cardio

I don't know how many yards they were up ahead but let's just say you draw a straight diagonal line from this bank to where the bridge's reflection hits the other side. May have been further though that a dog, a dogs face over a fallen tree with his owner behind him pleading a wishful command of "Stay. Don't go. Do not flinch. You are flinching. No. Stop. Don't worry, you guys. He won't hurt you, but he does like women."

That's when Trail Miser and Trash Man opened the human shield and allowed that grinning beast a straight up have of me. And I braced for what in some warp of time turned that dog into a vertical, face to face, eye to eye, I swear he was grinning tackle. He came close to having me on my back and he is an example of how backpacking can turn into some pretty weird cross fit.

So yeah, now I'm just going to call my country strolls, cross fit.


Today I am grateful for Sunday's cross fit which included an exorbitant amount of laughter, or cardio.

driven, Pokey's notes

She tells us to come on.
"Follow me," in the cutest most awesomeness anything ever.
Then she turns to head down a trail she's never been.

I need to write a story for Trail Miser and Balanced.



It was our first night but second time at Sipsey. We'd stopped, had dinner, driven. It was nearing dark and he'd already said we'd just get far enough to set up camp but not past the cave. Dark comes fast when you're trying to see the ground in front of you and there's one beam of light telling you where to step. And that night at Sipsey taught us vulnerability in the form of your foot may slide right out from under you several times. Be careful, genius.

I thought and then said out loud, "I knew we weren't going to be prepared for this."
I'm all about self fulfilling prophecies.

Other people's versions can differ about what happened on that log that night. It was the only crossing for I don't remember how long he said. I looked at that log over that narrow but still threatening wide river, stream, creek, tributary, I don't know. The boys have less foggy versions of things. They were Trail Miser, Trash Man, Jake, and DEEwayne.

I didn't represent women well. Most stories have an apology, right? Sorry, ladies, mothers, daughters, but I gave up before I stepped on that thing. Trail Miser had handled it well but still scared me a bit.

I will admit to being concerned once I heard it seemed like I just gave up and jumped into a mud which caught my left leg at the knee and pushed it's foot behind me. Trail Miser is kind but you can now hear the hugest smile come through the line when he explains, "I just think it was shaking and you were shaking and you did finally seem to come to the conclusion that you were never going to make it so you tried to control the fall."

"I just thought I had a better chance of clawing up that bank."

We both laugh and I remember why we do this. It's like I told her. Once I heard that kid belly laugh, every cell in me said, "I'm going to be a comedian." And I ain't even funny.


Today I am grateful that three guys helped pull me up that bank with Trail Miser laughing and Jake ordering, "Don't you give up."

two in one combo

It's been a while since we've met on the back porch and the rain that came was just enough to touch stories about turkeys and tractors and life can be a lazy Saturday afternoon planning trips and laughing. He paid five dollars for the Grape Nuts though I told him they were on me.

"Have you read the latest research on diets?"

"No, but I have a feeling you're going to tell me about it. Do it."

"You have to keep it a secret for two months. If you tell someone about it, serotonin is released in your brain giving you the reward before you even do anything about it. Just telling me increases your chances of failing."


Today I am grateful for those guys.

lunch

We have photographed and talked and shopped and many other things have happened here before. That's just one of the somethings that makes this place so special. We six ladies have a table in the back and though we work in an office together we're pretty busy.

Two of us have declared ourselves to the detriment of our heath as being local lunch experts. She and I share a history of food, and we are going to tell you that you can't go wrong at Bubba's. Anything on that menu. Just start with a combo plate at Squeal's, but on your first order at the Garage, zone in on the lemon pepper wings by getting an appetizer as the meal.

Then we would say, "Take a stroll into a world of old and light coming in through a wall of windows."

The fried pickles had a good crisp and a salad bar for lunch is where it's at. 

That skin on that baked potato was perfect and so was what was within. 

Today I am grateful for a meal and to be part of a growing community.

that song you sent

"You got it in you," he sang.




Today I am grateful for writers.

soundtrack to the night's notes

It is discussed. Great music and logic agree, but it ends up being this.


Today I am grateful for a young lady, a legend, and a stack of books at the library.

when you hug what you still got, I should say

It's the payday meal. It happens once a month or should only, I should say. Tonight I burned it in a scorched butter and Italian seasoning. I've done better with just butter, garlic and pepper.

We are all clawing up a steep, red bank, I say, and don't even realize what she's going through.


Today I am grateful that she's still here with us, that he is, that they are.
I am grateful for the opportunity to share a meal with her.


Rule #1 of a payday meal is you must be able to eat it with your fingers.
Tonight's meal passed that test.

this is mercy. this is grace.

It is her best Maya pose, that's the photo. If someone or something had ever seen to see something fit, it would be the gift of talking to her today. I ask her if there's a quote and she shakes her head while smiling and turning the pages of the notebook she's been keeping since the beginning of the semester.

Is there a quote? There are so many. We have till Friday.

For the last few months she's been writing and reading and watching and being and now I get to interview her. I don't deserve this, but yes, I do love it.



Today I am grateful for mercy and grace.

looking forward now

Today I am grateful for six miles of conversation, notes passed between, Kramer's Falls, a breakfast with champions, and a day full of opportunities. I am grateful for plans and hope.

not awesome yet. maybe never. being okay with that.

It feels like waking up early on a Sunday morning and understanding all it is that you will need to do today. Just take a hike. Just a hike. Put on the shoes with some good socks and get lost in a world of pine straw and cones and sticks and climbing on a tree to cross the spillway.

Fold clothes.
Wash your car. Good.
Drink only water. And coffee.
Eat.
But not so much.

Get ready for tomorrow.




Today I am grateful for fresh air and not so many bugs flying around. I am grateful for trees which fall and land so perfectly as to allow us to practice on a balance beam. I am grateful for a good pair of shoes and socks, for three free meals, for friends, and for being on the run to get things done so I can be a better person for the people around me.


I am grateful to share music with kin. (At the end when he says, "Period.") Right?

beach warning flags

Water is closed to the public. Any activity in the dune area is prohibited.


Today I am grateful for a freshly cut yard, two turkey salad sandwiches, and a big plastic cup of sweet tea. I am grateful for someone who hears my frustration and forgives me for feeling.
I am grateful for a fitful nap, a weekend, and a hike.

the end

It's just one of those mornings, I say, and it is and this isn't. The music is sad and repetitive now. There's nothing quite like embracing your sad and repetitive side. Well, maybe there's a blog. It is why we have to bring the Kelly Joe out.


Today I am grateful for an end to the night, the week, that story.

music

Today I am grateful for a banquet, a call from him, a good night's sleep, and that music that just, you know. We know what Kelly Joe Phelps does to us.

four

Four chances, reasons, ways, people. They sit in front of me.

Today I am grateful for four.

the yard

It is the jog, the pace, the slow me down rhythm of the sport which lulls us into noticing that the sky has turned pink and purple and navy. It is how the bells ring two blocks over and you figure it's about that time. All sports seem southern in the south but this one...we're just playing in the yard.



Today I am grateful for how the grass is always the same color and height, how the dirt is raked, and the bases brushed. I am grateful for how a group of people work together to make sure the yard is something they're proud to share.

valuing self

I have never prepared so thoroughly though I could have prepared better for a last term, weeks, step, day. It started two hours and eleven minutes ago, and it will continue till it says so.

The calendar goes up. Coffee is made. There is an excitement here. It's time to work again.



Today I am grateful for work.

collection

I text her. We have access to an engineer. Let's discuss budget and what we will need.
I think he should contact these people.


Today I am grateful for beautiful ideas and three people.

structure

It's the perfect welcome home. Turkey from a hunt mixed in a salad and placed between two slices of wheat bread. His house is ready to greet another girl, but it sure is quiet with all of the other ones gone.


I cross the road, and he pulls up.


Later the kid calls, and we talk to him on speakerphone.

It's about the blizzard.


Today I am also grateful for a kid and a story and how he can still laugh with my brother in my home.

nothing to see here

I mention to more than one person that I would if I could stop time but I think maybe that was a lie. This was just a break, a brain rest of long baths and a steady breeze. I'm excited about what comes next. Nine more interviews, a huge video, concerts, musicals, parties, he'll come home from the hospital, and graduations.

Then our fifth magazine.


Breaks are incredible but so is everything else.



Today I am grateful for both this and that.

photos

getting up early, sleeping late

I have to read that book but I have been doing everything before I have to read it and I think I have to read it but it reads like a soap opera and this probably does as well. Trapp reading and when you consider that you don't want to be trapped anywhere you have to consider that some of your favorite poets write some of the most trapped words you've ever read.

William Wadsworth, Maya Angelou, Kipling, Emerson


Today I am grateful for a lucky shirt, Ridiculousness on MTV, a salty air retreat. I am grateful for baths and bubbles and charcoal to put on my face. A brand new should you wash one of those bath things, a razor, soap, a locked door, and a balcony.

kids tell the greatest stories

They are comic genius, and we're just supposed to be having lunch. We not only have lunch. We have to go to the bathroom, load up, lock down, release air flow, sing, smile, point at the cows. Close as I have to showing them what riding in the back of a pickup truck feels like is opening the sunroof and all the windows for these girls. It's deciding and arguing and ending up taking away to a park, a trail, a lake. Brains has on her boots, but Exclamation and I have exposed socks. We can't jump through the puddles, but she sure smiles when she does.

And then, after chicken bites and two bites of a flattened burger, and I ate all mine while we spied colors, Brains said, "Bathroom."

When we got back to the house he wasn't home. We all used the bathroom, and I suggested we go down the road. The resulting video of Brains with the exclamation of Exclamation explaining to me that their daddy had gone to Texas on a trip he had planned and discussed with them, is either comic genius because yes, I showed it to their daddy or we should all be concerned that these young ladies are incredible storytellers.



Today I am grateful to be able to listen to some of my favorite storytellers and their children.

girls' day out

We have to get the neglected to the needy, and the plan is that we do it as a team. They had to be lured in with promises of food and a movie. One of them kept yelling, "Prize!" from the backseat. I don't typically use such punctuation but she speaks in them. The needy is closed, and that was one-eighth a tank of gas. And it's raining. Exclamation is sweetly sleeping, and we're giving the neglected to the needy.  Somehow. This stuff is not coming back with us.

Right hand girl searches and finds a sixth avenue location. The Australian gives us detailed instructions until we are parked 150 feet from the entrance. We've already seen people out front and through the glass. We know the door is unlocked. Right hand and I ask the now awake exclamation and brains if they feel comfortable protecting the vehicle. They both nod. Nobody wants out in that rain, but that stuff. Nope. Not happening.

Within five minutes we are told that no, it's not happening in this building. This is the shelter. The people who don't have a place are now having to help the people who have too much get all their junk back in what is a nice vehicle. This feels a little wrong but not really just thank you and they kept the backpack. That's when we decide that the first place didn't need what we had, and the second place just needed that backpack.

Right hand searches again, and this time the question is less about name and more about intention. An eighth street thrift store is only six miles away. The Australian informs us and gives us directions. It is there and filled with light and a smiling face and the only things she doesn't take are baby car seats and televisions. We celebrate by ringing the bell and having four huge boxes and three heavy bags full of everything but baby car seats and televisions delivered when he lifts the overhead door.

Victory is ours.


Today I am grateful for those who make life an adventure of peril and danger and triumph and victory.
May we always be challenged and tell nobody we forgot the tax receipt.

book number

Books and papers and taxes and bills and payments and those emails. What if I take that envelope with me? What do you release? What do you keep? Taxes for 7 years, right? Bank statements? Licenses? Utilities? Books are like music, but you have to keep that number low. Right? Right.

Today I am grateful for math, for the notion still yet to be a reality that everything has a place.
And for artwork by artists I love dearly. Robert Miller up top and Jaime Winton below.

100 is my book number.

"We all have clutter in our hearts, and that's what needs tidying," says Marie Kondo

Today I am grateful to look at and open books, to remember where I was and understand more about where I want to be. I still have those Sipsey Wilderness shorts from 11 years ago, and I can't throw away those purple pants BUT there are four boxes and one and a half bags of hopefully someone can put to use the clothing I have been neglecting. Two chest of drawers and one closet done. Sending it out with gratitude and love. And I sound so cheesy, but Marie would love me.

photo

taskmaster

"Divide it up into sections," she says but it was a long time ago and I just want to get rid of some stuff. So I'll start with the only section I can remember. Clothes. All of them in the middle of the bed after I take the sheet and cover and throw them in the laundry. Must get laundry detergent when I go to the store. And cat food. Don't make the cat angry. Spend some time with those two girls. Books. Books was another section, but then I am going to have to read at least one. Read that book. Go to party. Socialize. Eat but not too much though he says ribs and you know they love to cook. Don't think about what day it is. Get lost in the week at five miles and one photo per sunrise.



Today I am grateful for a list.

music

I'm just trying to stay in touch with anything I'm still in touch with. Here.


Today I am grateful for great lines, good music, and a week of getting lost in them.

responsibility

I need to send out the group email but I've been stalling because it's not working the way I am working it. One email sent out at the beginning of the week listing opportunities students have received two replies last week.

So, is that what you do? Pick about four or five, know their schedules, assign them tasks, present a show? Four or five photographers and four or five videographers?

Maximum of ten kids. You can't meet the needs of all of them.


Today I am grateful for about ten kids who have replied to an opportunity they were given.
Today I have to make that list.



Also, the giving up thing that's going on. I'm going to take a week away from the phone. It's going to be hard at first and then amazing.

an inning of love

He claims to be a machine, and we laugh.
The game is slow and organized.
He says, "You can be over here to take photos, but you don't get to cheer."
That's when I fell in love with him.


Today I am grateful to be outside and feel alive in the cold.
And my central heating, very grateful for that as well.

when the kids play

It is cold and rainy and blown and lit into a beautiful night of flags flying and colored uniforms. We are outside facing elements of low temps and scattered water and walking and bending (wait. no bending. bending hurts.)

the kids are playing.

So many kids you know and don't know and, "Hey, Ms. Goff."

There are conversations and wins and losses and people are expecting.


Today I am grateful for the opportunities, for a library, for a yard, for a squad, for coaches for buses, and cars.

backpacking semantics

He says, "We won, but they came with their own agendas."

And I think, "Don't we all? Are agendas intentions? Are we just speaking semantics here?"

What we all want in the end is a win. What does a win look like to us? The score at the end of the game? The championship? Our parents being happy? Our kids? Our team hugging, smiling, high fiving, fist bumping. It's what backpacking is. Small wins of I just slipped down in the dark in some mud, one foot behind, the other to the far right, tried to get up, fell down again maybe five times before Trash Man said, "I thought you broke your leg," and another five rep stretch of you didn't know that was possible before he broke out into, "I thought you had a heart attack."

Ten repetitions in two sets of five each is crossfit for dummies who can be eight miles into a wilderness. At some point we may just have to call it performance art until I pop that screw out.

"What was the best thing you found there?" He asks.

Not what I was expecting. I was happy to have made it through the cave. Trail Miser went over it and through it multiple times. I got on my knees and crawled through it once, but when I did the cell phone fell out of my pocket. And that boy returned to the center of that cave to get it. I should be ashamed of myself. What an idiot. Then that log, and both of 'em said it looked like the tree started shaking and all of a sudden it looked like I just gave up and jumped which surely would not have happened since I already have a screw in my hip from an unfortunate earlier incident of me being an idiot. It's just that we met some of the greatest characters on this trip. People who love to laugh and share stories and breathe fresh air and push themselves past limits they didn't realize they had. And be kind. There are really kind people and dogs out there.

Jake
DEwayne
Hog Hunting Gun Enthusiasts
A dog named Red

Getting out of a comfort zone? Most definitely.
Being with and meeting great characters? Yes.

He says, "People ask me, and I even ask myself, 'Why do it? Why put yourself through that?' And all I know to say is, 'Because it's so good to find out you can.'"


Today I am grateful for sore muscles and short pick your feet up steps. I am grateful for running water in that river, over those cliffs, behind the rocks, and through my shower head. I am grateful Trail Miser taught me to roll on my pack and Trash Man finds energy out there.




Long live and love Sipsey Wilderness.
It's where we first found our hiking hearts and brought dirt home with us.

project t-shirt maybe

Four more and we're within a week of holding what I began to imagine would never be. Maybe.
Today I am grateful that we'll at least have a t-shirt. Maybe.