Deflowered

Before this evening... I was a motorcycle virgin.

And now...

Well now I am something entirely different.  Because this evening I had my first motorcycle ride.  And it was perfect.  It was exactly what I dared hope it would be- All fluidity and ease in motion.  All grace and presence.   And holy bananas- I was present beyond all experience of presence.  I watched the sun go down from a motorcycle.

I saw the world fly by in a rush of air and goodness and throttle.

But it was not flying at all.  It held still for each heartbeat- each breath I took infused with my surroundings.

Perfect.

Perfect.

Perfect.

Dear Alaska,

There will, in fact, be things that I miss about you.

But YOU will not be one of them.

Because, in fact, I did not experience Alaska this season.  I experienced Anchorage.  And, naturally, there were and are things here that I genuinely enjoyed.  My cohort.  My roommates. The stories that I now have to tell about my crazy landlady, our psychotic and hermit-like neighbors, and the misadventures of one wildly moody housecat.

I enjoyed the mountains in the distance and the strange sense of community in this strange northern town.  Dogs everywhere, street people making it a point to yell at me.

The Bear Tooth Theatrepub and Chilkoot Charlie's Trivia night.

I cannot, however, say that I will miss the town as a whole.

Again, nor can I say that I will miss Alaska.  Alaska- the big wilderness, the big sense of wanderlust and glamour and loss- did not exist for me.  Not this season, anyway.  Plans foiled; mischief never quite properly managed; fashioning of nonsense and no-good constantly foiled...

I gave up on the BIG Alaska.  I cannot regret it or regret will eat me alive... but I will be saddened by the world outside that I never quite got my act together enough to engage.

Alas- I blame myself, Alaska, not you. It is my ache, my pain, my mistake.

Love,
Kate

September... Oh September...

I am indeed obsessed with my birthday month.  It has to be said.  September is the start of the fall- my favorite season.  It is the delicious month when the summer is finally letting go and the sweetness of golden autumn light begins to creep into the days.  I am a Libra- so I am especially partial to the late part of the month- but I will take any bit of it.

Holy Bananas.  Official obsession (which may become a problem later down the line when I decide that motorcycles are in fact a great mode of transportation) and serious streaming video problem with Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman's travel 'Long Way' documentaries.  Brilliantly funny, brilliantly British, and brilliantly executed, these journeys and these men are going to cost me an arm and a leg in Internet overages!

Completely absurd ailments.  Yep.  Storytime.   Yesterday I woke to shards of glass ripping into my throat, an epic ear ache and general health shit-tast-ic-ness.  So I roll out to find a walk in clinic (in the middle of the always pouring Anchorage rain) which, naturally, takes far more time than it should.  But eventually, after much chagrin and cursing of the weather gods, I am ushered into the back room where they take temperature, blood pressure, etc.  After two different thermometers and two rounds of double checking- confirmed.  My body temp is only 94 degrees.  Consult your survival dictionaries- I have officially dropped low enough to be hypothermic.  Crikey.

Bear Tooth Theatrepub.  I just love it here... a second-chance movie theatre that serves food and drink and keeps the kids away from the rest of us in an 'alcohol free' balcony zone.  It's brilliant. In fact, I may treat my hypothermic and bronchitis-ridden self to World War Z this weekend.  Since, you know, sickos can't make it to Denali even though that was the original plan.  Nah.. I'm not Bitter at All.  (Hack, stupid Alaska).

I remembered how lovely his voice is... and his.  And now I can't stop listening to either.

Reconnecting.  I've done a lot of that lately for some reason.  I realized that I had forgotten how lovely it is to reconnect with someone loved.

Okay...
Till Next Time...

F*ing Hypothermia?!?

The Woods are Lovely,

Dark and Deep- 
But I have promises to keep, 
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep. 

Sometimes, the way people get songs stuck in their heads, I get poetry.  Lately 'Stopping By Woods on a Snow Evening' has been background noise in my mind.  And even then, just that final stanza.

I believe it is the grace of this section- the remembered mileage, the promises unfulfilled, the darkness and deepness of it all- that gets to me.  The inevitably of continuing on...

Especially now as I gear up for yet another move.  The suitcases will come out, soon, and I will stare at them for a while, putting off the inevitable.  Then they will become the woods- dark and deep- and empty- until I remind myself of the promises that I have made and I have to keep.

Only then will the packing happen.  It will and in the frantic flurry of folded clothing and measured shoves, I will think about all of this mileage.  All of the roads I have driven, flights I have flown, seas I have sailed.  And I will think about the thousand sleepless hours of travel- the ones on the train station floors or airport baggage claims, with neon clocks mocking me.  Or the nights shoving too many people into one hotel room.  Or the heartbeats counted on a plane, staring blindly at the flight map, wishing to hell that my legs were shorter.

What promises have I made to go through all of that?

Promises of a welcome home hug- and those I keep.

Much love, all.

Some Days You Bite the Bear...

And some days the bear bites the hell out of you.  And some days that bear starts gnawing at about 8:15 am Alaskan time (by the way, AK does indeed have it's own time zone).

The Bear in question is distance.  It has prowled around me all morning long as I attempt to nurse the wounds it inflicted earlier when it enthusiastically shredded my heart into tiny little heart-pieces.

Please don't get me wrong- I know that this Bear is just part of the price of the life I have very willfully and stubbornly chosen to lead.  And I usually willingly pay it.  Because I love the thrill of motion, moving, movement; I love the deep breath I have to take every time I board a plane or the zing of excitement when I cannot see out the rear view mirror because the Jeep is packed with my most precious belongings and I am setting out on yet another adventure.  I even love the frustration of having to deal with passport issues (currently I need to renew the hell out of mine), Customs, delayed planes, gas prices, packing-repacking-unpacking, 'goodbyes,' 'hellos,' 'goodbyes' again, the UNKNOWN element that will inevitably blow up in my face.  I love my Vagabond World and I can deal with that Bear.

That is, until days like today when the Bear reminds me that some connections should not be broken by distance because the break is simply too much to bear (sorry).  Distance hardly ever wins in my life and considerations, but sometimes it does.  Sometimes it forces my hand and makes me think about the settled, connected, KNOWN element.

Sometimes I don't want to be so far away.

Until next time,
Don't let the bear bring you down.

A Confessional in August

I am hanging out on a particularly rainy Alaskan morning, eating a piece of toast, drinking a cup of coffee and listening to this album.  Yes, I know that I am a wee bit late in falling in love with it- but you are all used to my pop-culture deficiencies by now.  Anywho, in listening, I realized that the time had come for an August version of obsessions confessions!

Mahjong- thank you Sami Bruce- has taken over my life.  Seriously.  It's a little ridiculous. I could spend hours looking at those little tiles.  I may go blind staring at my computer screen.  I need to get a real kit and play in the soft, natural light of the real world.

I have become utterly obsessed with counting down the days until I fly away. In case curiosity has gotten to you- September 22.  After that I know that I will have another countdown going- fly to Costa Rica? Get a dog? Get a real job? Who knows.

Also, speaking of cultural deficiencies, how could I possibly NOT have known about Buena Vista Social Club before now?  And why did it take Alaska for them to really hit home??

The Glades.  Has anyone seen this?  Because I am officially obsessed with it- especially on rainy mornings like today... :).

Okay. That's all for now.  It's time to be marginally productive.  AKA... Mahjong.

Much love to all.

What Happens at the Christmas (Eve) in July Party....

... Stays at the Christmas (Eve) in July Party.

But what the cat does the following morning is worthy of a wee photo blog.  What you are witnessing is Wifey's cat, Gizmo on an exploratory adventure...

... For the turkey carcass that you can see sitting in the opened oven... Yum. 

Enjoy. 

Obsessions- the July Edition

Here I am in Alaska- and all I can think of is getting somewhere else.  Getting another passport stamp- getting another notch in my travel belt.  I must go Go GO.  The one constant in my life- going.  And that website is feeding the need like no other sustenance.

My brother recently got a Boxer puppy and has since tried to convince me to go the same route- alas.  I have another plan.  Hopefully a rescue- hopefully a puppy- and hopefully a deliciously perfect companion.

Management of internet usage.  It is a long, complicated and fairly ridiculous story.

Every Thursday Night. Best ever way to end the work week (yes... Ranger work week.  I am Sunday to Thursday).

Holy Bananas- I am loving on the Buena Vista Social Club- which is going hand-in-hand with my other obsession of Languages.  I want to learn more, know more, speak more.  It has gotten somewhat ridiculous, but I am okay with that.  My ridiculousness has never quite been in control.

So that's that.

Learning, going, doing, seeing, dancing... well, I had not mentioned dancing.  But the urge is there.

Much love, friends.

Redemption

I have two flatmates (or duplex-mates).  I have affectionately nick-named them Hooch! and Wifey (yes- the exclamation point is necessary when spelling Hooch!).

They are, categorically, the single-most redeeming.... everything... of my Alaskan experience so far.  Hooch! is wild and Southern and deliciously delicious while Wifey is SoCal and as gleefully evil as me.

I truly don't know how I lucked out on this one but these women- these absolutely perfect, brilliant, funny, interested and interesting, genuine women- they are keeping me in it from day to day.

Much love to all of you- but most love to my Wifey and Hooch!

Moving and Grooving- Alaska Style

So everyday at work, I give this 'talk' or 'orientation' about the 1964 Good Friday Earthquake 'that devastated not only Alaska (indeed economically, environmentally, and emotionally) but really a significant amount of the Western Seaboard.' [Thank you thank you, I do make these things up all by myself.  I sometimes like to talk pretty].  Every. Single. Day.

Anywho. I inevitably get the question- 'Are there a lot of Earthquakes still?' I inevitably answer- 'Yes, of course.  They literally happen all the time.  But most are so small you'll never even notice.'  I'm not lying.  They do happen all the time.  It plays out a little like sudden onset vertigo if you can even feel one... but for the most part you just don't notice.

Until last night.

I wake up at 3:30ish in the morning wondering why on earth it feels like I am suddenly on a boat. There I was, all tucked into bed and happily snoozing away and then I am inexplicably pitching and rolling.  Oh that's right.  Earthquakes.  Alaska.  Plate boundaries and movement. Gotcha, I'm on it.

Alas, there is not such an amazing end to this story.  The house jerked a bit.  The land shook a bit.  I turned onto my belly and went back to sleep.  I hit the 'post-earthquake snooze button' in my brain and returned to dream land.  I actually even kind of forgot about it a little.  Seriously.  I only remembered an hour into iPad Accessibility Training and texted my parents to say 'hey- by the by- had an earthquake last night.'  They then related the news to my dear brother. And from him (via text message) I received the following response of concern: 'is it just like i have imagined terror everywhere and people running around with towels on their heads.'  Grammatical errors notwithstanding, I got a hearty chuckle out of that one.

I literally went back to bed.

I think he was a little disappointed in my earth quaking story.  So for him I give you Moving and Grooving China Style. 

The first earthquake I experienced was indeed in the Chengdu, China, back in the day.  I probably did not blog about it.  I know I did not tell my parents about it for fear that they would fly overseas and bodily remove me from my (at the time current) situation.

Standing in front of open windows, on the sixth floor of a shoddily-built Chinese apartment complex, the building started moving.  This is, in essence, a HOLY SHIT I'M GOING TO DIE kind of moment.  It is one thing to be in an earthquake.  It is another thing to be in an earthquake in China (see afore-mentioned shoddily built apartment complex comment).  Their infrastructure is not exactly equipped... well for anything, really... but certainly not for major disasters.  And the fact that my building was literally swaying like a lovely bit of wheat in a windy field was less than comforting.  Less than comforting enough to have my life pass before my bespectacled eyes.  I called Pat afterward and yelled into the phone 'DID YOU FEEL THAT?!?!?!'

His response was, of course, 'Yeah.  That was nothing.'

So there you have it.  The good, the bad, the Alaskan, the Chinese, the responses of men in my life to my earthquake responses.  Hopefully the second was a better story for the masses.

The Earth, she shakes.

Until next time... you should probably google quakes in China.  It's only marginally depressing ;).