Weekend Dog Love

Mae, Lucy, Harry and Max….

Mae was so excited to see snow this week that I couldn’t get a decent picture….beside herself!  Lucy….showing off her new winter coat.  And the little Harry with his big brother Max.  Weekend dog love!

Mountain Mess?

Well, Saturday I did go out shopping looking for running shoes.  And I bought....RUBBER BOOTS!  That's right, you can't run in those. Well, you can, but it would be sloppy and awkward.

I am so thrilled to have found these though because they are the perfect thing for walking the dog in the morning. The fields we play in are soaking wet this time of year and last fall and early winter my feet were soaked every day! These fit perfectly, YAY!!

Sunday I went out again looking for the perfect running shoe.  No luck.  I went to Road Runner Sports and tried on about 6 pairs.  I really am a lot like Goldie Locks here ....too small, too big, rock plate, toe guard, bad tread...ugh!  On Wednesday I checked out one more local store but had no luck.  So finally, after driving my husband nuts talking about running shoes for WEEKS, I ordered another pair of Altras and an Asics GT2000 trail.  The Altras are the neoprene/polartec waterproof MID version of the Lone Peak 3.0  .  I'm not thrilled with the changes to the Lone Peak over the 2.5 version I have but if these are "right" they may be exactly what I'm looking for to wear in the mountains through early winter (gaiters!!)  The Asics are the fall back pair.

As soon as they both arrive I will give an update....right, because it's SO exciting to talk about my running shoes....

Okay, on a side note....did I mention (ya probably) what a big fan of Harry Chapin I was?  So, I have Sirius radio and honestly the BEST thing about it is the crazy old gems that pop up as you surf channels.  Awhile ago I heard Taxi and it just is SO INCREDIBLE.   Taxi... go on, take a listen.  "There's a wildman wizard, he's hiding in me, illuminating my mind".   And the part about having "something inside me, not what my life's about"?  oh man!

The funny thing about this is that I kept singing it, playing it, yelling it, writing it down, working out to it etc.  And I thought about a concert I went to back in the 70's.  Harry came out after the concert and talked to us, shook our hands.  It was just us, a small group of high school friends who hung around after the show.  He was such a nice, regular guy.  He even signed a leather visor that I was wearing at the time.  ya, a leather visor that had "Budweiser" tooled into it.  To my complete delight, my best friend found a photo of the two of us, circa 1978, and there I am, wearing the visor!  It was completely coincidental too!  Just like that...BAM, I've got a photo of me in the visor!!

I must have really been into hats as the newsboy cap on my friend is also mine....

Well, there you have it.  An update from the mountain mess that I am.  Maybe I spend too much time alone with Mae?  ya, maybe... I hope your first week of "fall" is going great!!  Drop me a note.  Got a favorite old song that lights up your day?  Share it!  

Songs In The Key Of Life

Goodbye July

31 years ago today, my mom, who was 57 at the time, passed away.  31 years, that's over 11,315 days, and I have thought about her and missed her on nearly every single one.  Excessive?  No, not really.  If you've lost someone you love, you know that's just the way it is.  You also know that Kubler-Ross has ca-ca stains in her underwear.  Seriously, those stages?  They certainly aren't linear.  They are more like a big Rubik's cube, ever shifting, rising and falling, a force that you carry around.  Anger, sadness, happy memories, regrets, all there in one awkward bundle.  31 years, I've been holding my bundle.  Acceptance?  Did she really use that word?  HA.  Well, you get used to it.  Perhaps that is all you can hope for, and in this life, we can get used to a hell of a lot.  Meh.  I'm going to go get a massage.  Later in the day I will probably have a shot and a beer, listen to Eddy Arnold and cry like a baby.  It will feel good.  Let it all out.  Tomorrow?  Well that's day 11,316.  I will get up, the sun will shine, I'll make coffee and maybe paddle the lake, move along.   We all still miss you Mom. 

July, what a month.  There were some good times, in the mountains there are always some good times.  Here, a few scenes.....

Blueberry field with a view

Picking?  or eating?

Lovely bus

It's not an ocean but it will do

Goodbye July!

Let's Catch Up....Over Coffee

I did try to give up coffee.  Really I did try.  I made it almost a month but honestly, I never popped out of that zombie stage and went through my days feeling like a grouchy sleepwalker.  Then I ran into a woman I know, an older and much wiser woman.  She told me she had had to give up coffee a few times and found the thing to do was to have "a little bit of coffee every day".  Sounded so simple.  Sounded so Yoda-like.  Coffee, little bit you must have.  My brain latched on to it and I turned it over and over in my mind. I decided that if I was going to have coffee it would be really good coffee. And that I would make it at home.  So, I went back to my old coffee snob ways of grinding my own beans and paying attention to the details.  I got help online, of course, at stumptown.  The result has been some damn fine coffee.

So, let's catch up....June was a month that brought a lot of sadness to our lives.  We took it in, moved along.   July opened with the promise of blue skies, warm sunny days, trips to the lake and summer plans.  We got to the raceway to watch some vintage auto racing.  We celebrated our 24th anniversary with a Dwight Yoakam concert and a Twin Peaks themed date night.  It was lovely.

But, on July 10, we learned the tragic news that a close friend of my son had passed away.  It has left all of us so saddened and heart broken.  I know that my son will always miss him.  It has become a part of him.  And it grieves me as a parent both to think that other parents are hurting (fathomless hurt) and that my own son and daughter have known such sorrow in their young lives.  I couldn't keep it from them.  I couldn't shield their eyes during that part of the movie or whisper so they wouldn't hear.  We talk about it, grieve and move along.  

One thing that I will say about finding peace in a tough time, is that the mountains seem to soothe all wounds.  I have walked out, to the top of the "hill", many times, to seek answers to life's sad questions.   I don't really find an answer, but I do find some solace.  I find the larger picture and while it often makes no sense, I find beauty and peace, and that gives me the strength to go back down the mountain and face life's sorrows and challenges. Stay strong, do not weaken...lace up your shoes, pull on your pack and move along. 

Coffee Lover

I realized when I started to write about caffeine withdrawal that I needed to back up a bit and talk about my life with coffee.  What's your earliest coffee memory?   When I was about 4 or 5 my mom shopped at the local A&P supermarket.  In those days, there was a coffee grinder at the end of the checkout counter.  I loved watching the machine noisily grind the beans and even then loved the aroma! I don't remember my folks being big coffee drinkers, but my Aunt Anna?  I can not picture her without the ever present cup of coffee in one hand, a cigarette burning in the other. My Aunt Margie is permanently connected in my memory to her aluminum coffee pot. I  can still see it percolating on the stove, boiling over, the liquid turning a dark brown in the glass bulb.  It was the strongest and best coffee on the planet!

I'm not sure when I started drinking coffee.  I know I drank it at 19 because I remember an older guy I dated telling me I shouldn't put sugar in my coffee, it wasn't very "grown-up".  (ya, really..er DOUCHE)  Anyway, I laugh at that now, but I take my coffee with cream, no sugar.

College and coffee go hand and hand.  Another vivid coffee memory I have is of a professor leading me by the arm to a large silver buffet urn as he said, "Kelly have you had coffee? Come and get some wake up juice!"   This probably would not have stuck with me all these years had he not also been a Catholic priest!   It wasn't prayer he was offering or to take my confession, it was a cup of joe and it was very much a "come to the dark side Luke" offer, said with a hint of excitement in his voice.

For every friend, I have a corresponding coffee memory.  My buddy in grad school took his coffee "light and sweet".  Our morning ritual coffee run brightened up so many days.  Richie?  Richie is waiting in line on a hot summer day for cups of cappuccino and drinking them in the sun.  Mike is a crisp white cup of espresso. Anne, my bff, is pots of coffee, lipstick stains on the cup and sugar all over my kitchen counter.  Kathy, Starbucks and Tevas in the Seattle rain.  And my climbing partner?  He's a tall skinny mocha, no whip. He has a gorgeous home espresso maker and ....an at home roaster. 

My husband and I have so many coffee memories that they probably deserve their own scrap book!  In the 80's we knew where all the gourmet shops were. Remember the flavored coffee trend?  We were hooked on hazelnut.  We have ground, pressed and brewed our way around the country.  Coffee has fueled us at bike races, warmed us up camping and climbing.  It has kept us awake through 30+ years together.  I remember our first coffee as husband and wife, our first cups as parents. Sometimes on Sundays , he brings me coffee in bed.

So why am I giving it up?  Am I a coffee lover or a caffeine addict?  Am I a coffee achiever or just someone who has a bad habit?  What is your relationship with the bean?  Are you passionate about coffee?  Is it just another beverage?   I'll be sure to fill you in on the caffeine withdrawal soon.  Until then, enjoy your weekend!  Run fast, play hard, have coffee with friends~