THE STUFF WE DID

I’ve been a regular New Orleans visitor since the age of two. In all of those times, I have never participated in a swamp tour. We visited the zoo a number of times and rolled down the tallest hill in New Orleans (which is a man-made hill in the middle of the zoo). I have ridden the streetcar all through the city. I have walked down the most touristy streets, but I have never done a “Cajun Adventure Tour”. Michael wanted to see alligators on this trip, so we booked ourselves on a two hour flat bottom boat ride through the Honey Island Swamp just east of New Orleans. I could not convince Michael to ride an airboat or do a kayak trip through the swamp. Those things didn’t feel safe to him but a large boat carrying twenty people with a captain that often joked about losing tourists in the swamp felt safe.

There have been drives through swampy areas where Michael will ask me about what I might be looking at out the window. I always say that I’m looking for alligators. It is not really true because an alligator is pretty impossible to spot from a speeding vehicle. Alligators spend a lot of time mostly submerged with only the tops of their heads sticking up out of the water. They are the color of the water and look more like floating bits of wood than animal. The things I’m really looking at out the window are birds. White egrets and gray herons mostly dot the swamps along the road side. This trip, I saw two flamingos fly overhead. One our way down through Arkansas, I spotted a bald eagle just sitting in a field. One our drive up through Mississippi, I spotted another bald eagle flying away from some smaller birds he had made unhappy. Bird spotting is easy. Also deer. I see lots of deer on our road trips.

So this cajun goofball version of my dad gave us a tour of the Honey Island Swamp. He pointed out the wildlife which was mostly just alligators and raccoons. He told us about the spiders and snakes in the area. He thumped the boat canopy regularly to scare us into thinking a snake had fallen into the boat. When he wasn’t being silly, he told us about the plants, pointing out wild rice and irises. At one point, we came across a small pink cocoon like structure. This was filled with apple snail eggs, a highly invasive species that will wreck havoc on the ecosystem. I leaned over and told Michael about how we had to get special permits to use these as model organisms in research. We use them in the study of eye regeneration because apple snails can regenerate their eyeballs. This was so fascinating to Michael that he almost shouted out to everyone else on the boat that I am a scientists and I know about these snails.

Thankfully we managed to keep my knowledge just between the two of us.

Along with animal sighting, we collected license tags, forty two of them to be exact. Though four of those tags were Canadian and the Alaska tag was discovered at our very last roadside stop on the way home. Since Michael is a teacher by trade, he likes to give us ‘grades’ on our tag collections. He said we earned a solid B on this trip. Between alligator searches and tag collecting, we had sort of a scavenger hunt to find Banksy art pieces. Michael was unfamiliar with Banksy, an England based street artist, political activist and director. A while back, Melissa and I went to a Banksy Exhibition Show that felt like more of place to be seen, sipping fancy cocktails than a place to see and learn about the art. Frankly it was a little disappointing and now I think the disappointing display of work was by design. The thing you are supposed to take away from that showing is that Banksy’s art must be seen in the wild and part of the art is opening your eyes to the sights around you.

Banksy was in New Orleans in 2008, three years after hurricane Katrina. He left behind around fifteen stencils scattered all over the city. Most of those have been destroyed, painted over or part of buildings that were demolished. The first one we found was a piece called Looters that had been rescued from destruction and put on display inside a hotel lobby. The hotel has a small room off to the side of the art that explains a little bit about the artist and the efforts made to save this piece of art work. It helped that this was the first one we actually saw because this gave Michael a quick and dirty education on Banksy. Banksy’s art, for me, perfectly conveys the impermanence of life. Every thing. EVERY. THING. is temporary. Even that ‘permanent’ tattoo you had placed on your low back in 1997 will be dust someday. The map I was using to hunt Banksy art had not been kept up to date. There was supposed to be one of his stencils just two blocks down from where we were staying. We went looking for it on our first evening and when we got to the building, the stencil had been removed, the wall painted over with pink paint.

Someone must have recognized the importance of Nola Girl with Umbrella because a protective plate of plexiglass had been secured over her. She resides on the side of building that is boarded up and covered with graffiti. It looks like it used to be a walk-in clinic which is funny because right next door is a Voodoo shop. We found ourselves walking with a tall lanky young man who we shared pleasantries with while waiting for the street light to change. He had just found out that he had the day off and the weather was beautiful. He asked if we were looking for “the Banksy” and when we said yes, he guided us there because it was on his way. Michael and I stood there, the only tourists in the area, marveling at how temporary all this art happens to be. Not just the Girl with Umbrella, but all the other brightly colored graffiti art. It reminded me of something I had seen and experienced a long time ago.

There used to be a famous black sand beach on the Big Island of Hawaii. Photographs of the beach were plastered on prints and postcards and used in tourist promotional brochures. I was on that island with my parents in 1990 and there was a major volcanic eruption at the beginning of that week that sent lava flowing towards that beach. We went and stood on that beach and could see the smoke and glow of hot lava in the distance. By the middle of that week, half of the beach had been covered with lava and by the time we left, the entire beach was gone. Poof. Just like that in a week’s time this beautiful beach area was covered with molten lava. Now, years later, the ocean is wearing away some of that now hardened lava and a new black sand beach is forming. Vegetation is starting to grow up between the craggy lava rocks.

This is graffiti in nature.

New Orleans is, in itself, very temporary. It is torn down and flooded out only to be built back up again, very much like that beach in Hawaii. And we spent our time simply wandering around, soaking up the temporary beauty of it all.

THE LAST TRAIN TO CLARKSVILLE

Union Station does it for me. Every time I walk into that space, I feel like I am stepping into something sacred. The way the sun streams in through the floor to ceiling windows causes me to gasp and even when it is a mess like it is right now because they’re getting the holiday decorations up, I can’t help myself from getting lost in the light and shadows reflected on the marble tile floor. The last time we were there, we had some time to kill as we waited for a shop to open. The morning had turned from normal errands to feeling touristy. I looked at Michael and said “Let’s go see if there’s a train we can get on and just go somewhere.” Now, as I just typed that, I know exactly who I sound like. It’s almost like he’s whispering in my ear.

Dad.

Dad was my adventure partner. He was the one giving permission to ride any and all airplanes at the fly-ins. It was his truck that we’d jump into to go chase down the hot air balloon or follow the firefighters out to a grass fire. Dad was the one that would suggest we go to the airport and see how many airports we could go see in one day. We never got around to that one and now I have serious regrets for not ever responding to this crazy shenanigan with anything other than “YES!'“ All of those car dealership drives he did? He didn’t do those just for the money. He did those drives because he loved the adventure of hitting the road and just going somewhere.

Micheal and I walked to the Amtrak area to look at the schedule and if there had been any trains leaving in the next ten minutes, I think I could have convinced Michael to get on it with me. Really, though we could have been killing time at the airport or the bus station and I would have said “hey, let’s try to catch the next flight or bus!” It’s just that those places aren’t as nice to hang out in as our Union Station. Our airport is a giant mess at the moment with three different terminals and construction for a new airport that will connect all the terminals in progress. The whole romantic setting of our Union Station should draw more train traffic than it really does. As it is now, there are only two or three train departures a day from the Kansas City station and we had already missed the morning ones. If we had been there earlier, we could have had dinner in Chicago. Instead we just looked into taking the train to Chicago for Spring Break next year.

The train is a mode of travel I have yet to experience for more than an hour or so. The last time I was on a train was in December of 2019 and I rode it from DC to Baltimore so I could spend the evening with Bradley and Ethan. That was the last trip I took before the world shut down and thank goodness it included that epic party in the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History. In my mind, riding the train is just like all the old black and white movies I used to watch. It is a romantic notion and I have dreams of riding the train just to sit for hours staring out the window or focusing on some writing project. My friend Jeff has ridden the train a number of times from here to St. Louis to visit his parents and he said that he always ends up sitting next to the drunk guy. He said there’s always drunk people on the train. My friend Jason disagrees with Jeff. He said he’s always had a pleasant time riding the train. I think they’re both right.

That day, Michael and I didn’t get on a train. We settled for planning our next adventure and just being tourists in this city with riding the streetcar and wandering around Pryde’s in Westport, talking ourselves out of ridiculous kitchen gadgets. As we walked around Westport trying to decide on lunch, our friend Aaron yelled at us from across the street, where he was bartending at Kellys and we ended up having a beer while chatting with Aaron while we figured out where to eat lunch. We had another beer at Mickey’s Hideaway where we settled for lunch. The walls are papered with an old high school yearbook and Michael pointed to a picture behind me. It was picture of James Westphal, a local celebrity thanks to Paul Rudd’s character in Anchorman. They were college roommates and Michael knows James from his bartending days.

We eventually made our way back to where we had parked the car, getting almost as many steps in as we would roaming around on vacation. And, yeah…we didn’t get on an Amtrak train to head out on an adventure, but we didn’t really need to in order to have a day of being a tourist.

WHAT TO TELL

Bits and pieces. Flashes. Snapshots. I don’t know what to tell you about our trip. The first two or three days of my time was spent in conference rooms, listening to people present their research and chatting with my peers. I walked into the conference believing that I wasn’t smart enough to be there only to discover that my name was on at least four, if not five, posters being presented at the conference. Then three different people who I work with at different times told me how glad they were to see someone from the microscopy group attending the meeting. So, my mental state went from not smart enough to just about smart enough to be sitting at this table and that maybe it is time to update my resume.

While I conferenced, Michael and the Cabbage roamed the streets of Vancouver. They hopped on and off the bus and in and out of shops. They filled their bellies with raw fish and sweets. The Cabbage collected Canadian coins and buttons. They visited the Diaso multiple times, emerging with new flavor of Poky each time and some trinket. When I joined them for dinners, we’d eat more raw fish and I’d listen to them talk about the things they saw. Each day, I listened and watched as Michael fell more and more in love with the city. By the end of the week, he was looking up housing and the steps to becoming a Canadian citizen.

When I was finally done conferencing, Amani drove up from Seattle to spend the day with us. We laughed, we ate…Lord, how we ate, and we toured the city. We took Chris to the A-maze-ing Laughter sculpture and I left him in the hand of one of the laughing statues, laughing at the perfection of leaving Chris in the middle of laughing statues. Amani, ever so gently and sweetly, moved Chris’s ashes around to work him into the grooves of the statue hand, so that his ashes would linger there a little longer. She took the most hilarious and obscene photo of me with a statue. Our laughter over this photo was so deep that it became the soundless, breathless kind, leaving us gasping for air. The four of us walked ourselves to a foot spa for foot rubs before dinner. Highly recommended. Amani and I bought ridiculous matching t-shirts so we could laugh our heads off even more when we parted ways. How special it is to find such a friendship at this stage in life.

The next day, the three of us explored the markets and shops of Granville. The Cabbage discovered a water park where we let them play in the clothes they had on, being totally unprepared for a day of water play. They played for hours, while Michael and I roamed the shops, periodically checking in with them. This was our very last day and we savored every sight and meal. The next morning, we walked out of the hotel for the last time into a cool and overcast day and we made our way to the airport. The weather was fitting for the mood. We arrived in Vancouver under similar weather conditions, but the clouds broke away so that our week was filled with sunshine. Just like in my yoga classes when I start the class with a focus on the breath and end the class with a focus on the breath, we started our trip with clouds and ended it with clouds.

Since we were on separate airlines and flights, all of us had a different re-entry to this country. Yet both of us felt the same way, like we’d we returned to the land of hot and angry. People were no longer polite and kind, like the people in the city we had just left. Everyone in Vancouver was so nice, quick to say ‘Thank you’ and ‘excuse me’ or ask about your well being. The people in Vancouver were quick to show respect for the Indigenous people, admitting to stealing their land. They are open and accepting and welcoming. Michael came home with new goals, good life altering goals. We arrived home late and the next day we dragged ourselves out, jet-lagged, to buy groceries. We kept reminding ourselves to ‘be Canadians’, reminding ourselves to be patient and kind not just with each other, but with every person we encountered. This is why it is so important to experience international travel. You learn some valuable lessons.

Michael feels like there are some big changes for us on the horizon. We definitely had some serious conversations about our future and what that looks like for our relationship. I don’t know if there’s big changes ahead. For me, it’s enough to come home inspired for change. I feel like I’ve been gone for months and that I came home to a house that should have been covered with sheets before we left. I’ll spend the next few days unpacking and resettling into this space before I let myself begin to plan for possibilities. In the meantime, I am holding onto our new found mantra and making it a daily practice to be patient and kind.

TOURIST FOR A DAY

Michael suggested that on the days we have fancy dinner reservations, we should spend the day playing tourists in Kansas City. So when I got a message from Terry that he was taking our friend Tom to the newly renovated Kansas City Museum and asking if we wanted to join them, I replied “sign us up!” First of all, this is a museum that Michael and I had never visited. Secondly, it was a chance to spend the afternoon with Terry and Tom, my favorite grumpy old men duo. Tom knows a whole lot about the history of Kansas City. He gave us a guided tour of Elmwood Cemetery once that was fascinating. Having him with us at the Kansas City Museum was like having our own personal tour guide.

The museum was great. I learned a lot about Kansas City, but my favorite part was one little exhibit tucked away in a back corner on the second floor. That one tiny display focused on LGBQT of Kansas City and in the glass case was a Gay Pride button from 1995. When we got to this exhibit, Terry leaned in close to the case and then said “Hey! I made that button!” Terry had designed the Pride Festival buttons for 1995 and here it was on display as a piece of Kansas City history. I looked at Terry and said “Terry! You’re in a museum and you are in a museum!” Then we all went to the basement where they have a pool table and Terry and Tom watched Michael and I attempt a game of pool.

Michael and I had some time to kill before our dinner reservations and Tom suggested that we go to Rieger’s Distillery. He told us that we didn’t even need to do a tour because they have a small history museum in the main lobby. We took Tom’s advice and we were not disappointed. The distillery originally was located across from the Livestock Exchange Building, but now resides in what used to be the Heim Brewery and Bottling Co. In 1907, the Heim brothers built an amusement park called Electric Park, right next to their brewery. Walt Disney and his sister were frequent visitors to Electric Park and was the original inspiration for Disneyland. Electric Park is all gone now, but Rieger’s has turned it into a lovely patio with a restaurant and bar. On the second level, there is another bar and an entrance to the giant metal tube slide that takes you back down to the first level.

After drinking a fancy gin and tonic and sliding down the slide, it was time for the fancy dinner portion of our day. And for the second time this year, I willingly ate fried chicken. I wasn’t even drunk this time. I ordred the sablefish ravioli that was served in a broth with the most adorable mushrooms I have ever seen. Michael ordred half a fried chicken. When his order came out, I took a tiny wing for tasting. Then Michael handed me half a breast. Our server came over with a bowl of hot, damp towels to wash our fingers with right as I was digging into this piece of chicken. I looked up at her in shame and said “I don’t know what has happened to me. I am eating chicken. I do not eat chicken.” She laughed and said “I’m telling the chef!” Our server also helped us pick our next fancy dinner, which we are putting off until maybe August. There’s some traveling happening this summer. So we’ll have to wait and see.

Michael and I both agreed that we can’t wait to play tourist on fancy dinner date day again, but on scooters.

DINER SCENES

The Diner Scenes photo series started in Mountain View, MO. We stopped in to eat lunch at a small town diner where we were the youngest people in the place. An older couple who looked to be about my parents’ age sat at a table near the window and talked to the two elderly women sitting at a table next to them. The man had the look and shape of my dad, white hair, rounded body. I could hear snippets of their conversation, talking about their younger days. He said that he and his wife had started dating when she was fifteen. “I pretty much wouldn’t let her look at anyone else.” I snapped a picture, light pouring in the windows, my lens slightly smudged. It was enough to give me the idea to keep the photos going. Each photo would be an incomplete list of all the food we ate during our travels.

We’ve been home three whole days, driving back from New Orleans in one shot. Josephine is curled up on my feet and snoring, exhausted from her week at Terry’s. Groceries have been purchased, house has been cleaned and laundry is done. I’m trying to gather my thoughts on New Orleans that isn’t just about food. We ate boiled crawfish in a town just before we hit New Orleans. We just stopped at a roadside convenience store and ordered two pounds of crawfish. Then we stood outside, using the tailgate of the truck as a table, peeling and eating crawfish as fast as we could. I took Michael to the places I remembered like Cafe Du Monde and Frank’s. Then there were new places like Willie Mae’s Scotch House where we stood outside waiting for almost two hours for fried chicken, catfish and the best butter beans I’ve ever eaten. That was the same day we stumbled onto a local’s bar in the French Quarter. We were the only tourists sitting at their outside tables. The drinks were cheap and the company was priceless. We stayed too long, saw a parade, drank too much. By the time we left, we couldn’t get into any nearby restaurants and Michael led me into a fast food fried chicken place called Willie’s. He ordered me catfish, but when I took a bite, I said “This tastes like chicken!” Then Michael looked at my food and said “That’s because it is chicken.” He made a move to go correct the mistake, but I shrugged and said “I’m eating this.” Then I proceeded to happily (tipsily) eat all of the four chicken tenders.

I was so drunk, I ate chicken and didn’t care.

We bought some art and walked twenty thousand or more steps a day. I got a sunburn. We rode the streetcar and the bus. We went to the art museum and the cemeteries. I took pictures, the kind of pictures I want to print and hang on the walls. I had my palms and tarot cards read by a woman in Jackson Square. She told me things I already knew like how I’m my worse enemy and I’m really good at my job. She saw my broken heart. She told me “You have a broken heart and you’re still holding onto that.” What’s funny about that is that I would not remember until we were home that I had forgotten what would have been my twenty fourth wedding anniversary with Chris. Michael and I were tailgating with crawfish and I was introducing him to New Orleans on that day. This seems appropriate for being in a city that is the same as the last time I was there, yet completely different. I’m like New Orleans before and after the hurricane.

And just like that, we’re home. Cleaning gutters and chicken coops. Responding to work emails and cleaning out inboxes. Meal prepping and gearing up for a return to an old routine. Right now, I have ‘couch/TV time’ scheduled on my calendar and I’ve settled in with my coffee and CBS Sunday Morning. Right now, I’m dreaming of strolling down the streets of the French Quarter.

CAMP WILDLING

Every summer as a tween and teen, I attended 4-H camp. I was a camper and then in my teens, I was a counselor. Camp was always set for the hottest month of the summer. Usually we were nowhere near water and cabins were not air conditioned. The food was basic cafeteria camp food and the shower situation was iffy. Despite all the sunburns and bug bites and general discomforts of camp, I always had the most fun. There were water balloon wars, prank battles, and sneaking out after curfew shenanigans. We sang silly songs around the campfire and we formed bonds with our bunk mates that seemed like forever bonds. Everyone cried at closing ceremonies because we did not want the fun to end, we did not want to leave these new friendships.

This was Camp Wildling.

For those of you wanting to know what adult summer camp looks like, it looks just like the above except with a swimming pool full of floating devices and a package of yoga and meditation wrapped in a self care ribbon. We floated in the pool. We did yogad. We crafted. We star gazed. We bonded. We laughed (I thought Kelly was going to choke on her veggie burger) so hard and we cried so much. We saw each other. We heard each other’s stories. And it was FUCKING AMAZING. At closing ceremonies, we went around the circle and shared what we got from camp and almost every single one of us started with “I didn’t know what I was getting into when I signed up for this.” None of us knew what to expect from camp, but almost every single one of us ended with “this was so much more than I could have expected.” And the gratitude for what each camper experienced was immeasurable.

I came back to work on Monday, still drunk from the Kool-aid that was summer camp and fell right into a bucket of freezing cold water. Re-entry to life was a breathtaking shock to my system and when I peeked over to Facebook, I noticed that I was not the only camper struggling with a return to this life. I think it is because all of us at camp shed the mask of ourselves that we wear for the general public. Camp allowed us the freedom to be our true authentic selves. We each brought an extra bag of grief, strain and worry with us and we each took turns to help carry each other’s extra bag so that we could have moments without so much of the weight, the heaviness that comes with grief. I don’t know about the others, but I found that when I tried to replace that old general public mask, it no longer fit quite right. Even though I know how right it feels to be my true authentic self, it also feels a little bit scary and a lot vulnerable. Though, I’m not scared or vulnerable enough to stop this version of me that has emerged from this camp.

I came back from camp a more confident Cindy.

These next two days are going to be a blur of work and packing. We leave Wednesday early early to head out west. I promise to return from those adventures with some stories to share.

BOLD SQUIRRELS

The squirrels in this park are no joke. They will come right up to you and steal your cookie.

14 Likes, 0 Comments - Cindy Maddera (@elephant_soap) on Instagram: "The squirrels in this park are no joke. They will come right up to you and steal your cookie."

The day before we left Boston, Michael and I bought some cheese, bread, a bag of grapes and a bottle of wine. We rode the bus for forty five minutes to get out to Castle Island where we walked in the Atlantic ocean along the beach. Then we bought a basket of fried clams and found a picnic table in a shady spot. We spread out our picnic and spent the afternoon grazing and drinking wine straight from the bottle because we forgot to pack glasses. After we washed the last grape down with the last of the wine, we loaded up and made our way back to our hotel room for a break from the heat.

Then it rained.

By the time we headed out to dinner that evening, the rain had stopped but the temperatures had dropped so that the evening was cool and pleasant. We decided to walk over to Boston Common after dinner and explore the park. We entered the Boston Public Garden first and I wandered over to take pictures of the pond while Michael wandered over to the water fountains. When I looked up to find him, he was standing there surrounded by squirrels and birds. It was like he’d just turned into a Disney princess. He looked at me and said “What is happening?” I slowely walked towards him and said “I don’t know, but it’s something pretty magical.” Turns out, the squirrels in this park are practically tame. You don’t even have to have a treat. All you have to do is get down on their level and hold out your hand like you have a treat. They will come right up to you. If you have treats, they will sit on your lap and eat them. I’m not talking about one or two squirrels here. Every squirrel in the park was bold as brass and would steel the cookies right from your baby’s fat little fingers. There are signs all over the park asking patrons to please not feed the birds, but nothing about not feeding the squirrels.

The park might need to rethink their “do not feed” signs.

Boston Common is Boston’s version of Central Park, though it is not near the size. At one point the Common housed Colonial militia, held victory gardens during the first World War, was a site for anti war and civil rights rallies and even the Pope performed mass there in 1979. Before all of that, the park was a place for the people of Boston to walk and for cattle to graze. If you go there as the sun is setting, the last few rays of the sun hit the tall buildings of downtown Boston so that they all look like they are coated in polished brass. It is a lovely sight to see. If you go though, beware of the squirrels or at least pack extra treats for them.

OUT OF TOWNER

The ghost of Paul Revere

8 Likes, 0 Comments - Cindy Maddera (@elephant_soap) on Instagram: "The ghost of Paul Revere"

I have managed to be out of town every August 1st since 2006. I didn’t realize this until Michael said something about the date while we ate our last lobster (lobstah) rolls of our Boston trip. He said “Is today a bad date?” “It’s not a great one” I replied while shoving a giant piece of lobster meat into my mouth. This was all I said on the subject. For our last day in Boston, the temperatures dropped to the high seventies. All week long, until that day, we were in the middle of a sweltering heat wave. It wasn’t a big deal for me because I spent most of the first four days of our trip in conference rooms listening to developmental biology talks. Michael, on the other hand, had two-shirt days. Really three-shirt days, but he didn’t pack enough t-shirts for that. We thought it would be cooler when we took a day trip up to Salem, but that turned out to be the hottest day. Some poor park ranger drew the short straw and was stuck out on the replica tall ship at the Maritime National Historic site. They had provided him with a tent like shelter and he refused to leave his square of shade to even point out where the masts are usually placed on the ship. It was so hot that I felt like I was sweating between my fingers, so I don’t blame that unlucky park ranger for refusing to leave his square of shade.

The best thing about that day, about the whole trip really, was the ferry ride we took back to Boston. Michael sat down at a table inside the ferry and we dumped our backpacks. He looked at me and said “go do what you need to do.” I swapped out lenses on my camera and headed outside where I was able to position myself at the very front of the ship. The ferry maneuvered it’s way out of the harbor and then began to pick up speed. Then we were speeding across the Atlantic and there I was at the very front of the ship feeling the full effect of racing across the water. I stood there with the wind hitting me full blast, snapping terrible pictures and practically giggling with joy. When Michael finally came out to find me, I turned to look at him with this giant grin on my face. “THIS IS AMAZING!” I yelled at him to be heard over the wind and sound of the engine. I am usually hesitant about getting on big boats. It is not from a fear of drowning, but more from a fear of boredom. It all stems from that one time Dad and I got trapped on a paddle boat ride up the Mississippi. Dad was not a good swimmer, but thought that even he could swim faster than the boat we were on. We both fantasized of jumping overboard. But this ferry? Dad would have loved this ride.

I wonder how Dad felt about fried clams. I ate enough of them for the both of us.

As we made our way through security to board our flight home, Michael got caught up in the security check point. Something about him that day lit up all the bells on the scanner. His luggage got scanned twice and he received a personal pat down from a TSA officer. It was not a big deal. We had plenty of time to kill before our flight any way. After he finally made it through, we were settled on a bench repacking his stuff and I kind of chuckled. I looked at him sideways and said “J was totally just fucking with you.” Michael was curious as to why I thought this, but I didn’t have the best explanation for him. It just felt like something J had a hand in. I could almost see him standing next to one of the TSA officers with a wicked grin on his face as he whispered in the officer’s ear “why don’t you recheck that bag.”

August is a weird month.

Ghosts are everywhere.

BAG IT

New bag

0 Likes, 0 Comments - Cindy Maddera (@elephant_soap) on Instagram: "New bag"

Michael and I were out on our scooters recently when we came to a cool section of road. The street narrowed down to one lane and you had to go through a tunnel. There is a stop light on either side of this tunnel, so you don’t end up crashing with on coming traffic. When we got to the tunnel, our light was red and I thought “what a great picture!”. Except in order for me to get that picture, I had to put my scooter on its stand, turn off the engine, remove the key and then use the key to unlock my seat so I can retrieve my camera. The light changed before I could complete step four. I did not get the picture I wanted. I did not even get a picture I didn’t want. Zero pictures were taken.

What I need it some sort of quick-draw camera system for when I’m riding the scooter. I need to be the Annie Oakley of photography.

I’ve been carting a backpack around for a couple of years. It’s big and has a padded bottom. My backpack holds my iPad or my laptop or both as well as my camera, an extra lens, and all of the other bits of things one tends to cart around with them. In my case, the extra things just happen to be two melted caramel apple suckers from Ike’s and half a sand dollar I collected from a beach in Oregon. Clearly, I have room to pair down the crap I cart around with me. I have been half seriously looking at bag options for traveling lighter, but the need to easily and quickly get to my camera (any one of them) made me step up the search. I read some reviews and did some research before purchasing the KAVU Rope Sling bag and this was my first weekend to test it out.

I am not disappointed with this purchase.

It comfortably and easily holds everything I need to carry with me during the week. I’m going to put an emphasis on the word ‘need’. I do not need to lug my large lens with me every day. I do not need to lug around half a box of tampons with me every day, which is what I found in in the bottom of one zippered compartment while cleaning out the backpack. I could stand to get a smaller wallet. In fact, the current wallet is an old wallet that I started using again after the zipper on my smaller wallet broke. My water bottle will fit in that pocket if I downsize my wallet. The list of things I need to cart around on weekends is even less. I don’t take my iPad every where on weekends. The KAVU bag meets all of these needs and it’s comfortable to carry on my back. Also, because of the sling design, I can flip the bag around and access the pockets quickly. My phone (camera 1) fits in the front pocket for easy access, while my Nikon (camera 2) fits in the larger compartment. If I’m thinking straight when I pack the Nikon, I can pack it in such a way that when I reach in, my hand fits around the camera body in shooting mode. I’m not Annie Oakley fast on the draw, but I’m sure that I will get better with practice.

I think this is going to be my new favorite traveling bag. I wore it all day on Saturday and I didn’t ever feel tightness or tension in my right shoulder. That is something I experience with every over the shoulder bag. I have a tiny wallet like bag that just holds my phone and a couple of cards. Even that bag makes that area between my neck and shoulder tight by the end of a day. And I love that tiny bag. It has the cutest elephant stitched to the outside. The KAVU bag distributes the weight of my things across my back. It is compact and less clunky than the backpack. It is also water proof. My backpack is not. I really used to stress about getting caught in the rain with that backpack on my back. I don’t have to worry about that now.

Look, no one’s paying me to write this post. I just don’t have anything else I want to talk about today.

SOMETIMES YOU'VE GOT TO GO

Little cabin in the woods

17 Likes, 1 Comments - Cindy Maddera (@elephant_soap) on Instagram: "Little cabin in the woods"

A few months back, my friend Heather sent me a text mentioning that she had her company cabin for Thanksgiving. Some of you might remember the last time I went to the cabin with Heather. I might have mentioned it here, but the cabin is in the tiny town of Inverness, CA. It sits high up on a hill surrounded by trees and the windows face Tomales Bay. I told Heather that if we weren’t tightening our belts and paying off debts, I’d invite us to tag along. Her reply was “it’s not until November.” She had a point. I cashed in some frequent flyer miles and we sold some stuff on Craig’s List. We bought plane tickets and rented a car and crashed her Thanksgiving.

And I’m so glad we did.

Michelle, who you might remember from that time I was a bearded lady and she was one half of the first ever interracially conjoined twins, flew up from San Diego. Heather’s friends, Maria and Mateo, flew in from Arizona. We’d never met, but I had heard some stories. Maria and Mateo ended up riding in the backseat of our rental car every where we went. I got so used to the two of them sitting behind us that I felt like we’d forgotten something when we left the cabin early Saturday morning. Instead of a turkey dinner on Thanksgiving, we ate Dungeness crab. In fact, we ate Dungeness crab for almost all meals. Turns out that six pounds of already picked crab meat feeds a party of six for two days. Just an fyi if you ever find yourself needing to place an order for picked crab meat and you order a pound per person, the person taking your order is going to scoff at you. You will ignore the scoffing and order that amount any way. Be prepared for the leftovers.

Instead of spending the holiday with family, we spent it with people we didn’t really know. I felt a bit of guilt over this. I claimed Michelle as part of our tribe the moment I met her three years ago. After spending five minutes with Maria and Mateo, I felt the same way about them. I even feel a little sad that they live so far away and are unavailable for random rides in the backseat of my car. So that guilt quickly dissipated when I realized that I was spending time with family. I was spending time with the family I have made for myself. We ate. We drank. We hiked to a beach. We played games and told stories. Mostly we laughed. Good lord, we laughed so dang much. I am very very fortunate.

Sometimes the best thing you can do for yourself is to go to a little cabin in the wood with no TV and very spotty cell signal. Make sure the cabin is filled with good people and a nice roaring fire. Be sure to spend some of that time on long walks and part of that time watching the rain. Laugh and memorize every silly ridiculous moment.

This is self care.

MEMORY TATTOOS

Mesas, buttes and volcanoes

7 Likes, 1 Comments - Cindy Maddera (@elephant_soap) on Instagram: "Mesas, buttes and volcanoes"

We needed a way to break up our drive time into five hour driving increments. Five or so hours to Alabaster Caverns for two nights. Five or so hours to Clayton NM for two nights. Five or so hours to Gunnison CO for three nights. This was our plan. All of our planned locations for this trip were places Michael had never been. Chris, Traci, her Chris and I used camp at Alabaster Caverns all the time. My gaze drifted down to the tent camping area often during our stay on this trip. Traci, remember that time you ended up throwing away your tent as we packed up to leave? We were still friends with James. He was there that weekend and it rained so much that we ended up trapped in our tents for a few hours. We borrowed a mop when the rain storm was over and mopped out our tents. That evening, a tarantula walked up and joined us around the campfire. It seemed like we were always there when a group of scouts were. We'd laugh at the sounds of the boys whooping and hollering as they stood under the cold outside shower, washing the layers of mud from their clothes from crawling through all the caves. Then there was the time Mom lost her cat there and we spent the day combing the area searching for it. We had permission to go all over the cave, off the main path. I found a whole skeleton of a horse tucked behind a large flat rock in one of the larger rooms.

There are three different ways to drive to Colorado. Two of those take you across Kansas. One takes you through the Oklahoma panhandle and into New Mexico before you turn north for Trinadad. As a kid and a young adult, I have travelled on all of these roads. My Dad's favorite path though, was the one that took us across the panhandle and into New Mexico. If you peeled away a layer of skin on my arm, you will find this map embedded there. Dad would drive the camper straight through the panhandle and stop in Capulin, NM for the night. At the time, or at least from what I remember from the last time we made that trip in 2006, the actual town of Capulin consisted of one campground and two rundown, abandoned buildings. The only reason the campground exists is because it is right across the street from the entrance to the Capulin Volcano National Monument. My Dad liked to stop here because he knew the guy who owned the campground. They had worked together once at American Airlines. Dad new a guy everywhere. The tradition was to spend the night in Capulin, get up early the next morning and hike the rim of the volcano before loading back up into the truck and heading on out to Colorado.

Most everything about this trip was so familiar. The roads traveled. The landscape. I knew exactly when to start looking for antelope. I knew which mounds of dirt to look at to see prairie dogs. I was unsurprised to see the roadrunners running down the fence line. I knew what time in the evening to start watching for bats to start flying around. The hot, dry, desert like air used to be the only kind of summer I knew. Baked earth. Baked skin. The way the inside of my nose always felt stuffy and on fire. Yet, there were new things too, things I'd never seen or experienced. I had never been inside Alabaster Caverns when there was so much water, enough to have a small water fall and pools of standing water with frogs and tiger striped salamanders. Even though I had been through Clayton, NM, I'd never stopped there. I had no idea that there were dinosaur tracks around Clayton lake or that they kept that lake stocked with trout. When we stopped to visit the Capulin Volcano, the National Park Visitor center was open. It didn't even exist the last time we were there. And of all the times we travelled across Hwy 160, we had never made the detour up to see the Great Sand Dunes.

This was the first time I'd been to Colorado and not caught a fish. Not a one. I left my Dad's ashes in Taylor River near our campground, part of me offering them as an appeasement to the Fish Gods. Instead the Fish Gods responded with "Oh...this guy. We remember this guy. He fished your limit a lifetime ago." Which is all true. If the limit was four fish per person and you only caught one fish, he caught the other three and said they were your's. He caught my limit of fish a lifetime ago. 

WHAT DAY IS IT?

Long shadows

2 Likes, 1 Comments - Cindy Maddera (@elephant_soap) on Instagram: "Long shadows"

We're back and I have vacation hangover in that confusing discombobulated (spelled that right on the first try) way where you don't know where you are or what day it is or what the hell am I supposed to be doing right now. We traveled in total, somewhere around 1,743 miles over 10 days. Is that right? Yeah...I think that's right. During most of that time, we had very sketchy cell service. While we were in the mountains, we had zero cell service. I spent part of this morning skimming through emails because I had just as many unread emails in my inbox as miles we travelled. That did not include my inbox for work emails. 

Sorry...I just fell asleep for about ten minutes.

Any way. I have thoughts and stories to tell from our trip. I just need some time to organize it all. I can tell you that being without electricity and cell service for three days was the best part of our trip. I actually spent time journalling and drawing pictures to illustrate our daily activities. I did a lot of practicing the art of being still. There was a nice family from Edmond, OK in our campground with kids near the Cabbage's age. We handed her a walkie-talkie and set her free. At one point, she was actually playing in the dirt, scooping it up into a mound and decorating it with sticks and stones. We sat around the only campfire we were allowed to have during the whole trip because of fire bans. We gazed at stars. And the whole time, I had no idea what was happening in the world outside of our campground. Sometimes, a little oblivion is blissful.

The world came back to us when we came down the mountain and into Pueblo, CO. Anthony Bourdain was found dead in his hotel room. Harvey Weinstein pleaded 'not guilty' to sexual assault charges. Becky DeVos said that the Federal Commission on School Safety would not focus on the role guns play in school violence. A dead whale was found to be full of 18 pounds of plastic. Donald Trump continued to use Twitter to show how gross and ignorant he really is. Same old, same old. Of all the news, it is the death of Anthony Bourdain that hit us the hardest. He made me want to visit and explore places that I would have never even thought to visit and explore. His show educated us about our connections to cultures and each other through food. His voice and his way of telling stories will be missed. 

I have stories to write down. Some are tinted with sadness. Some are laced with joy. But they need some time to brew before they make it here. 

TOURISTS AND MEMORIALS

Instagram post by Cindy Maddera * Feb 26, 2018 at 5:00pm UTC

0 Likes, 0 Comments - Cindy Maddera (@elephant_soap) on Instagram

There were two places on Michael's list of things he wanted to see in New York that made me pull a face when he said he wanted to see them. One was Times Square. I will admit that I like my fair share of super touristy things, particularly the kitschy stuff, but Times Square is the worst. It's loud and crowded and there are too many TV screens with bright lights flashing advertisements. I believe that actual New Yorkers avoid this area like the plague. We shuffled through on our last evening in the City and Michael now agrees with me. You have to at least experience it once. Every time I think about Times Square, I remember the time that Taluara and I had to walk through to get to a ticket office. A woman stopped Talaura and said "Excuse me, but can you tell me how to get to Times Square?" Talaura replied with "look around, you're here." Then the woman said "No, no...the place where they drop the ball at New Year's" Talaura made a face and then pointed all around "Here. You are in that spot." and then we muscled our way on through the crowd, sighing with relief on the other side.

The second thing on Michael's list was to visit the 9/11 Memorial. Though I have heard that it is a beautiful memorial, it was just something I didn't care to visit. Still, I put on a brave face and went with Michael. That day started out really well. We had a breakfast of lox and bagels at the Chelsea Market. We took a cab from there down the World Trade Tower and stood across the street for bit so I could take pictures. There was a man with a thick German accent waiting with us at the cross walk on that side of the street. He asked me what camera I was using because he was going to let me use his wide angle lens. Unfortunately we did not have compatible cameras, but I was floored that he was just going to offer up the use of thousand dollar lens to a complete stranger. We finally crossed the street and headed over to the memorial.

We stepped up to edge of the memorial and immediately iron bands wrapped around my chest and started to squeeze. I turned on my heel and managed to gasp out "I can't" as I stepped away from the edge of the memorial, leaving Michael standing there slightly at a loss. He asked "are we leaving?" I replied "No. You look and see what you need to see here. I'll just stand over here because I cannot look down into that." By this point, tears were streaming down my face even though I was trying to keep a lightness to my voice and not make a scene. Michael walked over and put his arms around me and we stood like this for a few minutes while I composed myself. I noticed a couple standing with their backs to the memorial, smiles on their faces with their selfie stick raised high. It all made me slightly nauseous and Michael said "let's move on." So we left the main memorial and headed towards a building that looked like it was made of whale bones called The Wings of Hope. Once we were inside, we quickly realized we were in a mall and this left a bad taste in both of our mouths because we thought we were walking into a memorial of some kind. We quickly moved on to look at the Brooklyn Bridge.

The other night I dreamed that J was still alive. He'd been lost in Iraq all this time and when they found him, he was sick. Sand had coated his lungs and he couldn't breath. I was trying to make it to the hospital to talk to him before the doctors intubated him. I woke up with a start, my heart pounding in my chest, my checks damp. I was disoriented and even thought for a second that it was possible J was still alive somewhere in Iraq. Except it's not possible. I remembered my brief glance down into the 9/11 Memorial and how in that very brief glance all I could see was ash and bodies and how this one horrific event changed the molecular structure of the whole country. The impact would have seismic waves that would last and will last for years.

Like a never ending tsunami. 

WHERE'S MY CHEESE

Peek a boo

6 Likes, 1 Comments - Cindy Maddera (@elephant_soap) on Instagram: "Peek a boo"

There are only two people at work this morning: me and one of my bosses. Everything got coated in a layer of ice yesterday and today there might be snow. Schools are closed due to weather. Many people are out with the flu. I left for New York with a tiny cough that turned into a big cough with a fever. So I spent two days of my trip downing cold/flu medicine and pretending that I didn't really feel that bad. After taking Sarge on a really long walk on Friday, I gave up with the pretense and laid on the couch for the rest of the day. I was feeling a whole lot better by the time Michael showed up late Friday night, even though I sounded terrible. Sure, there were many times over the following two days where I was forced to breath through my mouth and I had to, at times, resort to using napkins for Kleenex. 

Today, I am back to the daily grind and I am a little bit lost. I've had to look up the day's date four times this morning. I've probably asked "what day is this?" twenty times before noon. I have a whole lot of pictures to sort and edit. I have a whole lot of brain thoughts to sort and edit. I have a whole bunch of new pins to attach to my backpack. Here's the abridged version of two days in New York, until I can get all of those other things taken care of.

• Steps taken over two days: 46,833.
• Ethnic foods consumed: Indian, Thai, Chinese, Italian, Jewish Kosher Deli, American (?)
• Things we saw: The Museum of Natural History, Central Park, Central Station, Tiffany's, St. Patrick's Cathedral, Chelsea Market, 9/11 Memorial, St. Paul's Chapel, Jacob Mould Fountain, New York City Hall, The Brooklyn Bridge, Stone Street, African Burial Ground National Monument, Trinity Church, New York Stock Exchange, The Charging Bull and little girl statue, Federal Hall, Battery Park, Castle Clinton National Monument, The Statue of Liberty, The Stonewall, Theodore Roosevelt's Birthplace National Historic Site, Washington Square Park/Arch, The Strand bookstore, The Flatiron Building, The Empire State Building, Times Square. I'm sure I'm missing something.
• The number of National Park Stamps acquired: three
• Pairs of pants purchased: one
• Pairs of arch inserts purchased: one

I think we did a good job of cramming in as much as possible over the two days of our visit. And once I'm back to a state of mind where I can remember what day it is, I'll tell you more about it. 

LABORING

Halloween decorations. I've named the doll Suzanne

6 Likes, 1 Comments - Cindy Maddera (@elephant_soap) on Instagram: "Halloween decorations. I've named the doll Suzanne"

It has started to become a Labor Day Weekend tradition to meet my brother (Randy) and sister-in-law (Katrina) at their place near Rockaway Beach. They have some land there that holds a small cabin and a storage shed, with room to park their camper. There's electricity and water hookups. All the things you need to camp comfortably. Before we got our camper, we'd go and stay in the cabin. The Cabbage would end up sleeping in the camper with Randy and Katrina. Part of this tradition also included the Cabbage. We always had her for Labor Day Weekend, which is also the weekend before her birthday. So Katrina would have a cake and a birthday present. We would have a moment in the afternoon where the Cabbage would blow out some candles and we'd eat cake. Then she'd take her new Barbie or whatever into Randy and Katrina's camper to play and watch TV. 

The Cabbage is slightly disappointed in our choice of campers. We do not have a TV.

Any way, the calendar worked out weird so that this year we did not have the Cabbage for Labor Day. This was the first time we've made the trip without her. It was also the first time we made the trip with our own camper. There were a few days of planning before we got there and Katrina and I were kind of at a loss for things to do. We were so used to planning our weekend around kid friendly things that now we were all "what do adults do?" Turns out that adults do a lot of things. We went to a distillery. We went to a few thrifty antique shops. I found a sack of Howdy Doody heads of various sizes. I also found Suzanne. I decided that she could take the place of all the baby doll heads I had planned to fill the lantern with. She is spectacularly creepy and Michael can't even stand for me to mention her name. He's already that disturbed by her presence. I can't wait to set her up that lantern with a butcher knife. I'm so in love with her creepiness that I am even considering using her in this year's Christmas card. 

On Sunday, we made a last minute decision to drive over to Eureka Springs. It was only an hour away and Micheal had never been there. I hadn't been there in years. There was a time when Eureka Springs was the weekend getaway place. We camped there regularly when I was kid. I remember one trip where J and I rode the trolley car all day long while our parents roamed the shops. Later on, Chris and I would make trips there together. The Mud Street Cafe was our favorite place to eat and when Katrina suggested we go to Eureka Springs, I declared that this is where we'd eat lunch. Some things have changed in the little town since the last time I visited. There are new shops and some even empty shop spaces. My favorite jewelry store where Chris bought my pearl earrings so long ago is still there but the jewelry has changed styles. Mud Street Cafe has not changed a bit. It is still one of the busiest places. They still have the coffee mug of Trivia cards on the table. The food is still delicious and, dear Lord, the desserts are still the best, most decadently wonderful desserts. I ate cheesy grits with vegetables and slice of coconut cream pie. I left with a goal to learn how to make that pie and go on a coconut cream pie diet. 

The best part was that Michael also loved Mud Street. He usually is disappointed in most places. There's always something that he complains about. It could be the service or it could be some aspect of the food he ordered. But everything at Mud Street made him happy. In fact, he even told our waitress that he had never worked or been in a restaurant where everything was done so well. He also really enjoyed the town of Eureka Springs and we talked about visiting again some day soon. It was a good trip. It was a good weekend, so good that I have struggled to get back into my normal routine this morning. 

I'm still dreaming of coconut cream pie. 

BANDAIDS

Sometimes my brain draws me back to those days just after Chris died. I remember clearly, sitting on Misti's couch hugging a coffee mug with both hands while tears streamed down my face. Mostly I remember being in a fog. I was still trying to wrap my brain around the concept that Chris was truly gone and there was nothing I could do about it. God, that's such a lesson: learning to just accept the way things are in that moment because there's nothing you can do to change it. The idea of life without Chris was too fresh and felt like an open sore that had become slightly infected, but I was aware of the small distractions my friends were trying to make for me.

The morning after Chris's service, Chad and I were the first ones up. It was early early and we tip toed our way out of Misti's house and out into the brisk February morning. There was a thin layer of frost coating the ground and we could see our breath as we walked up the street, towards the bright blinding sun. We had our cameras with us as we walked. Chad instantly shifted over into photography mode, pointing his camera at this and that. I looked around me and didn't really see anything interesting. Couldn't see. But I lifted the lens any way and clicked here and there. All the pictures I took that day turned out over exposed and too bright with a technicolor look to them. It didn't matter though, because in that moment, while we walked that neighborhood, I didn't think about that festering wound of grief. 

I wonder if Chad even remembers that walk.

The too few times we've been able to see each other, the two of us have always spent some of our time together on photo walks. So, when I realized that we would be very close to the Wigwam Village Inn #2 in Cave City, Kentucky, I knew that this would be our photo walk spot. What seemed odd to me was that up until this point neither one of us really had our cameras out. I am almost just as used to seeing Chad's face with a big camera in front of it as I am without. I don't know if we have both just gotten better at just being and seeing things in front of us with out the lens or what, but something shifted when we got to the Wigwam Inn. It was just the two of us. We had waited until just about sunset and when we got there we both hopped out of the car and started shooting. There was very little talking with the exception of the occasional "oh! that's a good idea!" or "that's a nice angle."  

At one point, I looked over at Chad. He was standing with his camera pressed to his face, setting up a shot. He has recently suffered a painful loss and was dealing with his own grief during this trip. As I looked at him, I could see that grief shift over and out of the way a bit. I thought about that cold February morning of taking pictures. I thought about how this thing with cameras is our bandaid for those wounds we gather in life. Remember how just the act of putting that bandaid over a scrape, just made you feel better? Same thing. I hoped and wished with all my might that this was, in some small way, making him feel better. He stopped and looked over at me and we just grinned at each other. 

I don't know how long we were there. We stayed until we had used up all of the light. We stayed as long as we needed to. 

I SHOULD HAVE SENT YOU A POSTCARD

Shopping dog

7 Likes, 1 Comments - Cindy Maddera (@elephant_soap) on Instagram: "Shopping dog"

Michael and I got back into town around six thirty on Saturday evening. We were tired and dirty and hungry, but we unloaded the camper and checked on the chickens before ordering pizza and taking showers. Sunday was spent doing laundry and grocery shopping and laying on the couch. I did manage to upload and begin editing some pictures. I did not dig out the Nikon as often as I probably should have, but I did use it to take a series of images of the Wigwam Inn #2 and I'm really happy with some of the pictures I captured. Something else I didn't do on this trip was take notes. I did not sit down in the evenings and write about each day's adventure or even keep a list of things from the day. As a result of all of that, I am now sitting here trying to figure out what to tell you about our Abraham Lincoln trip of 2017.

The Lincoln family home in Springfield is lovely. If you are lucky, you will have Park Ranger Peter as your tour guide through the Lincoln's home. If you make eye contact with Park Ranger Peter, he will speak through his tour directly to you like it is your own personal tour and there are no other people with you in the room. Park Ranger Peter also has an eye twitch that makes it look like he is winking. He would also like you to know that he is very interested in being Secretary of Interior. Springfield, as a whole, is kind of like driving through the bad side of town. This may have worked in our favor because on our first day, the power went out for the whole campground. We had to take Josephine with us for part of the day because we could not leave her in a hot camper. She traveled with us to the farmers' market and Lincoln's Tomb and lunch at a walk up fish shack. Then we went to Gander Mountain for their going out of business sale and no one said a word about Josephine riding around in a shopping cart. It was a good thing we brought her too because she took up space in the cart that we would have otherwise filled with crap we didn't need. 

That night, we experienced our first big storm in a popup camper. I had been asleep for maybe an hour when Michael came in and said that the wind was picking up and that he was going to run our trash over to the dumpster and stop off at the bathroom. Less than five minutes later, the sky opened up and wind started howling. I sat up in my bed and watched the canvas walls of the camper flap in and out as if the camper was breathing heavy. The sound of the rain was deafening. Josephine sat alert in my lap while I reached for my phone in search of a weather report, hoping that it was just severe weather and not a tornado. I feel like riding out one tornado in a camper in a life time is enough. The power flickered on and off. Michael was trapped in the bathhouse. We started texting each other. Michael decided to make a run for it and I said 'okay' just as I read the weather report that warned of being struck by lightening. There was a loud clap of thunder and flash of lightening and thought "great! Michael's just been struck by lightening." Then he hopped into the camper, his clothes soaked. We ate string cheese and lunch meat while waiting out the storm.

The next day, we realized while we were trying to fold the camper up that the wind had actually twisted the frame of the camper slightly. We now have to do some magic tricks to get it to close up properly. Something happened to the battery during all of this too, so the camper has to be plugged in to raise and lower the roof. These are minor things that the dealership will deal with because of the warranty. It seems though that our camper needs a spa day or at least a vacation after our vacation. 

I'M NOT DEAD

I stood on the San Andreas fault

See this Instagram photo by @elephant_soap

I went to California for a whole week and for at least two of those days, I had very little cell service. I have pictures and stories. They are all unorganized which seems to be my theme for December. I came back all discombobulated and slightly weepy. Every where you go in San Francisco, you can smell pot. I think I'm still experiencing a contact high because my brain is clouded over and it feels like I'm thinking through pea soup. While I'm trying to get my thoughts and pictures and Christmas (dear lordy, I've got twelve days to figure out Christmas) you guys can watch this video Heather and I made. We reenacted the earthquake of 1906 in Olema that separated this fence. I particularly like the end when we remember to curtsy for the camera. 

RADIO SILENCE

Good morning, Boston. #Boston

See this Instagram photo by @elephant_soap * 10 likes

Here's what happened. I went to Boston last week for a conference where I heard about lots of interesting science. So much science that my brain is leaking through my nose. I came back from Boston with a head cold/sinus infection or maybe the Ziki virus. Something unpleasant has settled into my sinuses and my white blood cells are super angry about it. They are at war! I think they're using swords because something just stabbed the inside of my left eye. Any way, I feel sort of apathetic about writing anything down mostly because I end up staring off into Mucinex space. 

Boston is the most historical city in the United States. Maybe not the most, but it's got to be one the most. The whole city is practically a National Park and I walked my dang feet off. I stood at the site of the Boston Massacre. I stood at the window that lead out onto the balcony where they first read the Declaration of Independence to the public. I saw JFK's sailboat and Paul Revere's house and replicas of boats involved with the Boston Tea Party. I ate at least one lobster roll a day. Boston is pretty fantastic. 

IN DEFENSE OF PAPER MAPS

Getting our kicks

See this Instagram photo by @elephant_soap * 4 likes

It happened to Talaura and I when we were in Maine. Most of the time we couldn't get a cell signal while we were out driving around and we'd get stuck waiting for google maps to load so we could figure out where the heck we were. We finally gave up and bought an actual map. You know (or maybe you don't), the paper kind of map that teaches you patience when it's time to fold back up. For those of you who have no idea about paper maps, I am real sorry. My dad had paper maps stashed everywhere. He had a large basket stuffed full of them next to his recliner. The glovebox of his truck was like one of those gag peanut cans but with maps instead of springs. Every truck pocket was jammed full with paper maps and the dashboard would also be littered with them. It drove my mother crazy. 

Michael and I had the same problems with cell service and maps while we were in Wisconsin. Also, that area had gotten a storm a few days prior to our visit that caused flash flooding. Roads and bridges had been washed away. So there was this square of odd and confusing detours that took you down tiny roads that were sometimes paved and sometimes gravel. I took our paper map in with us when we stopped at the Northern Great Lakes Visitors Center and the rangers there were able to highlight a route for us that would take us around closed roads. Sunday morning, when we left Randy and Katrina's, we decided to stay on Route 66 as long as we could and avoid the interstates completely. After looking at maps on my phone for about ten minutes, I said "I don't want to do this one my phone!" I was tired and part of my brain was still gunky from all the limoncello I'd had the night before. So, Michael pulled over and bought one Oklahoma map and one Missouri map and then we proceeded to take the longest possible way home.

It was glorious. We traveled along most Route 66 all the way into Baxter Springs, KS and then followed Hwy 69 up through Kansas and on into the city. We stopped at a roadside fruit stand and bought fresh corn and peaches. We wandered around Ed Galloway's Totem Pole Park and admired a corvette club traveling through from Illinois. We saw a bicyclist pulled over near an old ranch. We noticed that the cyclist was prepared for a long haul with large saddle bags and a small trailer. We turned around to check on him because we'd just heard the weatherman say something about a heat index of 102. The cyclist was an older Japanese man who did not speak much english. We made sure that he was OK and that he had enough water and then we left him there wishing we'd asked him way more questions. It's my biggest regret of yesterday. I regret not getting his picture. I regret not finding out where he was on his trip. Did he start in California or Chicago? I really regret not getting his story. 

We travelled on to Baxter Springs where we stopped in at the Historic Vintage Service Station to buy a pin and a car sticker. We spent some time talking with Dean "Crazy Legs" Walker who was manning the station. He told us how to get out to the Rainbow Bridge and about where to see the original tow truck that inspired Mater. We drove out to the bridge and took pictures and then we headed north towards Ft. Scott. We stopped at the Fort and got stamps in our National Parks Passport and all along the way, we discussed the logistics of doing a scooter trip of Route 66. Michael kept talking about needing some sort of support driving team for parts where we can't ride on 66 and how we'd have to do it two trips. I think he's making it more complicated than it needs to be. We pack light, rent a Uhaul to get us to Chicago with the scooters, ride the scooters to California and the rent a Uhaul to drive them back to KCMO. Done. If that guy can fit all the things he needed for the trip into a tiny bicycle trailer and two bags, we can fit everything on the scooters. 

It took us about eight hours to get home yesterday when usually that's about a four hour drive. We were exhausted by the time we made it home and in the back of my head, I was a little annoyed with myself for not pushing to get us home sooner. I'm behind on laundry and the bathroom needs to be cleaned. We both had things to get ready for work the next day. Instead, we moved at a snail's pace.

And we had the best day.