WTF Friday (=What The Friday! Friday)

Today is Friday. Already! Finally!

I have mixed feelings about today.

It all started with Monday, on which day, by the end of the day, I had already decided it was Tuesday.

Seriously. I had completely and utterly convinced myself of it's Tuesday-ness and was so excited that the next day was Wednesday.

Which it wasn't. Because what was supposed to be Wednesday morning had really only just caught up to my over-reaching expectations and become Tuesday.

Capice?

Yah, me too.

Then one day this week... I'm not sure which, but I think it may have been Tuesday. The for-real-Tuesday, I had my first 12.5 hour day of the year at the office. And let me tell ya, it was not fun. I do not like spending evenings locked up in my office in Downtown Oakland. In case you weren't aware, Oakland is scary. Especially at night. Like really, really scary. And I grew up in a very ghetto city.

So.

What's my name again?

That's pretty much the state of affairs today. I'm just confused.

But SALVATION: It's a long weekend! Monday is a holiday! I'm pretty sure it is, at least. Please correct me if I'm wrong. And if I'm right - that's just going to throw off next week, probably.

Sigh.

Here's a picture of my Auntie-Mama Rene's Golden Retriever, Duke, following me around in my Grandma's garden. He's standing on Gram's spinach, which Gram didn't appreciate very much.

But the picture is just for fun. It's cute. And doesn't it remind you of Dug from "Up"?
I KNOW RIGHT! Squirrel!

Shark's Teeth, Blueberries, Car-jumping Daredevils and One Fabulous Auntie

My Auntie-Mama Rene is one of my favorite people in the world. She's my Mother's sister. The same amazing Woman I went caneoing down the Nottaway river with last year (and got locked out of the truck at the end). She spent a few years as a Truck Driver and now really has no desire to go anywhere outside of her normal country home places. She explores the area, bit by bit. She digs in the earth for Indian artifacts - arrowheads, pottery and the like (and finds it all in droves, too!) and sifts the river bed for shark's teeth. She explores, in her own way, God's green earth. Everything is a delicate gift, a discovery to her, from sighting an Eagle lazing over the river to holding a baby box turtle.

I think my urge to discover, the way I go about it, comes from her, from my earliest exposures to her as a child.

I remember being about six years old. My mother had brought me and my sister to Gram's farm for the summer. Rene took us on many excursions that summer. To the flower fields to pick daisies. To the berry patch to pick strawberries and blackberries. To spots deep in the woods to dig for arrowheads (I saw a sleeping snake in a pit out there!).

One sunny afternoon Rene drove us down a long backroad to go pick wild blueberries. The road was white sand and it was beautiful. We drove along, verrrrrrrrrrry slowly, just creeping along, as country people who are just enjoying the day do. My little sister was three years old and pretty much followed me around wherever I suggested. I was impatient to get to wherever we were going, as six year olds are. Finally I just couldn't take it anymore. The sand on the road was so very lovely and just begged to be played in. What's more, there were millions of blueberry plants all around us.

I was the devil. I whispered to my sister to unbuckle her seatbelt, grabbed her hand, opened the door of the car and we both hopped out with our buckets. The car was practically rolling along at a Turtle's pace, just mozying really, while Auntie and Mom gabbed away in the front seat.

Kelly and I were ecstatic that we'd escaped the slowly rolling gossip-mobile and immediately began to roll around in the beautiful white-sugary sand road. It didn't take long for the car to come to a screeching stop and Mama and Auntie to jump out, pale-faced.

I don't remember getting in trouble. I do remember the sand. I remember picking blueberries the rest of the afternoon. That was my first daredevil-escape-artist act. It wasn't my last. But I'm not an adrenaline junkie by any means either. However, the impression it left on my three-year old sister must have been something,  because she is. She's the bungee-jumping, skydiving type. And it's probably my fault.

Now I'm Thirty. Auntie-Mama is a couple decades older. And as I look at her I see that I'm now in the position she once was. To teach, to guide the babies around me. I'm happy to have my Nephew around so I can help him learn and explore.

Everytime I go back to Virginia, Rene teaches me something new about looking and finding and searching, about taking long walks and soul-whisperings and planting strawberries (and running over them with a tractor), about family and being neighborly and taking care of the people in your life.

Thanks Auntie-Mama for the continued inspiration you give me, for all you still teach me. I love you.

 This is a Florida backroad, but it's a white-sandy backroad all the same, just so you can see what I'm talking about.

The Westover Plantation

My little sister is going to hate me for this post. You see, her last name is Westover. And she wasn't with me when I visited the plantation... Oh well.

While I was down home on the farm in Virginia, I had one day of exploration in mind. I wanted to go back to the James River plantations and explore some more. This time I invited my lovely auntie-mama Rene along. We set off in the morning and drove an hour Southeast from Gram's farm down to the mighty James, the selfsame river that meets the Atlantic and was the gateway for the first British colonizers to the Americas.

The Westover Plantation is one of the oldest plantations established along the James (the oldest being Berkeley - more on Berkeley later). It was built in 1730 by William Byrd II, the founder of the city of Richmond. It was named after Lord Henry West, son of the Governor of Virginia.

The house proper is not open to the public to tour, but the grounds can be toured and are GORGEOUS. I can safely say that of all the Plantation homes I've toured along the James, Westover is my absolute favorite. It is the most happily situated house I have ever laid eyes on.

On the property there are grand gardens to explore, a plantation-style house, kitchen and other out-buildings from long past days, including a "necessary", an ice house and an old root cellar that used to be part of an old secret passage system to provide escape during Indian attack. (Yes, seriously!) I may have climbed down the ladder into the old passage...

An old cabinet in the kitchen

 A spinning wheel in the kitchen

 Gardens

 Details from the front gate

 GORGEOUS old Magnolia tree

 The front entry to the house - this is a famous doorway, known as the Westover doorway.

 One of the "wings" to the house - a beautiful little solarium-style walkway between the house proper and the side buildings. The winged walkways were added in the 1900's.

 The ladder in the root cellar leading down to the "secret passage"

 Happily looking out onto the James River.

Four Years!

Today is a landmark day for me.

Today is the four-year anniversary for me joining Clorox's Multimedia Department. Crazy, eh?

Four years and four weeks ago I received a crazy email from my little sister, who had started working for Clorox's design department a few months earlier. "Sister" she said to me, "send me your resume and demo reel. The folks here want to see your stuff."

I said no. Truly, I did. I'd just started a job in Utah, managing the graphics department of a medium sized print house. It wasn't my dream job, but I was good at it and I enjoyed it. Honestly, my dream job was working for a small, in-house media department at a corporation... (Uh, hello, Clorox!) But I'd made a commitment to my new (print house) job and I was going to keep it.

Sister persisted in pestering me. "Send me your resume. Just do it!"

FINE.

The next weekend I flew out to meet the Clorox people (who were awesome and agreed to meet me on a Saturday because I couldn't take time off of work - we were THAT busy!). I'd expected to pick up some video freelance work, possibly. But to my utter shock, horror and amazement, they offered me a full-time position, starting just as soon as I could possibly move to California.

I remember sitting in my car. Shaking. So absurdly tingly, grateful, excited, amazed, that I felt almost like puking. It was a life-changing moment.

Three weeks later I finished out my print job, packed up a uhaul trailer hooked to the back of my trusty White '99 Jeep Cherokee Sport (That thing was a TANK. Far and away my favorite car ever. Miss it!) and drove the long highway down to Cali.

I grew up in the Bay Area. Did you know that? I'm a California girl, born and bred. The funny thing is, I never, in a million years, thought I'd live here again. And not twenty miles from where I grew up. Life is full of all sorts of surprises, isn't it?

Well. Not unexpectedly, it's been a great job. And it's been flexible enough to allow me to take off and travel and keep my wanderlust-monster in check. Which really is the most important thing.

It's been a great four years, Clorox. Thanks for the ride.

Everything I Need to Know About Myself I Learned From the Legend of Zelda. (8-bit)

I look back at my life sometimes as though it is simply a series of moments on a timeline.

1980- born
1983- little sister came along
1985- slid down the staircase on the couch cushions, played fox-in-the-box, played telephone with my little sister on our purple care bear play phones
1986 - world rocked, we moved (New house had an indoor hot tub --- Salvation!)
1987- little brother born
1988 - we moved again. Got a NES 8-bit system for Christmas.

And so on, and so forth.

One of the biggest revelations about myself came to me as I was playing The Legend of Zelda on that old 8-bit NES. Truly. 
I realized as I wandered around the big map that I couldn't jump in and beat any of the levels until I'd explored as much of the map as possible.

I know.

Nerd alert. 

But it's true. And it's still true to this day. I don't like to make choices that will affect the outcome of my life until I know my options, until I've explored the lay of the land and know what's out there.

I'm a generalist. I'm a grappler. I'm an explorer. I'm me.

Who are you?

Yesterdays

Yesterday I woke to the sound of frogs chirping, the breeze blowing through Cedars, Dogwoods and Pine trees. Yesterday I woke to the smell of Honeysuckle and the feel of humidity against my skin. Yesterday I walked outside to my favorite porch for the last time and looked over the clean garden rows I worked all week with my Grandmother and watched the dogs frolic around in the turned-under fields.

Today I woke in California, to the sound of cars passing by on the street behind my house. The air was dry and my skin parched. I lay in my bed a long while, imagining myself back again, walking across the field to from my Gram's house to my Aunt's, toes sinking into the sandy earth, throwing a stick for the dogs to fetch and humming country songs to myself.

My Grandmother is 81. She's made her peace and is waiting...

It is hard to leave people you love, knowing it may be the last time you see them.

 Gram's Garden on the edge of the empty back field.

My Grandma’s Garden is Bigger Than Your Backyard

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On a working farm there are two businesses run simultaneously: the business of farming and the business of living.

The modern farmer plants crops in large, cleared fields with heavy machinery, tends them with more machinery and harvests them with even more machinery. The crops that are planted each year vary according to market price, and the farmer gambles each season by planting what he or she thinks will fetch the best price. Sometimes crops fail. Sometimes the market changes before harvest. Sometimes it all works out.

Nearly every farm you see will have a garden as well as crop fields. Not a city-style garden, all trim with lattices and Tomato wires and stakes for creeping plants to grow up. But a large plot, usually plowed over by the same tractor the farmer uses on the fields, planted full of good things: Corn, Broccoli, Kale, Spinach, Tomato, Dill, Cucumber, Cabbage, Onions, String beans, Butter beans… use your imagination. It’s big enough to feed the family from all year. (Of course, these days country gardens are supplemented by trips to Wal-Mart, but everyone knows there’s just nothing like farm fresh.)

This morning I stood barefoot in the garden, working beside my grandmother. She picked baby spinach leaves and fresh kale (it's spicy! who knew?) for our supper this evening (and also to thin out the plants so they’ll continue to produce) while I hoed weeds.  I listen to my tiny, white-haired Grandmother hum in her high pitched, slightly off-key tone, the tone I’ve grown to love over the years, she hums to the vegetables and talks to them, interrogating the weeds in her garden bed. “What do we have here? Just what are you?” And then her deft, sweetly gnarled hands reach quickly down and futz with the invading plant, pull it up and toss it aside as she moves on down the garden row.

My neatly kept, mulch covered garden back in California doesn’t compare in either size or quality - with the amazing produce Grandma will pick in the summer months. The clay dirt in California is tough and hard to work with compared to the loose sandy loam in Virginia. It seems that here on the east coast all you need to do is stick something in the ground and it will grow. Back in California I fight with the earth, condition it, add eggshells to it, water daily and fertilize it weekly to coax tomatoes out of the ground. In Virginia, Grandma fertilizes once with cow manure and then nature does the rest. No watering. No conditioning. At the end of the summer Grandma and everyone else will have picked all they want, eaten all they can hold, canned all they can store, and traded a surplus of one thing on one farm for a surplus of another on a different farm. At the end of summer, vegetables will rot on the plants in Grandma’s garden. And then the large tractor will come again and turn it all under the earth to compost and get ready for next spring.

That’s just the way of it.

Hmm. The mason jar I’m drinking ice water out of tastes briny, of pickles. Guess I know what Grandma canned last year. 

Tastes like home. 

I am blessed.

This Place

This place

-Is a place where a dog is not just a companion, it’ll save your life on a daily basis just by being around.

-Is a place where you’ll never go hungry. Everybody cooks good food and plenty of it. Find a fridge and dig in.

-Is a place where you learn the meaning of work.

-Is filled with love.

-Is where you fill a mason jar up with ice water and bring it with you to hoe the fields. That's the original bottled water, y'all.

-Is where you’ll have to drive thirty miles down country roads into town if you have a craving for fast food.

-Is where you’ll want to plant yourself in the sandy loam just to feel the silky dirt between your toes.

-Is where the air is intoxicating and smells of honeysuckle in the spring; humidity and earth before the rain, and fried chicken at dinner time.

-Is where the sunset lights up the sky over the trees in the far corner of the field every evening.

-Is home.

Fine Friday

Today's the day! It's the day when I break with the travel famine I've been experiencing and head off into the skies.

Back to the East Coast I go! I'll start off in D.C. and head south, down to the homeland, down to my roots and my family and the farm, it's humid days and thunderstorm nights. I'll see a few long-lost friends and do a bit of touring. And mostly, I'll sleep, and visit and walk a while around the country roads and enjoy the company of the people I love.

But first, I've got to make it through the day. A short workday, followed by a trip to the movie theater to see Thor (because I won't have a chance to see it next week and I reaaaaaaaaaallllly wanna see it), a frenzy of packing and then over to my sister's to drop off my car and head to the airport. Exciting, no? (Meh)

What are you up to on this Fine Friday?

Mormon Helping Hands

Saturday was a very, very busy day.

We've been counseled to be "Anxiously engaged in a good cause." So for Mormons across the state of California we once a year we participate in a day of service called Mormon Helping Hands. (We do other good stuff too at different times, of course!) All of our congregations across the state coordinated with local organizations in need of manpower to paint, patch, weed, fix, help.

I was thrilled when I found out that my congregation was assigned to help at a place that I go regularly - a great open space called Sugarloaf.

From 9 to noon, I pushed a wheel barrow full of dirt, raked it, stamped it, packed it and generally helped to beautify the stage area of the open space. The open space frequently hosts mass campouts full of boyscouts and other organizations. The stage area is home to nightly skits and other such fun shenanigans. Well, it, and many other areas in the park needed some TLC, so we hauled dirt and bark and beautified. Other people painted and stained fences and weeded garden areas.

Now, the place is "shipshape" again, and ready for use.
And as someone who loves that little park, I'm so very excited to be able to see the direct effects of my help every time I go to Sugarloaf. Pretty darned cool.

The work we did this Saturday will last several years before needing to be renewed. Next year we'll serve at a different location.

It's amazing how much work it takes to keep our "wild" places properly maintained, don't you think? 
But there it is.

It doesn't matter what faith you are (or aren't), get out and help your community! It really does make a difference and it'll make you feel good too.

:)

photos from: http://mhhcalifornia.org/

Curbing the Compulsion

I've been without a computer at home for over a week. I've been surprised by how much I've enjoyed it! I've become too connected. Checking email is a compulsion. I do it ALL day long. Either on my iPhone, or my home computer, or my work computer or... wherever.

So when I had to take my video editing machine into Apple (YET AGAIN... 4th time since December for the SAME issue! Apple - you're really pushing my buttons lately!), and then two days later I happened to spill water on my new MacBook Air and it shut off not to turn on ever again. (I may have cried a little) *Ahem...* I found myself sans computing devices at home. At first I kind of panicked. I mean, I couldn't work on my book. I couldn't work on various side video projects... Nothin'.

And then the evenings at home began to pass quietly, pleasantly. I sat and read, went for hikes in the hills (yay for great weather!), played with my Nephew. These are, of course, things I normally do anyway, but I was so much less rushed. I was so much more relaxed. I realized that I would spend all day at work, working on computers, just to come home and turn on more computers and do more work. What kind of a life is that, really?

Look at what the last five months of not traveling have done to me! They've wreaked havoc on my adventuresome side. It's time to get out and go somewhere! (Luckily I'm flying away from here on Friday.)

Now I have one computer back home... and I didn't go to bed until midnight last night - for no reason at all. I stayed up playing around with the computer, dinking around with a video project and not really getting anywhere because I was so tired in the first place (long weekend!).

So I'm thinking that really I don't want those computers on so much. I think I'll ignore them on purpose when I get home. How about that? Of course, I will have to work on projects from time to time, but I think ignoring computers from 5pm-9pm would be quite in order, don't you?

PS, that water spill is going to cost me $800 to fix. Considering the laptop only cost $1300... ARGH!

Okay computers, did you get the memo????