Mountains to Mitten Part II: Hi...Bye!

Now you see her, now you don't!

The next few weeks are a blur.

On the 21st, my mother and I go to a small Solstice gathering in Ann Arbor. I don't really vibe with the crowd and the alienation puts me in a mood for a bit, but Lori makes it all worth it. She led a workshop on her practice of the 5-Rhythms dances  founded by Gabrielle Roth (1941-2012)

In all my time with Lori, I had never been led through one of these routines - her daily life-nectar and foundation of her spiritual practice - so I was excited to finally partake. Also, since being in Packwood, my dancing opportunities had been limited to synchronized sing-alongs of The Fox with Mary and meager attempts to get in a few to-and-frows in the bar before my space would be infringed upon and I would just cease all-together. By the end of the hour - one full of swooping and spinning wildly across the room, uninterrupted - I had tears forming in in the corner of my eyes as I realized how much I had needed that freeing space of self-expression. An opening to the light from dark confinement, to keep it solstice-y.

The weather is harsh that day and we cancel our outdoor portion of our celebration to cash in on a relaxing evening at home. And then the moving around starts all over again in the morning...

I am off bright and early the next day to whisk up my friend George for a Grand Rapids excursion.

Grand Rapids is becoming a cool cat.

Just around the time I left, it decided to get even cooler with a massive Downtown outdoor/indoor market featuring Michigan-made everything. Learning about it during a moment of nostalgia 2,500 miles away from home was kind of a big jealousy-inducing slap in the face. So it was a juicy cherry on the top of our Grand Rapids Sunday.

Everything is tantilizingly taunting, leaving me to battle the inducing shopper's fever. It is the holidays, after all. I snap out of it (mostly) - gourmet tea satchels and Olive Oils infused with everything short of baby's bottom are not my gift-giving style. However I do end up buckling when we are roped into trying over half a dozen sophisticated, alcohol-infused jam flavors. We settle for Barrel-aged whisky Apple Butter and Jalepeno Raspberry. A contribution to Christmas Brunch, right? I have the (pricey) Barrel-aged Whisky Maple Syrup bookmarked for a future splurge.

When we have had our fill, we head over to my friend Lauren's where she is once again in the midst of being Wonder Woman. Battling a terribly mysterious case of ills, she has not only insisted on keeping the Putluck a go, but has tasked herself with tearing down every room of her house to re-paint it. She is in the middle of a purple sea when we arrive. George and I make ourselves useful with cleaning projects before commandeering the kitchen to cook our evening contribution.

The eating commences late but the place is transformed, with no trace of having been a construction zone a few hours earlier. Both familiar and new faces, amazing food and a bonus holiday play conjured up by Kayan, Imani and a few of their little friends.  On full bellies and sleepy eyes, we finish with a Rap encore by Kayan and some budding guitar talent.

Raw Cranberry Carrot "cake"

Imani lookin' stylish

Mountains to Mitten part I: Getting there

My winter break game plan went something as follows: 

Lay low. play game. family. snuggle cat. family. lay LOW. snuggle cat. snuggle cat. think about doing something and then snuggle cat. family. maybe some close friends somewhere in the mix. snuggle cat infinity. 

My actual winter break was more like this: 

surprise a friend. snuggle cat. family dinners. snuggle cat. surprise more friends. snuggle cat. leave town. snuggle cat. family games and holiday debates. snuggle cat. surprise more friends (with unexpected holiday baking). snuggle cat. holidays. leave town. almost get stranded out of town. dance with friends. snuggle cat a lot. more friends. snuggle cat and cancel plans. new years. cat. lots of friends. cat. intense family kurfufuls. cat. catcatcat infinity. 

So....I got the cat part in at least. 

***I'd like to preface with the fact that I am in a very different place now than I was then (well, duh.) there comes a point in procrastination at which detailed anecdotes are rendered pretty useless. Plus, I am more excited about where I am now (emotionally). But for the purpose of these recounts, I will try to refrain from bringing too much inner dialogue from the current me into the entries. That will be later!***

On two hours of sleep, Mary and I are whizzing to Morton. Our commute angel Corey will meet us there and take us to Portland. Mary is instantly conked out once we load his car. She's good at taking her sleep exactly when it beacons. I am too pumped to be tired. Corey is good conversation and we couldn't have been given a prettier sunrise for the drive.

In fact, most of the trip goes smoothly.

But oh man, 21st century. My first reaction upon entering the airport is "Mary, tell me where to go." She peers at my ticket and points to the line ahead, for Delta. It is blissfully non-existent. Awesome. However, the couple in front of me takes forever, asking about special accommodations or something. I zone out. When I am finally called up, the lady at the desk asks me if I am checked in. From my bewildered I thought I was doing that here look , she barely waits for an answer before asking in unflinching monotone "are you a priority passenger" (or something fancy like that.) In annoyance, she points over down the lobby to her left. "You need to do a self check-in or go down to the special services and they will help you." I am already deterred from dealing with another harsh over-worked employee so I decide to walk over to the rows of computer kiosks I'd avoided before.

I am still a phone-code virgin. The screen asks me to wave my texted little Rorschach square under a laser but nothing is happening. The only thing reacting is my stress level. Finally, I just go to the "special service desk." No one is there and when someone finally sees me waiting, she acts even more annoyed than the first person. Apparently that line isn't open. As politely as I can, I try to explain to her that I am not an indoctrinated robo-tron hooked into the "know" of everything cyber. She marches me back over to the computers, asks for my ticket and presses a bunch of buttons. Maintaining my manners, I thank her and explain I don't fly often. I haven't seen these before. She humphs. What advancement. We've progressed our technology and stunted our manners to Cave Man age.

So, back to the smooth sailing (besides getting my Swiss Army knife taken at security - oops).

The flight is relatively on time. We are riding one of Boeing's newest plane - "the pride of our fleet today." Fancy.

 Okay, it is pretty fancy. First of all, they have found a way to make me pay attention to the safety video. Live action skits filmed with cinematic refinement that poke fun at themselves. These are shown on individual screens on the back of each seat. I got that uncomfortable "bah, sheep" feeling when they flashed sychronized advertisements on all 150+ screens in front of each passenger but ultimately succumbed to the private theater offering...I mean, c'mon. I got to watch Despicable Me II and Somm (very interesting documentary) for free. Needless to say, I did not do the sleep I was planning to do.

Family sans cat stand before me at the baggage claim 4 hours later. Immediately, there are the familiar  well-intended bickerings and banterings and silent allies formed. Our reunion conversation is abridged and sidetracked with the urgent logistics of dinner. I had been sitting upon the hope of surprising my very dear friend Anna at Arbor Farms and, settling upon driving home for dinner it was looking like a possibility once more.

First principle of coming home: Lay low. 

Mission: Anna surprise turns into 48-hour hang out session. There was a secret mission, really tasty sangria and games involved. But not really a laying low thing.

My contribution to the Holiday discussion.

Dominoes for arts-es, yes?

This was good. Take note. So much happening in your mouth. 

To end this entry, I will grace you with a lovely feline face. I figured I would get these out of the way now, since they have very little context except that they happened incrementally between everything I did for the entire two weeks.

Principle "cat snuggles": still in tact.

Intermission:

Entering into the new year, I have been deciding to look at some things in my life more closely and seriously. Health, finances, time investment...seriously did not necessarily connote stern or tense feelings but at the same time I decided I needed to make some changes, the universe decided to change things for me also. The past couple of weeks since being home has been a series of losing things, breaking things, finding things, replacing things, and otherwise logistic-ing things that pop up as extra nusances out of no where.

All in all it has been very cumbersome to try and put all my ducks in a row, so to speak. The blog has suffered. But there is much to catch up on! So stay tuned for entries!