Into The Great Wide Open

I haven’t told you about what’s happening tomorrow before now because:

a) This week donned its best Hammer-inspired crazy pants and thus
b) my words have been spent elsewhere, writing instructions for grant-torch-passing, helping students attack comma splices and encouraging them to write conclusion paragraphs.
c) This being very-new-to-me territory, I honestly have no idea what to expect (beyond miles of trails and trials of miles, of course).
d) All of the above.

Matt’s written a far more eloquent version of the past week’s events and our impending trail-laden trek. The truncated version of the story goes a little something like this:

Tomorrow I’m running 31 miles. That’s (by far) as far as my legs will have carried me up to this point. I’m a bundled mix of nerves and excitement and fear and trust and doubt and without a doubt I’m finishing once I start. My legs feel ready. The rest of me isn’t so rock steady. But I said I’d run, and as crazy as it feels to admit, hydration unfinished and unfriendly pathogens making their presence known, right now thirty-one still sounds like quite a bit of fun.

And not just because at some point I’ll be running here:

But also because of that.

See you on the other side, kids. (I’ll be the one crying and looking like I just went swimming and probably not being able to walk, but also beaming and asking with a mouthful of pizza when we get to do that again.)

A Sea Shanty Of Sorts

I go down. Rung after rung and still the oxygen immerses me the blue light the clear atoms of our human air. I go down. My flippers cripple me, I crawl like an insect down the ladder and there is no one to tell me when the ocean will begin.

The Little Mermaid is the first movie I ever remember seeing in a theater. My dad took us when it was first released and we undoubtedly ate popcorn and Ursula made my sister cry and Sebastian made my dad laugh and Ariel → Read more...

Metamorphosis

Turning and turning in the widening gyre, the fire cannot hear the firefighter.

We electively rose before dawn, eighty fires worth of smoke still poaching our air, sleep still determinedly stuck to our faces. We sat with small waves of nausea as our stomachs realized the time (4am) and the place (no longer asleep). Eggs and tator tots and sausage we ate, merrily but quietly, the three of us thinking about moutains and miles and the day’s adventures quickly approaching.

Mountain → Read more...

Moonwalk

Tuesday night the moon donned a waxing gibbous, blasting its nearly full body through blinds I can never seem to shut tightly, so much do I want the sun’s company during the day, and then the moon’s when the sun’s seen fit to sink below this prized, peak-studded horizon.

I have moons on my mind lately. Maybe because the moon’s been especially bright as of late. Maybe because the moon’s always especially bright here with so few clouds to cloak the sky → Read more...

Into The Great Wide Open

I haven’t told you about what’s happening tomorrow before now because:

a) This week donned its best Hammer-inspired crazy pants and thus b) my words have been spent elsewhere, writing instructions for grant-torch-passing, helping students attack comma splices and encouraging them to write conclusion paragraphs. c) This being very-new-to-me territory, I honestly have no idea what to expect (beyond miles of trails and trials of miles, of course). d) All of the above.

Matt’s written a far more eloquent version of the past week’s → Read more...