Open

 

[Best paired with music by Vancouver Sleep Clinic]

 

I woke up early to color my lungs with fresh morning air. When I slid my stiff feet into hiking shoes, I planned to leave my house and head Right to loop through sleep-dusted neighborhoods and admire the hush of dawn. It wasn’t until I was partway up Madonna mountain, pausing in the trail to watch an invisible crane lift the sun over earthline, that I realized I went Left.

Gifted by the powers at play, I stood sandwiched between growing sun and shrinking moon–the rays and reflections catching on tiny silver tightropes, swaying with blades of patchy grass. My shadow leaned soft and brown on the hillside. From the air, nothing more than a tiny birthmark on a small knoll.

 

a Lesson in odd pairings

Typically, the Baroque Period nauseates me. The harpsichord bouncing about in lively jubilation, the echoed runs leaping from left to right hand — it’s a dizzying party at which I’ve never belonged.

But something weird happened today as I drove down to Santa Barbara: I enjoyed Bach. Somewhere near Los Olivos, strands of mist highlighted shaded mountains, and like a Kauai landscape, the heavy grey sky invited me closer. The miles moved quickly; I tore at them steadily as the opus grew like a giant flower in my mind. What I saw was strangely misaligned with what I heard, and ordinarily, I’d never put the two together. But for those brief moments, they exposed an unusual, beautiful partnership.

When the piece was over I shut off the radio.

In silence and the slow lane, I preserved a feeling and wound through Los Padres National Forest until I hit Cold Spring Tavern. That’s where we agreed to meet, the friends I made in Argentina and I. It was a halfway point, excluding Caitlin’s trek from Michigan, and it held its distance from palm trees and oversized TVs.

It was the first time we’d all been in the same place in over two years and it was a biker bar.

By the fire we drank our beers and began to buy and sell stories for the price of laughter. There was so much to share but we effectively shrunk the years we spent apart. One by one, all at once, over the blues band that played in the corner, we talked. As men with tobacco stained mustaches ate their tri-tip sandwiches, we reminisced. As deer heads watched over us, and wooden planks supported us, we caught up.  There, our South American conversations were out of context. What we heard was so different than the sights that surrounded us, but they fit and all was cozy and right.

Sam, Sarah and Jack

My friend Sam’s been growing out his beard and I’m convinced he’s hiding wisdom in there.

Last night I took a looksy at the full moon, and a looksy down at my lazy self before calling one of my oldest friends to take a night hike with me. There was a splatter of residual laundry powder hanging to my sleeve from the load I’d just put in. Sheets. 

When he showed up on my doorstep, singing a tune to my porch light and wiggling to the beat the way he does, we picked our peak right then and there. Bishops. Not too far, not too easy or hard, short or long.

It met the Goldilocks principle, so we met it with high-quality footwear: his Merrell’s, mine Salomon’s. And we talked about normal things, you know, work and friends and honesty and goals and songwriting and lentils and biking and Thanksgiving plans. Occasionally, we’d take breathers along a switchback. The fields below grew motionlessly, the lights winked with secrecy. 

Everything is so manageable from up here.

He said it without knowing its impact. And we pressed on, following the trails as they meandered around and up the mountain.

Want to hear one of my favorite quotes? I haven’t been able to get it out of my head.

Sure.

“Energy creates energy. It is by spending myself that I become rich.” 

Is there a word that combines yeah, woah, mm, love and fascination? If so, it would describe my reaction to that Sarah Bernhardt quote. The idea of spending yourself … being spent…giving everything…becoming currency. It was so wonderfully charging and inspiring, and I thought of it for a long while, long after the echo of his words left the crisp air. I thought about it as I came home to my clean, warm sheets and tucked myself in, airtight. I read a bit of Kerouac to set the tone of my pending slumber and stopped on this sentence and Buddhist quote:

When you get to the top of a mountain, keep climbing.

 

Tall Girls Camping Trip

Though I may be muscling an old phrase into something it’s not: Tall girls who camp together stick together. *

This weekend, Amy, Olivia and I spent some quality time with nature’s giants. Tucked away in the Santa Cruz mountains, Big Basin is California’s oldest state park (speak up, Yosemite?) and the birthplace of our very first tall girl tradition.

If I didn’t eat so much pumpkin pie and smores/drink so much wine, I’d undoubtedly have surfaced an ab or 8 from laughing so hard in such a short period of time. From relentless pun-makin to twerking to T-rex tomahawking, to feeling out our morning dance moves to the tune of James Brown — things were sufficiently weird.  I would willingly subject myself to a lifetime of everlasting House/Trace music if it meant spending more nights like the one we tall girls spent camping sans men.

 

Also, please find it in your heart to either send me a quality camera, or hold your scoff at these blurry, badly lit iphone photos. It’s also to blame for my greasy hair and single day’s outfit. Yeah, why not.

 

We’ll begin with several shots of my new Subaru. This was its first adventure, I was such a proud mom.

 

       

 

 

 

 

*Tall girls are 5’7″ or above. These pictures are not to scale.

9

This one’s a good month. A bountiful month, a  proving month. A glittering crimson and jeweled month, filled with chance and truth month.

On September first, I stopped then started. It was a needed reset, and eight days in, I still feel more or less revived.

It started in Eureka when Drew and I escaped to the North Coast for labor day weekend. My first time in a puddle jumper plane started a domino effect of firsts –in a matter of days, I met droves of his family and friends, experienced cabin life in Willow Creek, hooted and hollered at small town folk in Big Foot suits, saw a night sky tightly polka dotted with stars, and witnessed a scorpion try to sneak its way into a suitcase.

We hiked and explored and played and wandered and sat by the firepit with his parents. We squeezed hands every time we saw deer minding their afternoons like they mind their babies. We drank Troublemaker and ate sliders with childish class, uninterested in time or texts or responsibility.

And I got to bring my dad to a new place. His birthday anniversary was yesterday, and like every day this month, I toasted to his life. In warm company, I remembered him as I always do. Happy birthday dad, this month’s for you.

Here’s a playlist I’ve made to soundtrack this new and ninth month. Enjoy the songs and these below sights.

new tradition

15 movements of a Rachmaninoff piece, 10 people, 3 beds, 2 showers, 1 fridge full of imperial stouts. That about summarizes the best staycation weekend a girl could’ve asked for.

My family came down to the central coast to see me sing at Cal Poly’s Performing Arts Center, and we all stayed snug as bugs in rugs in a picture perfect vacation home in Avila Beach. We did things normal families do, like play on swing sets and chase brownies with English toffee.

Needless to say, there was a George shaped whole in all of our hearts this weekend. Not a minute went by where we weren’t all wishing he was enjoying the view or coffee or choir music alongside us.

 

     

Photography by my sister and cousin, Bryanna.