for a while. In fact, this little trip had a great start. Usually, our road trips start off hurried and crabby. We pretty much never get on the road by the time we'd planned on, we generally forget at least one terribly important item back at home, and much snapping and sniping ensues. This year we planned to go to Storyhill Fest just outside of Bozeman, MT, and then up to the Whitefish/Glacier National Park area to visit my brother. Last year we did Storyhill Fest in three days, and it was fun, but it was rushed and stressful trying to get there on time (we didn't quite make it). So this year we gave ourselves three whole days to get there, and five after to get to Whitefish and make it home.
All was well. We didn't even make it out of Minnesota the first night, much to the disappointment of Long-Legs Bunny (he didn't get to flip the map). The next day we steeled ourselves for the long drive across North Dakota. We took our time, and we were having a good time. We were hoping to make it to Theodore Roosevelt National Park by around 4pm to find a campsite, and it looked like we were right on track when we stopped to get gas at Cenex in Richardton, North Dakota. Greg was pumping gas and cleaning Goldy's windshield when I got out of the car to throw away some trash. I noticed that Goldy was sitting in the middle of a big puddle. Which was strange, because it hadn't rained all day. It probably hadn't rained all week. I noticed the puddle was getting larger. Not knowing much of anything about cars, I asked Greg, "Is that bad?" He looked down and gaped. He opened the hood. Hmmmm....it appeared that Goldy was leaking her coolant all over the pavement. Make that had leaked. The reservior was now empty. "Can we drive it?" I asked stupidly. The answer was no. Luckily for us, it was a Sunday evening in Bumfuck, excuse me, Richardton, North Dakota, which apparently consisted of just the Cenex we were stranded at and a few houses down off the interstate. That would make it really easy to get a tow. And a fix. If the town even had a tow truck.
We went inside the Cenex and asked the clerk about a tow. "On a SUNDAY?" she asked, scandalized. "Can we at least borrow the phone book?" asked Greg. There was a sizeable town, Dickinson, about 30 miles away. We would try that. We first tried the truck stop. "Well," said the guy who answered, "we used to refer people to Shop X, but they burned down. So I don't know where you could get one." Helpful. We tried two auto shops that had towtrucks. There was no answer. On the third try, a guy picked up. He said he could get us, but he wasn't sure when. Since the other shop in town burned down, he was doing all the work, and there were about three ahead of us.
Well, that was ok. I mean, the Cenex seemed to be the center of life in Richardton. So there was no air conditioning. It was only about 90 degrees. Why, that was 13 degrees cooler that it had been going to Storyhill Fest last year. And all the flies in the place really weren't that bad; if you kept fanning your face constantly they barely ever landed right on it. And we got to get some local flavor listening to the conversations of other people who were sitting in the boiling, fly-infested Cenex, who apparently had actually chosen to spend a Sunday afternoon in this way. A group of old men talked about truck parts, while two middle-aged women droned on about heirloom lace doilies and who would end up getting them once someone else died. Thrilling stuff, I tell you. We drank a couple Pepsis and walked around the Cenex. It truly was an all-in-one location. They were the town gas station/pizza parlor/grocery store/video rental shop/liquor store. So there was a lot to explore. We amused ourselves for awhile by placing inappropriate titles in the "Family" section along the video rental wall. Then we perused the liquor selection, thinking it wouldn't be long before we needed it. There were many cases of Bud Ice, a single bottle of whiskey, a single bottle of vodka, a bottle of peppermint schapps, and 12 bottles of something called peaches and cream, which looked like peach milk. Apparently it's a big seller in Richardton. Blechhh!
Still the tow truck didn't arrive. So we had a little competition. We would study the Cenex and all it's merchandise. Then we would each select the item most likely to cause the absolute quickest "code brown." The winner would recieve an all expenses paid trip out of Richarton! Or not, just bragging rights. (Is it obvious what "code brown" is? That kind of became the catch phrase of the trip. Well, I work at a hospital, where we have codes almost daily. Code blue is a real code (medical emergency), code red is a fire, etc. Well, among those of us who work in healthcare (but probably should not), code brown refers to a room you might not want to enter because it stinks. Like shit. We're a crude bunch, sometimes. Most times, in fact.) Anyway, Greg found something literally bright red turning on one of those hot dog turners they have in gas stations. Does anyone know what it might have been? Well, he won with that. We were discussing whether we should purchase said item and see if it produced the intended effect, but the tow truck finally arrived. No tears were shed as we drove away from the Richardton Cenex, Goldy hitched on the back of the tow truck.
Luckily, the guy who picked us up said he thought he could fix Goldy by noon the next day. That would make us late for Storyhill Fest for a second year, but it was still pretty good, considering. He did fix it quickly, and we were back on the road by 10am the next day. We were late to the Fest, but we inexplicably still got an awesome campsite and made it for dinner and most of the music. After that, Goldy's bitchy streak was over, and she ran like a dream for the rest of the trip. But we'll always remember our fun afternoon in Richardton. The end.
Things work well that way, so we assumed that this trip would be no different. And it wasn't, for a while. In fact, this little trip had a great start. Usually, our road trips start off hurried and crabby. We pretty much never get on the road by the time we'd planned on, we generally forget at least one terribly important item back at home, and much snapping and sniping ensues. This year we planned to go to Storyhill Fest just outside of Bozeman, MT, and then up to the Whitefish/Glacier National Park area to visit my brother. Last year we did Storyhill Fest in three days, and it was fun, but it was rushed and stressful trying to get there on time (we didn't quite make it). So this year we gave ourselves three whole days to get there, and five after to get to Whitefish and make it home.
All was well. We didn't even make it out of Minnesota the first night, much to the disappointment of Long-Legs Bunny (he didn't get to flip the map). The next day we steeled ourselves for the long drive across North Dakota. We took our time, and we were having a good time. We were hoping to make it to Theodore Roosevelt National Park by around 4pm to find a campsite, and it looked like we were right on track when we stopped to get gas at Cenex in Richardton, North Dakota. Greg was pumping gas and cleaning Goldy's windshield when I got out of the car to throw away some trash. I noticed that Goldy was sitting in the middle of a big puddle. Which was strange, because it hadn't rained all day. It probably hadn't rained all week. I noticed the puddle was getting larger. Not knowing much of anything about cars, I asked Greg, "Is that bad?" He looked down and gaped. He opened the hood. Hmmmm....it appeared that Goldy was leaking her coolant all over the pavement. Make that had leaked. The reservior was now empty. "Can we drive it?" I asked stupidly. The answer was no. Luckily for us, it was a Sunday evening in Bumfuck, excuse me, Richardton, North Dakota, which apparently consisted of just the Cenex we were stranded at and a few houses down off the interstate. That would make it really easy to get a tow. And a fix. If the town even had a tow truck.
We went inside the Cenex and asked the clerk about a tow. "On a SUNDAY?" she asked, scandalized. "Can we at least borrow the phone book?" asked Greg. There was a sizeable town, Dickinson, about 30 miles away. We would try that. We first tried the truck stop. "Well," said the guy who answered, "we used to refer people to Shop X, but they burned down. So I don't know where you could get one." Helpful. We tried two auto shops that had towtrucks. There was no answer. On the third try, a guy picked up. He said he could get us, but he wasn't sure when. Since the other shop in town burned down, he was doing all the work, and there were about three ahead of us.
Well, that was ok. I mean, the Cenex seemed to be the center of life in Richardton. So there was no air conditioning. It was only about 90 degrees. Why, that was 13 degrees cooler that it had been going to Storyhill Fest last year. And all the flies in the place really weren't that bad; if you kept fanning your face constantly they barely ever landed right on it. And we got to get some local flavor listening to the conversations of other people who were sitting in the boiling, fly-infested Cenex, who apparently had actually chosen to spend a Sunday afternoon in this way. A group of old men talked about truck parts, while two middle-aged women droned on about heirloom lace doilies and who would end up getting them once someone else died. Thrilling stuff, I tell you. We drank a couple Pepsis and walked around the Cenex. It truly was an all-in-one location. They were the town gas station/pizza parlor/grocery store/video rental shop/liquor store. So there was a lot to explore. We amused ourselves for awhile by placing inappropriate titles in the "Family" section along the video rental wall. Then we perused the liquor selection, thinking it wouldn't be long before we needed it. There were many cases of Bud Ice, a single bottle of whiskey, a single bottle of vodka, a bottle of peppermint schapps, and 12 bottles of something called peaches and cream, which looked like peach milk. Apparently it's a big seller in Richardton. Blechhh!
Still the tow truck didn't arrive. So we had a little competition. We would study the Cenex and all it's merchandise. Then we would each select the item most likely to cause the absolute quickest "code brown." The winner would recieve an all expenses paid trip out of Richarton! Or not, just bragging rights. (Is it obvious what "code brown" is? That kind of became the catch phrase of the trip. Well, I work at a hospital, where we have codes almost daily. Code blue is a real code (medical emergency), code red is a fire, etc. Well, among those of us who work in healthcare (but probably should not), code brown refers to a room you might not want to enter because it stinks. Like shit. We're a crude bunch, sometimes. Most times, in fact.) Anyway, Greg found something literally bright red turning on one of those hot dog turners they have in gas stations. Does anyone know what it might have been? Well, he won with that. We were discussing whether we should purchase said item and see if it produced the intended effect, but the tow truck finally arrived. No tears were shed as we drove away from the Richardton Cenex, Goldy hitched on the back of the tow truck.
Luckily, the guy who picked us up said he thought he could fix Goldy by noon the next day. That would make us late for Storyhill Fest for a second year, but it was still pretty good, considering. He did fix it quickly, and we were back on the road by 10am the next day. We were late to the Fest, but we inexplicably still got an awesome campsite and made it for dinner and most of the music. After that, Goldy's bitchy streak was over, and she ran like a dream for the rest of the trip. But we'll always remember our fun afternoon in Richardton. The end.
7.28.2007
trippy
We were supposed to leave for Montana today. We're still in Saint Paul. Greg and Oscar are sleeping upstairs, and I'm down in the living room, doing what I do best....procrastinating. The car is not packed, although the front bumper has been mended with duct tape so as to improve mileage, so that's something, I guess. My suitcase is packed upstairs, which is also better than I usually do. There is still much to be done before we leave. It's 1:30 a.m. and we have to get up before 7, but I just can't sleep. I'm a terrible sleeper under the best of circumstances, but mix in a healthy dose of excitement about the trip, nervousness about all we still need to accomplish before we can go, the compelling final volume of Harry Potter, and especially a thought-provoking letter received from an old friend, and I'll be lucky to sleep before sunup.
I almost died the first time I went to Montana. It seems so long ago, now, that we packed up Greg's old blue Grand Am and confidently and foolishly drove it straight west. We left school on a rainy March day, armed with a road atlas and a lot of Gatorade and oatmeal cream pies. The snow must have recently melted; I remember picking up an old leaf off the ground and handing it to Greg right before we left. It's the kind of thing I still do to this day, and whether it was the color of the leaf or it's size that attracted me to it I no longer recall. But I remember very much walking through those trees that I would never see again, and handing him that leaf that he would carry in his wallet for years afterward.
God, we were young. The weather improved as we progressed west, and we spent the first night in a Motel 6 in Rapid City. It was 50-some degrees, the warmest weather we'd felt in months, and we were off on a real adventure, having lied to our parents not only about where we were going, but who we were with. That's how young we were....it actually seemed to matter that we were traveling by ourselves and it certainly seemed to matter that our parents not know it. We awoke early the next morning, eager to head back on the road. Greg got the first shower, and I turned on the TV and opened the curtains in our tiny room and gawked: there was at least eight inches of snow in the parking lot and more falling fast. Happily I gathered snowballs and began chucking them over the shower curtain on a very surprised Greg. A few hours later was when we almost killed ourselves in a car crash in the Montana mountains. We lost control and swerved toward a drop off that would surely have killed us, gained control for a split second and swerved the other way, mananging to come out of it with only minor damage to the car and a totally blown front tire. Some nice guy gave us a lift into Bozeman, and though we were in quite a predicament, all I could do was stare out the window at those mountains.
As we did all we could to try to keep moving west, that same weather system that caused all the trouble in the first place was moving east. About 24 hours after we enountered it (and luckily lived to tell the tale), it apparently collided with a different system, producing several tornadoes, one of which destroyed our town. Our little road trip ended up longer than we'd anticipated....we didn't have to return to school for weeks, seeing as how much of it had been reduced to rubble. And when we did return, the part I missed the most was those big, old trees.
It just seems funny tonight, how much I didn't know back then. How I ended up marrying that guy I ate oatmeal cream pies and mini Babybels with in an old blue Grand Am on interstate 90. How my brother would come to call Montana home. How I'd never even met some of the people who I now recognize to be most influential in my life: C----, CAM, B---, the X's....I'd never heard of Storyhill, never read Pam Houston or Jon Krakauer or Barbara Kingsolver. I'd never been sick. I had no idea of the things I would lose, or the things I would gain precisely because I had lost others. I have a photo from that long ago road trip, a silly photo taken in the car of the side of Greg's head. It will look different tomorrow, that same head will have a couple grays at the temple. I just feel old tonight for some reason.
I've always kept a journal. Not an eveyday kind of thing, just a record of things I did or more often felt. Some of the entries now seem so trivial. I like to re-read these from time-to-time and refer to the corresponding years as "The Drama Queen Years." But some are not trivial at all, and when I re-read these they still have the power to move me to tears or long to talk once again with people from my past. One such entry detailed a nice morning walk up a mountain with an old friend of mine. Years old now, I still love to read it because I think it is the most honest thing I ever wrote in my life. In those days I was lucky if I even recognized my feelings for what they were, much less admitted them, even to myself, but on this day I did, and somehow all the words came out right on the paper. I sent that entry to my friend about two years ago, just to prove what my feelings once were, and how I treasured that pre-dawn hike and the sunrise we watched and the wine we drank and the rocks we sat against. Back in the day when we lived in my tent together and traveled in his old Toyota we used to read each other's journals anyway. But edited versions. There were entries we denied each other, and this was one of them. But years later, it seemed beautiful, and he thought so, too, and because of it we began anew, this time truly as friends (and nothing more). And this week, he sent me his version of that day, written years and years ago, but just recently found and photocopied for me. It was so hopeful. Mine was beautiful in its sadness and uncertainty, as if I knew even back then what would eventually happen, but his was all youth and hope and dreams that would never come true. I remember sitting in the tent by night and talking vaguely of the future and how confident we were that we would somehow manage to make a difference in the world, that our lives would be full of adventure and love and mountaintop sunrises, and that the ordinary things that trap so many people would never get in our way. But they did. We grew up, and he's trapped in med school, the path he swore he would never take all those years ago and I'm here in Saint Paul with a house and a husband and a body that keeps trying to fail me.
I just feel old tonight. All that thinking of who I used to be, and wondering if I am who I said I'd never be. I wonder what I'll think ten years from now. If I'll remember sitting up until 3 am reading Harry Potter and writing about getting old before a Montana road trip. Who knows? Trippy.
I almost died the first time I went to Montana. It seems so long ago, now, that we packed up Greg's old blue Grand Am and confidently and foolishly drove it straight west. We left school on a rainy March day, armed with a road atlas and a lot of Gatorade and oatmeal cream pies. The snow must have recently melted; I remember picking up an old leaf off the ground and handing it to Greg right before we left. It's the kind of thing I still do to this day, and whether it was the color of the leaf or it's size that attracted me to it I no longer recall. But I remember very much walking through those trees that I would never see again, and handing him that leaf that he would carry in his wallet for years afterward.
God, we were young. The weather improved as we progressed west, and we spent the first night in a Motel 6 in Rapid City. It was 50-some degrees, the warmest weather we'd felt in months, and we were off on a real adventure, having lied to our parents not only about where we were going, but who we were with. That's how young we were....it actually seemed to matter that we were traveling by ourselves and it certainly seemed to matter that our parents not know it. We awoke early the next morning, eager to head back on the road. Greg got the first shower, and I turned on the TV and opened the curtains in our tiny room and gawked: there was at least eight inches of snow in the parking lot and more falling fast. Happily I gathered snowballs and began chucking them over the shower curtain on a very surprised Greg. A few hours later was when we almost killed ourselves in a car crash in the Montana mountains. We lost control and swerved toward a drop off that would surely have killed us, gained control for a split second and swerved the other way, mananging to come out of it with only minor damage to the car and a totally blown front tire. Some nice guy gave us a lift into Bozeman, and though we were in quite a predicament, all I could do was stare out the window at those mountains.
As we did all we could to try to keep moving west, that same weather system that caused all the trouble in the first place was moving east. About 24 hours after we enountered it (and luckily lived to tell the tale), it apparently collided with a different system, producing several tornadoes, one of which destroyed our town. Our little road trip ended up longer than we'd anticipated....we didn't have to return to school for weeks, seeing as how much of it had been reduced to rubble. And when we did return, the part I missed the most was those big, old trees.
It just seems funny tonight, how much I didn't know back then. How I ended up marrying that guy I ate oatmeal cream pies and mini Babybels with in an old blue Grand Am on interstate 90. How my brother would come to call Montana home. How I'd never even met some of the people who I now recognize to be most influential in my life: C----, CAM, B---, the X's....I'd never heard of Storyhill, never read Pam Houston or Jon Krakauer or Barbara Kingsolver. I'd never been sick. I had no idea of the things I would lose, or the things I would gain precisely because I had lost others. I have a photo from that long ago road trip, a silly photo taken in the car of the side of Greg's head. It will look different tomorrow, that same head will have a couple grays at the temple. I just feel old tonight for some reason.
I've always kept a journal. Not an eveyday kind of thing, just a record of things I did or more often felt. Some of the entries now seem so trivial. I like to re-read these from time-to-time and refer to the corresponding years as "The Drama Queen Years." But some are not trivial at all, and when I re-read these they still have the power to move me to tears or long to talk once again with people from my past. One such entry detailed a nice morning walk up a mountain with an old friend of mine. Years old now, I still love to read it because I think it is the most honest thing I ever wrote in my life. In those days I was lucky if I even recognized my feelings for what they were, much less admitted them, even to myself, but on this day I did, and somehow all the words came out right on the paper. I sent that entry to my friend about two years ago, just to prove what my feelings once were, and how I treasured that pre-dawn hike and the sunrise we watched and the wine we drank and the rocks we sat against. Back in the day when we lived in my tent together and traveled in his old Toyota we used to read each other's journals anyway. But edited versions. There were entries we denied each other, and this was one of them. But years later, it seemed beautiful, and he thought so, too, and because of it we began anew, this time truly as friends (and nothing more). And this week, he sent me his version of that day, written years and years ago, but just recently found and photocopied for me. It was so hopeful. Mine was beautiful in its sadness and uncertainty, as if I knew even back then what would eventually happen, but his was all youth and hope and dreams that would never come true. I remember sitting in the tent by night and talking vaguely of the future and how confident we were that we would somehow manage to make a difference in the world, that our lives would be full of adventure and love and mountaintop sunrises, and that the ordinary things that trap so many people would never get in our way. But they did. We grew up, and he's trapped in med school, the path he swore he would never take all those years ago and I'm here in Saint Paul with a house and a husband and a body that keeps trying to fail me.
I just feel old tonight. All that thinking of who I used to be, and wondering if I am who I said I'd never be. I wonder what I'll think ten years from now. If I'll remember sitting up until 3 am reading Harry Potter and writing about getting old before a Montana road trip. Who knows? Trippy.
7.12.2007
hooking
Today was a good day. I wasn't on the schedule for work, because Susie and I had requested it off to go to a work conference in White Bear Lake. We requested it off, promptly forgot ("Why did Mary give me an extra day off this week? Oh, well....SCORE!!!!) and never signed up for the conference. We've also been having a stretch of gorgeous summer weather here, the kind like we always used to have back home but NEVER have here....sunny, low 70s, low humidity. We remembered about the conference on Monday, and you could sign up to attend the day of, but I refrained from doing so, thinking that I could really use a "real" day off after all the wedding craziness, especially if the weather held. Wednesday night's weather forcast was for another gorgeous day. "I don't think I'm going to make it to the conference," I told Greg. "I'm going to hook....you should, too."
"Hooking" is our term for skipping work, you know, playing hooky. At least once a week (usually more often) we will wake up to the alarm and one of us will ask the other, "Wanna hook today?" To which the other always answers "yes," but then proceeds to get up and get dressed. Real hook days are few and far between. Our last hook day was March 1, which was an even better weather day than today. On that day, we had a huge snowstorm, and for once I actually had the day off. Greg got sent home from work early due to the snow, and we went out to lunch and then took Oscar for a long walk in the snow. I guess that was kind of a hook half-day, and actually not hooking at all for me, but it still felt like it. Another time the summer before, I was really sick with a migraine in the early morning, so sick even that Greg stayed home in case I needed to go to the doctor, but then the medicine kicked in and I felt fine by 11am, so that was kind of a hook half-day, too.
The hooking festivities started last night, when we went to the 10:45 showing of Harry Potter, ensuring that we wouldn't be home anytime before 1am. Then, we didn't go to sleep until almost 3. Stayed in bed forever this morning, woke up and went straight to lunch (we always eat hook-day lunch at Green Mill or Baker's Square, today it was Baker's). Then a long leisurely walk with the dogs, a little biking, some reading out in the sun, and that was our day. Nothing that special, but great because of the weather and what we should have been doing instead.
So there it is, the story of our happy little hook day. We also made a hook day date for the day of the first snow of the year in the fall. Everyone needs a hook day every now and again, don't they? (I know you'll appreciate this one, Jessie....as much fun as we had at the work conference in Duluth making rude gestures at Lynne on the mirror on the ceiling of the DECC, I know you appreciate a good hook day as much as me!)
"Hooking" is our term for skipping work, you know, playing hooky. At least once a week (usually more often) we will wake up to the alarm and one of us will ask the other, "Wanna hook today?" To which the other always answers "yes," but then proceeds to get up and get dressed. Real hook days are few and far between. Our last hook day was March 1, which was an even better weather day than today. On that day, we had a huge snowstorm, and for once I actually had the day off. Greg got sent home from work early due to the snow, and we went out to lunch and then took Oscar for a long walk in the snow. I guess that was kind of a hook half-day, and actually not hooking at all for me, but it still felt like it. Another time the summer before, I was really sick with a migraine in the early morning, so sick even that Greg stayed home in case I needed to go to the doctor, but then the medicine kicked in and I felt fine by 11am, so that was kind of a hook half-day, too.
The hooking festivities started last night, when we went to the 10:45 showing of Harry Potter, ensuring that we wouldn't be home anytime before 1am. Then, we didn't go to sleep until almost 3. Stayed in bed forever this morning, woke up and went straight to lunch (we always eat hook-day lunch at Green Mill or Baker's Square, today it was Baker's). Then a long leisurely walk with the dogs, a little biking, some reading out in the sun, and that was our day. Nothing that special, but great because of the weather and what we should have been doing instead.
So there it is, the story of our happy little hook day. We also made a hook day date for the day of the first snow of the year in the fall. Everyone needs a hook day every now and again, don't they? (I know you'll appreciate this one, Jessie....as much fun as we had at the work conference in Duluth making rude gestures at Lynne on the mirror on the ceiling of the DECC, I know you appreciate a good hook day as much as me!)
7.06.2007
the bug-bitten bridesmaid (and other stories of belonging neither here nor there)
I have pink fingernails. 10 of them, capping tanned fingers that I no longer recognize as my own. As I sit here typing this, I occasionally catch a glimpse of shiny pink flying over the letters and I think, "what the hell!" I have pink bugbites. 10 of those, too, confined not only to the usual legs and arms, but also the chest and earlobe (really what the hell!). 7 of the bites (one a bloody scab) are in prime view when I wear my bridesmaid dress. Beautiful dress and shiny nails or not, did anyone really expect I could make it through this last month without at least one sunburn and several bugbites? I was not meant for gorgeous expensive dresses. But I love it nonetheless. I want to wear that dress terribly; it's easily the nicest piece of clothing I've ever owned. But I'm not quite there, bridesmaidwise. Love the dress, but not enough to look good in it. Not enough to commit to the whole package. I'll be there wearing it all right, but I'll be the one with the bugbites and tan lines and chipped nail polish. I'll be the one in some kind of bridesmaid nomansland.
Kind of like coming home. I grew up here in Virginia, and Greg and I often talk of someday moving back (maybe not here, exactly, but somewhere like it). Then I come here and I think, "Who would I talk to? Who would my friends be?" Would I ever really be able to belong here again?" Certainly I have friends here, but still I wonder.... I walked Oscar all over town tonight, in that kind of mood that inspires way too much thinking, and I realized how many things are different about Virginia. But many of them are the same, too, the thing that has changed the most is undeniably me. I can step out of the car here at night, a fresh arrival from St. Paul, and spend several minutes just sniffing the air. I love that smell....those of you who live here probably don't even recognize it. I can spend hours in the woods around here and want nothing more than to never leave again. But viewpoints can be a little different here sometimes. You have to watch what you say a little more carefully. You always run into someone you know who is gossipping about somebody else you know. There is often not a very worldly perspective on things. Sometimes you get the feeling that the world may very well end in the mine pit on the edge of town.
I can stand in my parents' driveway at the end of a stay up north and tell Greg, "I just want to go home." And we go, and it feels like exactly the way things should be. Other times we can arrive home in St. Paul and I will almost tear up, and say, "I want to go back home (up north)." Sometimes I belong in one place, and sometimes in the other, and more often than not, I belong in neither. I call them both "home," but it's not really true of either of them.
I've always had a very profound sense of place. Even as a very young child, I always had a special place to go to. When I was freshly 18 and knew almost nothing about the world beyond my parents' front door, I met an unlikely friend. He was 20 years my senior, and I tell this story rarely because I know how weird that sounds. But really, we just shared something that I'm not sure there's even a name for. Soul maybe comes the closest, but that's not quite it. There was just a part of us that was the same. He was about the freest person I've ever known. What he owned he could fit in his Camaro. He moved from here to there, working seasonally wherever he could. I wished terribly to someday have a life exactly like his. But as I watched him a little more, I realized that he was searching for something, too. Right then and there, I decided that people basically follow one of three paths: place, job, or person. And that no matter how free somebody may seem, they are usually not free of the desire to follow one of those paths. My friend seemed not to care which of the three that would be, he just wanted one, and the rest would just fall into place from there. I guess I thought I would always be a place person. Certainly it's what I thought back then, and I guess I still think it today, even while knowing that is has to be false.
But I still search for that place I belong, often forgetting that it's not a place at all.
Kind of like coming home. I grew up here in Virginia, and Greg and I often talk of someday moving back (maybe not here, exactly, but somewhere like it). Then I come here and I think, "Who would I talk to? Who would my friends be?" Would I ever really be able to belong here again?" Certainly I have friends here, but still I wonder.... I walked Oscar all over town tonight, in that kind of mood that inspires way too much thinking, and I realized how many things are different about Virginia. But many of them are the same, too, the thing that has changed the most is undeniably me. I can step out of the car here at night, a fresh arrival from St. Paul, and spend several minutes just sniffing the air. I love that smell....those of you who live here probably don't even recognize it. I can spend hours in the woods around here and want nothing more than to never leave again. But viewpoints can be a little different here sometimes. You have to watch what you say a little more carefully. You always run into someone you know who is gossipping about somebody else you know. There is often not a very worldly perspective on things. Sometimes you get the feeling that the world may very well end in the mine pit on the edge of town.
I can stand in my parents' driveway at the end of a stay up north and tell Greg, "I just want to go home." And we go, and it feels like exactly the way things should be. Other times we can arrive home in St. Paul and I will almost tear up, and say, "I want to go back home (up north)." Sometimes I belong in one place, and sometimes in the other, and more often than not, I belong in neither. I call them both "home," but it's not really true of either of them.
I've always had a very profound sense of place. Even as a very young child, I always had a special place to go to. When I was freshly 18 and knew almost nothing about the world beyond my parents' front door, I met an unlikely friend. He was 20 years my senior, and I tell this story rarely because I know how weird that sounds. But really, we just shared something that I'm not sure there's even a name for. Soul maybe comes the closest, but that's not quite it. There was just a part of us that was the same. He was about the freest person I've ever known. What he owned he could fit in his Camaro. He moved from here to there, working seasonally wherever he could. I wished terribly to someday have a life exactly like his. But as I watched him a little more, I realized that he was searching for something, too. Right then and there, I decided that people basically follow one of three paths: place, job, or person. And that no matter how free somebody may seem, they are usually not free of the desire to follow one of those paths. My friend seemed not to care which of the three that would be, he just wanted one, and the rest would just fall into place from there. I guess I thought I would always be a place person. Certainly it's what I thought back then, and I guess I still think it today, even while knowing that is has to be false.
But I still search for that place I belong, often forgetting that it's not a place at all.
7.03.2007
reign of the saturday hair
I don't like to get my hair cut. Professionally, that is. I have way more stories of haircuts I've given myself or Greg has given me in the last 10 years than any person my age should have. Most memorable among these is the 4 inches I cut off in Boston after an ex and I had spent 9 days wandering around in the White Mountains. We decided to head into civilization and have a nice dinner out (I even wore chapstick and heels, so you know it was an occasion!) and I wanted a new look. Believe me, just a shower and removal of my skanky bandana would have accomplished a lot in that department, but I remember standing in the bathroom with that awesomely clean feeling you only get when you've been dirty enough to make major bathtub rings, and cutting my long hair off with my Leatherman to about chin length. The thing is, I remember it looking decent. Of course, I've never really had the highest standards, but I liked that haircut. I also remember one birthday (24?) when I was simply going out to Old Chicago with Jess and Mary yet suddenly needed a haircut, and Greg cut several inches off right in our Robbinsdale kitchen.
Some people see little kids all dressed up and say, "Oh, how cute!" I see little kids (girls especially) with messy hair and say the same thing. I call it "Saturday Hair." Because Saturday is a day when you never need to comb your hair. You can be as messy as you want. No school, no church, no work. I love messy hair much more than I should, and sport it most days of the week. If "saturday hair" gets especially messy, the other name it can go by is "wild woman hair." I only go out to restaurants where wild woman hair is acceptable.
As most of you know, I'm in a wedding this Saturday. I was supposed to get my hair cut and highlighted tonight for the occasion, and I chickened out. I haven't had my hair cut since October 26 (I remember the occasion b/c it was Jessie's last day of work and Greg's birthday), so I really should have done it. But I like its mousy brownish-blonde color and my sloppy ponytail. Maybe there comes a time in life when you just get sick of playing by other people's rules, or trying to be somebody you'll never be. I'd rather look like me and be comfortable than look like somebody who's trying to be pretty or stylish (which I'm old enough to know I'll never, ever pull off). The reign of the saturday hair is not yet over. I don't think it ever will be.
Some people see little kids all dressed up and say, "Oh, how cute!" I see little kids (girls especially) with messy hair and say the same thing. I call it "Saturday Hair." Because Saturday is a day when you never need to comb your hair. You can be as messy as you want. No school, no church, no work. I love messy hair much more than I should, and sport it most days of the week. If "saturday hair" gets especially messy, the other name it can go by is "wild woman hair." I only go out to restaurants where wild woman hair is acceptable.
As most of you know, I'm in a wedding this Saturday. I was supposed to get my hair cut and highlighted tonight for the occasion, and I chickened out. I haven't had my hair cut since October 26 (I remember the occasion b/c it was Jessie's last day of work and Greg's birthday), so I really should have done it. But I like its mousy brownish-blonde color and my sloppy ponytail. Maybe there comes a time in life when you just get sick of playing by other people's rules, or trying to be somebody you'll never be. I'd rather look like me and be comfortable than look like somebody who's trying to be pretty or stylish (which I'm old enough to know I'll never, ever pull off). The reign of the saturday hair is not yet over. I don't think it ever will be.
4.18.2007
cabin fever (the long goodbye)
I haven't been to my favorite place in almost two years. I don't know if I'll ever return to it. It's not even that it was that special, I just knew it really well. I had a history there. It was a small cabin on a modest piece of lakeshore. It had running water (from the lake), an outhouse complete with spiders, wild raspberry bushes, a beautiful wooden swing with a table in the middle of two benches, lots of crawfish, a heron (Ed Heron) and a loon (Loony). My grandfather and father built the cabin when my brother and I were toddlers, back when people of modest means (or even less) could do such things.
I don't know how much of who we become has to do with what we did as children, but I know that spending time there made me the person I am today. I would rank it first on the list, with college second (exempting obvious things like parental involvement and genetics). We learned so much about our world, without ever really knowing we learned it. I am still sometimes surprised by people my own age who can't recognize a strawberry plant or a merganser, just common things on our property that we knew as 4-year-olds. And I don't know exactly what purspose that knowledge has....it certainly hasn't made me rich or successful, but it has made my world a little more beautiful. The time we spent outside, especially there was so special, but also so ordinary. We caught fish, frogs, butterflies, and fireflies, watched birds, made mud pies, just played out in the woods. And I feel so lucky to have spent my childhood that way.
And even after I grew up, I loved the cabin even more. Greg and I started going to it every fall, starting when we were 19. Sometimes it was beautiful weather, sometimes it snowed. If it snowed, we just piled on about 10 old quilts a piece and drank hot chocolate with peppermint schnapps. The year we were 22, it was nice fall weather for our annual trip. We spent a quiet evening talking on the old swing and staring at the stars. We ended up that night, Septmenber 29, 2000, engaged to be married, a secret we would keep between ourselves for a while (seeing as how we were "seeing other people" at the time, it seemed kind of awkward). A year later, it was also great weather when we got married on September 29. A year after that it was COLD AS HELL after Lisa's wedding in September, and we used every quilt in the place to keep warm, but to us it was still preferable to staying in my parents (blessedly heated) house.
For Greg and me, the cabin was where we wanted to go all summer long. It was just where we belonged, where everything just fit perfecctly. A lot of things were changing on the lake, but we still loved it. Huge houses were going up all over at an alarming rate. At first we laughed at them....how they just didn't fit in at all with their huge garages and blacktop all over the place. But they just kept showing up, and then they did fit in, just because there were so many.
Two winters ago I was talking to my mom on the phone, and she said that they were thinking about selling the cabin. In a year that was filled with loss, the possibility of that particular loss was the hardest one to take somehow. I truly felt like I'd be lost without that place....like I'd have no home. My parents didn't own the place outright. They were half owners along with my aunt and uncle, who were the ones who wanted to sell. My parents have never had any money and couldn't buy them out. It was just the way things were. I was mad, and sad, and my parents were so matter-of-fact about it. But they didn't want to sell that place at all. After all, it had been dad who built it with his dad. And my mom, a stay-at-home mom for those years watched her children grow up there. And they loved it just as much as I did, maybe even more. They never told me, but I knew. And, as the summer wore on, it became even more obvious, as nobody mowed the grass or cleaned the spiders out of the bathtub. Greg and I blatantly didn't lift a finger to help it look any better, kicked the ant traps into very visible locations, and routinely turned away people curious about the "for sale" sign by saying we didn't know the asking price, but estimating it to be extrememly high.
We went to the cabin all summer and enjoyed our time there even more so knowing that each time might be the last. That summer the weekends seemed hotter than ever, and the lake water lower. It seemed that there were way more boats and jet skis than ever, and we rarely saw Loony or Ed Heron. There were more and more people and bigger and bigger "cabins." Looking back on it, we were saying a long goodbye that summer, trying to convince ourselves that we would be just fine without that place, indeed, it was changing for the worse.
But then fall came. Greg lost his job, and I had requested a month's vacation to enjoy my favorite season. We ended up living at the cabin for that month, and in the fall, all the magic was back The boats and trucks and noise were gone, and Ed and Loony were back every day. We lived our perfect life in that tiny cabin, with crappy or no appliances and loved it so much. It was so natural. We fell into that life as if it was what we were always meant for. As our time there came to a close, we thought the cabin has escaped sale for the season. But as we packed the car to leave, I knew suddenly that it hadn't. I stood there in the early October snow, watching Loony out in the gray waves and cried, telling Greg that I'd never see it again if we left. "Sure we will," he reassured me, but we never did. Just a week later, the sale went through, and just like that, my place is someone else's now.
I still miss it, but life is like that, and Greg and I now frequent state parks and kind of have a few new places that are "ours." But tonight, I had a migraine, and one of the symptoms I get with these headaches is an extremely heightened sense of smell. It's usually a bad side effect, as I hate to smell any food at all (and others need to eat), or any dog at all (and we have 2), but tonight it was kind of nice. I was laying in the guest bedroom with those old quilts from the lake because I could smell the cabin in them. It was like a small, sweet little gift from that place that had already given me so many big ones.
I don't know how much of who we become has to do with what we did as children, but I know that spending time there made me the person I am today. I would rank it first on the list, with college second (exempting obvious things like parental involvement and genetics). We learned so much about our world, without ever really knowing we learned it. I am still sometimes surprised by people my own age who can't recognize a strawberry plant or a merganser, just common things on our property that we knew as 4-year-olds. And I don't know exactly what purspose that knowledge has....it certainly hasn't made me rich or successful, but it has made my world a little more beautiful. The time we spent outside, especially there was so special, but also so ordinary. We caught fish, frogs, butterflies, and fireflies, watched birds, made mud pies, just played out in the woods. And I feel so lucky to have spent my childhood that way.
And even after I grew up, I loved the cabin even more. Greg and I started going to it every fall, starting when we were 19. Sometimes it was beautiful weather, sometimes it snowed. If it snowed, we just piled on about 10 old quilts a piece and drank hot chocolate with peppermint schnapps. The year we were 22, it was nice fall weather for our annual trip. We spent a quiet evening talking on the old swing and staring at the stars. We ended up that night, Septmenber 29, 2000, engaged to be married, a secret we would keep between ourselves for a while (seeing as how we were "seeing other people" at the time, it seemed kind of awkward). A year later, it was also great weather when we got married on September 29. A year after that it was COLD AS HELL after Lisa's wedding in September, and we used every quilt in the place to keep warm, but to us it was still preferable to staying in my parents (blessedly heated) house.
For Greg and me, the cabin was where we wanted to go all summer long. It was just where we belonged, where everything just fit perfecctly. A lot of things were changing on the lake, but we still loved it. Huge houses were going up all over at an alarming rate. At first we laughed at them....how they just didn't fit in at all with their huge garages and blacktop all over the place. But they just kept showing up, and then they did fit in, just because there were so many.
Two winters ago I was talking to my mom on the phone, and she said that they were thinking about selling the cabin. In a year that was filled with loss, the possibility of that particular loss was the hardest one to take somehow. I truly felt like I'd be lost without that place....like I'd have no home. My parents didn't own the place outright. They were half owners along with my aunt and uncle, who were the ones who wanted to sell. My parents have never had any money and couldn't buy them out. It was just the way things were. I was mad, and sad, and my parents were so matter-of-fact about it. But they didn't want to sell that place at all. After all, it had been dad who built it with his dad. And my mom, a stay-at-home mom for those years watched her children grow up there. And they loved it just as much as I did, maybe even more. They never told me, but I knew. And, as the summer wore on, it became even more obvious, as nobody mowed the grass or cleaned the spiders out of the bathtub. Greg and I blatantly didn't lift a finger to help it look any better, kicked the ant traps into very visible locations, and routinely turned away people curious about the "for sale" sign by saying we didn't know the asking price, but estimating it to be extrememly high.
We went to the cabin all summer and enjoyed our time there even more so knowing that each time might be the last. That summer the weekends seemed hotter than ever, and the lake water lower. It seemed that there were way more boats and jet skis than ever, and we rarely saw Loony or Ed Heron. There were more and more people and bigger and bigger "cabins." Looking back on it, we were saying a long goodbye that summer, trying to convince ourselves that we would be just fine without that place, indeed, it was changing for the worse.
But then fall came. Greg lost his job, and I had requested a month's vacation to enjoy my favorite season. We ended up living at the cabin for that month, and in the fall, all the magic was back The boats and trucks and noise were gone, and Ed and Loony were back every day. We lived our perfect life in that tiny cabin, with crappy or no appliances and loved it so much. It was so natural. We fell into that life as if it was what we were always meant for. As our time there came to a close, we thought the cabin has escaped sale for the season. But as we packed the car to leave, I knew suddenly that it hadn't. I stood there in the early October snow, watching Loony out in the gray waves and cried, telling Greg that I'd never see it again if we left. "Sure we will," he reassured me, but we never did. Just a week later, the sale went through, and just like that, my place is someone else's now.
I still miss it, but life is like that, and Greg and I now frequent state parks and kind of have a few new places that are "ours." But tonight, I had a migraine, and one of the symptoms I get with these headaches is an extremely heightened sense of smell. It's usually a bad side effect, as I hate to smell any food at all (and others need to eat), or any dog at all (and we have 2), but tonight it was kind of nice. I was laying in the guest bedroom with those old quilts from the lake because I could smell the cabin in them. It was like a small, sweet little gift from that place that had already given me so many big ones.
3.09.2007
battles
thursday....my last weekday off for a long time. the day is sunny and somewhat warm. i wake up to the sound of our volkswagon getting towed. in addition to the blown engine, the transmission has gone as well, and it's stuck in park so we couldn't even push it out of the way. goddammit. but the snow is melting, the sun is shining. i have so much to do. laundry. dishes. resumes. the house looks like shit. so i take the dogs out. i love spring....first things first. spiro gets a short walk, osky gets a long one. we enjoy our time outdoors inordinately. we track mud in the house when we get home. and the headache i've been battling all week long suddenly gets the best of me. the laundry will not get done. the dishes will stay dirty. i'm out of commission for the next eight hours. greg comes home and finds me in bed. "i don't have time for this," i tell him, and i'm crying, which doesn't help anything. because i never have time for anything. i especially don't have time for these headaches that leave me incapacitated and zombie-like for days on end. and i remember in college, when my friends and i sometimes talked about what we would change about ourselves if we could, and i never wanted to be pretty or rich or even smart, just never have another headache again. when i feel better i log onto the computer, and i have a message from my friend battling cancer, and i think suddenly that my battles are not so big anymore, after all. i've been sick, too, really sick, and i remember other days when i told god or whoever had control over such things, if anybody, that i would gladly have a headache every day for the rest of my life as long i could have that life to live. i think about how much my friend has probably changed in the days since her diagnosis; how you change in so many little ways that only you can know about. i think that when you deal with things like this at a young age, in a way it draws a line between you and others your age. you will never look at life in exactly the same way again. in some ways, it makes things nicer, everything seems more beautiful, and in some ways it makes things harder because it sets you apart, even if it's only you who really knows. i can cry almost any day of the week out of frustration at all i want to do and how i'd never do it all, even if there were twice as many hours in the day as there are. and it's funny how i never thought before yesterday that there was a time not that long ago when i would have given anything to have these problems.
1.21.2007
The Maass Family Travel Journal Takes a Look Back: Osky's First Camping Trip
Shocker....Greg and I like to camp. I can't really remember when we started, but we occasionally camped in the Arb at Gustavus (never got caught), and several school breaks found us in tents all over the country. I used to camp in my family's front yard. I'd stay out there until my mom told me to act civilized and start sleeping in the house or my dad had to mow the lawn. Must be in the blood.
A little less than four years ago, we became homeowners, and almost immediately afterward, dog owners. Osky, a five-year old part border collie entered our home and hearts in 2003. We were unsure how having a dog would impact our numerous hiking and camping trips. It soon became obvious that Oscar liked hiking even more than we did. Camping....that was another story.
We planned our first camping trip with Oscar in mid-April. We usually go north for hiking/camping, but in mid-April, we headed south, where the snow was gone and the rivers were running. We chose Whitewater State Park for our destination, packed up Goldy with the big tent, and set off. Naturally, this being a Maass family trip, we didn't arrive at our destination until well after dark. Oscar was content to sit in the car while we set up the tent. But not nearly so content when it came to sleeping in it. He did not enjoy the tent, whined to get let out, and generally made a huge pest of himself. A long walk around the campground to sniff and pee on about 45 things placated him a bit, and we settled in for the night.
We awoke at an ungodly hour to Osky whining to go out. Greg told him to shut up (standard practice at home) and he did for awhile. Right around sunup, he was whining again, and again told to shut up. Which he did. The next thing I saw was Greg hurriedly pulling on his pants. He informed me that Oscar had figured out how to let himself out of the tent, and was doing god-knows-what outside; something that involved a lot of other dogs barking at him.
He was retrieved by Greg, and many of our fellow campers were apologized to, and all was well. We tethered Oscar securely to the picnic table and began to cook breakfast. Oscar got a small bowl of dog chow, which he quietly went to work burying in the hard dirt. We didn't notice until after breakfast, when it began to rain. Picking the swollen, soggy dog chow up was a chore that fell to me. The rain was getting worse, and some lightning and thunder (Osky's nemesis) were off in the distance. Our rain-soaked oatmeal had been a less-than-satisfying breakfast, and after waiting out the rain for awhile, we decided to take the road any hard-core outdoors people would take....the road into Winona where we could eat lunch at Green Mill.
Greg and I had a nice large lunch inside, while Osky waited out in the car. We took him the leftovers...one piece of pizza and several pizza crusts, which we planned to give him later. Back at the campsite, the rain was letting up a bit, and we changed into hiking boots and clothes. Oscar took that opportunity to bury his pizza crusts in the ashes in the fire pit.
And we were off on the trail. Osky loves to hike more than anything, so we were finally having a good time. He enjoyed splashing through the Whitewater River, and we were enjoying just being out on the trail after the long winter. That's when we had our first encounter with the "sniff-sniff-flop." Now easily recognizable to us almost immediately, the sniff-sniff-flop is Osky's patented response to SCAT! But at this time, we didn't know enough to pull him back soon enough, and he was soon wearing greasy, blackish poo all over his white fur. The thought of sharing the tent with him for a second night, already quite unappealing after the first, became downright disgusting. Luckily a bath in the Whitewater River left him looking and smelling like....a wet dog.... but not a feces-covered wet dog, at least. The rest of our trip was actually quite uneventful.
After that camping trip, we took Oscar to Tettegouche. We brought him his own blanket, which improved his behavior considerably. We now always tie the tent doors shut with boot laces, to prevent early morning escapes. The only incidents of note were when we woke up to Osky shaking woodticks all over the tent, and when some deer invaded the campsite. (Oscar, for some reason, has an incredible prey drive for deer). So we adapted, and now Oscar is our camping buddy. He is an especially good camper if we've hiked more than 10 miles that day.
But now we have a new dog, Spiro, so this season's early camping trips should be interesting....
A little less than four years ago, we became homeowners, and almost immediately afterward, dog owners. Osky, a five-year old part border collie entered our home and hearts in 2003. We were unsure how having a dog would impact our numerous hiking and camping trips. It soon became obvious that Oscar liked hiking even more than we did. Camping....that was another story.
We planned our first camping trip with Oscar in mid-April. We usually go north for hiking/camping, but in mid-April, we headed south, where the snow was gone and the rivers were running. We chose Whitewater State Park for our destination, packed up Goldy with the big tent, and set off. Naturally, this being a Maass family trip, we didn't arrive at our destination until well after dark. Oscar was content to sit in the car while we set up the tent. But not nearly so content when it came to sleeping in it. He did not enjoy the tent, whined to get let out, and generally made a huge pest of himself. A long walk around the campground to sniff and pee on about 45 things placated him a bit, and we settled in for the night.
We awoke at an ungodly hour to Osky whining to go out. Greg told him to shut up (standard practice at home) and he did for awhile. Right around sunup, he was whining again, and again told to shut up. Which he did. The next thing I saw was Greg hurriedly pulling on his pants. He informed me that Oscar had figured out how to let himself out of the tent, and was doing god-knows-what outside; something that involved a lot of other dogs barking at him.
He was retrieved by Greg, and many of our fellow campers were apologized to, and all was well. We tethered Oscar securely to the picnic table and began to cook breakfast. Oscar got a small bowl of dog chow, which he quietly went to work burying in the hard dirt. We didn't notice until after breakfast, when it began to rain. Picking the swollen, soggy dog chow up was a chore that fell to me. The rain was getting worse, and some lightning and thunder (Osky's nemesis) were off in the distance. Our rain-soaked oatmeal had been a less-than-satisfying breakfast, and after waiting out the rain for awhile, we decided to take the road any hard-core outdoors people would take....the road into Winona where we could eat lunch at Green Mill.
Greg and I had a nice large lunch inside, while Osky waited out in the car. We took him the leftovers...one piece of pizza and several pizza crusts, which we planned to give him later. Back at the campsite, the rain was letting up a bit, and we changed into hiking boots and clothes. Oscar took that opportunity to bury his pizza crusts in the ashes in the fire pit.
And we were off on the trail. Osky loves to hike more than anything, so we were finally having a good time. He enjoyed splashing through the Whitewater River, and we were enjoying just being out on the trail after the long winter. That's when we had our first encounter with the "sniff-sniff-flop." Now easily recognizable to us almost immediately, the sniff-sniff-flop is Osky's patented response to SCAT! But at this time, we didn't know enough to pull him back soon enough, and he was soon wearing greasy, blackish poo all over his white fur. The thought of sharing the tent with him for a second night, already quite unappealing after the first, became downright disgusting. Luckily a bath in the Whitewater River left him looking and smelling like....a wet dog.... but not a feces-covered wet dog, at least. The rest of our trip was actually quite uneventful.
After that camping trip, we took Oscar to Tettegouche. We brought him his own blanket, which improved his behavior considerably. We now always tie the tent doors shut with boot laces, to prevent early morning escapes. The only incidents of note were when we woke up to Osky shaking woodticks all over the tent, and when some deer invaded the campsite. (Oscar, for some reason, has an incredible prey drive for deer). So we adapted, and now Oscar is our camping buddy. He is an especially good camper if we've hiked more than 10 miles that day.
But now we have a new dog, Spiro, so this season's early camping trips should be interesting....
1.12.2007
today's truest truth
I was re-reading my "itchy feet and trip dreaming" post and it suddenly occurred to me that many of my favorite travel memories with Greg were times that didn't sound like that much fun; indeed, some of them were pretty awful as we lived them. (Fleabag motel in Seligman, AZ, anyone?) If any of you read that post, you probably thought that if those were some of my favorite memories, you would hate to see the bad ones.
I realized that for me, anyway, something is almost never really great unless parts of it are really bad, too, or really hard, or really not that fun. I was reading something I wrote about our Cracker Lake hike (in Glacier National Park 2 years ago). That hike kind of sucked. First of all, I started our time in Montana out by leaving my wedding rings in Wyoming. So we had to go get them, and by the time we got back to Montana, the weather had turned for the worse. It rained and rained and was foggy and rained some more. Well, we decided to hike anyway, and the sadistic guys camped next to us told us Cracker Lake would be a nice little day hike, maybe "a little" muddy, though. Well, we started off one gray morning, and made a couple miles pretty easily. Then the mud. At this point, we didn't really want to turn back and kept hoping it would get better, but it just got worse. We could barely hike, I slipped and fell and ended up wearing a good portion of the trail (and horse apples) on my clothing, and it was so thick it totally covered our boots at times. (I believe the muddiest boot contest was invented on this trip, but I'm not entirely sure.) Then it started to rain in earnest. Not long after that was when we started noticing the bear tracks in the mud. Large, dinner-plate sized tracks. And scat. Enormous piles of it. Gargantuan scat. Still we trekked on, thinking that if it was going to suck this bad, we were at least going to get to see the view at the lake. We stopped briefly for lunch in a meadow. As soon as we weren't moving, we were freezing. That's about the time it started to snow, as well. Well, we made it to the lake, turned around, and hiked out. This simple 12-mile day hike took us 8 hours. It really wasn't that much fun while we were doing it. About that hike I wrote, "it was wonderful in the way of wonderful things that are comprised largely of terrible ones." To this day, that hike is still one of my favorite memories. It wouldn't have been nearly as memorable if the weather had been great, or there were no bears. We were proud of just doing it, I guess. It was wonderful in the way of wonderful things that are comprised largely of terrible ones. I like that line. Today it feels like the truest truth I know. That the best memories and the best stories are the best precisely because they are also the worst.
That's all....my truest truth for today....
I realized that for me, anyway, something is almost never really great unless parts of it are really bad, too, or really hard, or really not that fun. I was reading something I wrote about our Cracker Lake hike (in Glacier National Park 2 years ago). That hike kind of sucked. First of all, I started our time in Montana out by leaving my wedding rings in Wyoming. So we had to go get them, and by the time we got back to Montana, the weather had turned for the worse. It rained and rained and was foggy and rained some more. Well, we decided to hike anyway, and the sadistic guys camped next to us told us Cracker Lake would be a nice little day hike, maybe "a little" muddy, though. Well, we started off one gray morning, and made a couple miles pretty easily. Then the mud. At this point, we didn't really want to turn back and kept hoping it would get better, but it just got worse. We could barely hike, I slipped and fell and ended up wearing a good portion of the trail (and horse apples) on my clothing, and it was so thick it totally covered our boots at times. (I believe the muddiest boot contest was invented on this trip, but I'm not entirely sure.) Then it started to rain in earnest. Not long after that was when we started noticing the bear tracks in the mud. Large, dinner-plate sized tracks. And scat. Enormous piles of it. Gargantuan scat. Still we trekked on, thinking that if it was going to suck this bad, we were at least going to get to see the view at the lake. We stopped briefly for lunch in a meadow. As soon as we weren't moving, we were freezing. That's about the time it started to snow, as well. Well, we made it to the lake, turned around, and hiked out. This simple 12-mile day hike took us 8 hours. It really wasn't that much fun while we were doing it. About that hike I wrote, "it was wonderful in the way of wonderful things that are comprised largely of terrible ones." To this day, that hike is still one of my favorite memories. It wouldn't have been nearly as memorable if the weather had been great, or there were no bears. We were proud of just doing it, I guess. It was wonderful in the way of wonderful things that are comprised largely of terrible ones. I like that line. Today it feels like the truest truth I know. That the best memories and the best stories are the best precisely because they are also the worst.
That's all....my truest truth for today....
1.01.2007
dichotomy
My newfound enthusiasm for our new life didn't last into the new year. Maybe it's just my nature to never let something be completely okay. We're planning the life I want terribly, but just knowing that I will be leaving this life makes me a little sad. Just a week ago I told Lindsay the only things I would miss about living here would be my nieces and a couple of restaurants. But now I see things I'll miss everywhere I look.
It's no secret that I've completely outgrown my job, and at times I almost hate it. But I have good friends there, people I would never know otherwise. My best friend at work is a 38-year-old mother of four. Unbelievably, we have so much in common. I have work friends from Somalia, Nigeria, Ethiopia, Russia, and Egypt. They just give me a different perspective on things. You wouldn't believe some of the things some of them have lived through. It's enough to make you wonder how you ever got so lucky as to be born in this country at all. I am lucky to know them all. And the hospital is an exciting place....very fast-paced and diverse. You should hear me try to explain how to get to the ER in Spanglish to a stabbing victim (that happened....he showed me the wound....ok, maybe I won't miss that!)
I'll miss St. Paul, too. We have an awesome Farmers' Market, and I've gotten used to having cheap, fresh vegetables in the summer. Also, we buy meat and eggs there year round, and I've grown to dislike the grocery store chicken and eggs. We have fun stores close to home, like Peapods and the Red Balloon Bookshop for kids' stuff. We have Mississippi Market down the street which is a co-op that always has the "Just Tomatoes" line of dried fruits in stock, not to mention organic fruits and veggies. We have lots of restaurants close to home and beautiful old streets with wonderful trees. They are especially great in the fall and winter. I have lived here for almost four years with Greg and one year with Subashi before I was married, and it's become my home.
I'll miss our house, even though it's too big and hard to keep up for slobs like us. We bought it together and picked out all the furnishing especially for it. We have a great front porch, where I spend most of my waking moments in the spring, summer, and fall. We eat dinner out there, talk out there, meet neighbors there, listen to Twins games on the radio and drink wine out there. We have great neighbors. Oscar even has two best (dog) friends among our neighbors. Phoebe is also part border collie and lives across the street, and Georgia is his other favorite bitch....she lives one street behind us. We live two blocks from the Mississippi River, and Osky and I walk down there almost every day. You can see an amazing array of birds there. There is a bald eagle we see quite often. I named him Baldeagle Badugelkinz.
I ride the train to work. It's so nice only having to drive a couple miles a day. In the winter, when we don't travel as much, I buy gas for Goldy about once every 2 months, in the summer about once every 6 weeks or so. I like to go to Twins games and Gophers games every so often. Next week Greg and I are going to a Timberwolves game. We also occasionally go to the Minnesota Orchestra or a play at the Ordway or Orphium. We have Midwest Mountaineering in Minneapolis which is an awesome outdoors store and also REI over in Bloomington.
We have friends here, although we don't see them nearly enough. Our only family here is my brother-in-law and sister-in-law and their two daughters, but they are like our best friends. Paul can always be counted on to help out with anything, even if you ask last minute, and Steph is always good for some conversation. I love my nieces Britta and Sophie so much, even when Sophie is puking at the dinner table and Britta is demanding 10 books before bedtime. I will miss them most of all.
"This is the year we're going to get our shit together and finally start our new life," Greg said to me today. It really is the plan, and I'm happy about it. Hell, I invented it. But I'm sad, too. Nothing's ever black and white with me. It's always a dichotomy....shades of gray.
I hope this year is a good one....
It's no secret that I've completely outgrown my job, and at times I almost hate it. But I have good friends there, people I would never know otherwise. My best friend at work is a 38-year-old mother of four. Unbelievably, we have so much in common. I have work friends from Somalia, Nigeria, Ethiopia, Russia, and Egypt. They just give me a different perspective on things. You wouldn't believe some of the things some of them have lived through. It's enough to make you wonder how you ever got so lucky as to be born in this country at all. I am lucky to know them all. And the hospital is an exciting place....very fast-paced and diverse. You should hear me try to explain how to get to the ER in Spanglish to a stabbing victim (that happened....he showed me the wound....ok, maybe I won't miss that!)
I'll miss St. Paul, too. We have an awesome Farmers' Market, and I've gotten used to having cheap, fresh vegetables in the summer. Also, we buy meat and eggs there year round, and I've grown to dislike the grocery store chicken and eggs. We have fun stores close to home, like Peapods and the Red Balloon Bookshop for kids' stuff. We have Mississippi Market down the street which is a co-op that always has the "Just Tomatoes" line of dried fruits in stock, not to mention organic fruits and veggies. We have lots of restaurants close to home and beautiful old streets with wonderful trees. They are especially great in the fall and winter. I have lived here for almost four years with Greg and one year with Subashi before I was married, and it's become my home.
I'll miss our house, even though it's too big and hard to keep up for slobs like us. We bought it together and picked out all the furnishing especially for it. We have a great front porch, where I spend most of my waking moments in the spring, summer, and fall. We eat dinner out there, talk out there, meet neighbors there, listen to Twins games on the radio and drink wine out there. We have great neighbors. Oscar even has two best (dog) friends among our neighbors. Phoebe is also part border collie and lives across the street, and Georgia is his other favorite bitch....she lives one street behind us. We live two blocks from the Mississippi River, and Osky and I walk down there almost every day. You can see an amazing array of birds there. There is a bald eagle we see quite often. I named him Baldeagle Badugelkinz.
I ride the train to work. It's so nice only having to drive a couple miles a day. In the winter, when we don't travel as much, I buy gas for Goldy about once every 2 months, in the summer about once every 6 weeks or so. I like to go to Twins games and Gophers games every so often. Next week Greg and I are going to a Timberwolves game. We also occasionally go to the Minnesota Orchestra or a play at the Ordway or Orphium. We have Midwest Mountaineering in Minneapolis which is an awesome outdoors store and also REI over in Bloomington.
We have friends here, although we don't see them nearly enough. Our only family here is my brother-in-law and sister-in-law and their two daughters, but they are like our best friends. Paul can always be counted on to help out with anything, even if you ask last minute, and Steph is always good for some conversation. I love my nieces Britta and Sophie so much, even when Sophie is puking at the dinner table and Britta is demanding 10 books before bedtime. I will miss them most of all.
"This is the year we're going to get our shit together and finally start our new life," Greg said to me today. It really is the plan, and I'm happy about it. Hell, I invented it. But I'm sad, too. Nothing's ever black and white with me. It's always a dichotomy....shades of gray.
I hope this year is a good one....
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