Ridin’ a Train to Alabama

Submitted entry: I started this morning reading Carl’s Masquerade to Paul while the coffee brewed and I can tell you I am so not fond of these books. The basic premise is that a mom and dad leave for somewhere (in this case a masquerade party) and tell the DOG “Do a good job watching the baby”. Then they leave and the dog carries the baby around on adventures arriving home just in time for the parents to tell the dog what a good job he did watching the baby. Paul likes the pictures and so we look at them but I find it annoying and perhaps a bit scary from a toddler’s perspective. This one is particularly annoying since the dog takes the baby to the party her parents are at and they’re never noticed. If I could draw I think a parody of the book called Carl Unmasked would be in order where the dog takes the kid to the party where the parents go “Isn’t that our dog and child over there?” and realize what fools they are.

In other news our check arrived yesterday finally. We drove to Springfield in the afternoon and went to the library then over to Barnes and Noble to see this month’s Yahoo Internet Life magazine. I’d been told there was a small review of this journal in it. And lo and behold there was in fact a very sweet review (Thanks to the reviewer if he is reading). However there was so little else appealing in the magazine to us in our lives and how we use the net that no matter how vain I felt I couldn’t justify buying it.

Sage is off for a meeting with the president of Emerald City Shelters today. We’ve done some free work for them in the past and plan on doing more as well. Sage also has some ideas for design and marketing of the site. We still haven’t got a design that we’re pleased with mostly because they insist on the animated gems and other design elements that we just don’t like. Hopefully Sage gets her way some today *grin*.

And this morning she sent the paypal payment for the laptop so that should be here in a week or so depending on how fast they send it and how they send it (next day, etc.). It’s been a nice vacation for me from computer work. The timing was great as I’m still waiting for materials from my client before my big crunch comes. My hope is that the materials arrive a little before the laptop so that I can do most of the work here instead of at the house. I’ll get far more time in that way. My hope is to finish it up in a few weeks so we can have a good cache of money for trips and living expenses.

Oh - strange moment yesterday at the library. We’re only allowed to have 100 books out at a time (I know crazy but true we have that many out!). On Saturday we gave a friend all our books (like 70 I estimate) to return but she hadn’t made it to the library before we did. So when the librarian told me that I could only take out four books I told her the story - that we “Beat our friend here” and she said something like “Oh really - that’s too bad.” Then I explained to her that we thought she’d be in town before we did. And she said (ironically I think as she checked out a book by the Dalai Lama for me) “I thought that you meant that you physically beat him.” How funny - I don’t think I look the type (one of these days I will post a picture for the curious) but apparently she did though she backpedaled furiously as soon as she could.

I think my metabolism is changing - probably due to the taking of vitamins for about a month - I think I really needed them. Lately I’ve only been able to comfortably drink a single cup of coffee per day. Any more and I feel really anxious for hours after. How I ever got by drinking a cup before leaving for work, a cup on the way, a cup upon arrival, a soda with lunch, a cup in midafternoon and often another cup or soda on the way home is beyond me. If I did that today I’d be a quivering ball of jelly.

That’s going to have to be it for now - Sage wants to leave early so she can get to the little library in town before her meeting to get an audio book to listen to on the 45 minute drive there and back.

Same day - 5:30 or so

It’s later as you’ve probably guessed if you were paying attention. Paul is asleep outside. We had quite a day together.

It started out not so great with me feeling tired and Paul feeling mischievous and me just wanting to read a book to him (or preferably to myself). Finally I saw where this was going (nowhere fast) and got up off the couch, put on my shoes and his and we started walking off in search of persimmons.

When I first found out about persimmons about this time last year I was convinced that we had none on the land. After all, I’d never found yummy pinkish-orange fruit lying about the forest floor. But finally late in the season I found a tree with two persimmons on it. The last two of the year as it turned out. Doing walks with Paul and doing wood have made me better at identifying the trees and today I checked about every one I knew of and we came up with a total of one for each of us. Then it felt as if I got my eyes and trees were visible everywhere - probably five in total. Most were bare, some dead but one turned out to be perfect. On the ground around it were about 8 ripe fruits. Paul and I gobbled those up then I shook the tree and got a bunch more. Probably all told we each ate a half a pound of them and then I borrowed Paul’s hat and put about a dozen in there. Paul got disenchanted with persimmon eating and gathering and went to play on and in a nearby hollow log while I continued to shake the tree and fill the hat. Then when the tree had given all it was going to give (whatever you do, don’t pick and eat the unripe fruit - there’s nothing more astringent) and so we walked on through the woods, checking a few more trees, and ending up at the house where we checked mail, looked at Africam and The Owl Pages for a while before heading home. In other windows and while he played in the room I looked up friends on some of the high school alumni directories - no luck finding anyone unlike Sage who keeps finding more and more of her class. But then I’m from Vermont and she lived in Silicon Valley so who would be more likely to find their friends online.

Then we went to the yurt and made a big batch of pasta and ate and played. He’s getting really into pretending now - for a while he was pretending he was various animals - cat, dog, baby bird while I fed him. Then we pretended together to be riding a train (the broom) to Alabama (ask him where he’s going whenever he plays a game and that’s where he’ll tell you he’s going) and after a long train ride with two stops for gas and a stop for food at a train station we wound up in Alabama at the beach. There he chased seagulls and sandpipers, catching them in his treasured yellow bucket until Sage got home from her meeting.

I’ve been fighting the urge to have a second cup of coffee all afternoon. I’ve been dozy since after eating and could hardly meditate without frequently nearly nodding off. Then I figured out why. All the sugar from the persimmons combined with the huge ton of pasta I ate has given me a sugar crash.

Tomorrow has to be a town trip - we haven’t much left over from this check (hopefully more coming soon) but are getting a bunch of staples - beans, rice, tofu, peanut butter and bread among other things. We’re probably picking Kitey up tomorrow too, Oops, Paul just had an early wake-up from his nap so I’ll end it here.

My personality has a plurality and that’s why they call me Mr. Duality

Submitted entry: I don’t really mean that to say anything more than you might make of it - I just crawled out from under the yurt where we keep the cassettes (there are too many to keep inside and we haven’t even got a great way to keep them inside so it’s a sort of a good natured passive-agressive battle between Sage and I - Sage cleans up and puts them outside and I bring new ones in.). Anyway - I’m listening to Shut Up and Sing by The Bobs which is one of about four tapes I brought up. (The others are Today’s Specials by The Specials, Hi De Ho Man by Cab Calloway, Wonderful Life by Black, Live at the Iron Horse Music Hall by The Nields (thanks Woj!), a collection that Sage made of ABC and the compilation Sage’s friend Julie made called The clouds are heavy, you dig? which introduced us to the wonders of Kurt Elling).

This Bobs album is the last one we bought that we really liked and haven’t bought the last two being afraid to listen to them after they replaced their only female vocalist with a much younger, more conventionally attractive woman (whom Sage and I snarkily call “Chippy Bob”. Hey I bet all the men in The Bobs now drive fast red convertibles too now which reminds me of what a woman I once knew always said when she would pass a middle aged man in his corvette - “Sorry about your penis”

It’s been a wild week here. We’re hopelessly blissfully broke with a broken laptop, one already won on ebay to replace it and a large advance check supposedly arriving “Any day now…” Sage gets the grumps about it about once a day but I don’t worry. I know it’s coming (probably tomorrow) and it’s just starting to get humorous. Earlier this week we had hardly any food (okay, we had lots of beans, rice and other things but nothing really tasty), and were running low on matches, lamp oil, cat food and seemed to find something new every few hours that we were out of. But Sage borrowed $20 from Kitey on Thursday (her birthday) and bought a few treats and lots of staples (including a small bag of coffee just in time). Then on Friday we seemed to be running out of everything again and Sage was really crabby about it. And as I changed into a pair of shorts and was preparing to lie down for a nap by emptying the pockets I found a folded $20 bill that I hadn’t remembered was there and after a short time of being deluded into thinking that we were all going to go to the library in Springfield again (it was already 4:00) we regained our senses as the sun set and we arrived in town. So instead we spent all our money on lamp oil and more food. The check has to arrive in the next few days - apparently though they said they mailed it on Monday it didn’t actually get out until Wednesday (which could have meant Thursday if they put it in the box after the last pickup).

Sage reports that her birthday was wonderful - she originally hoped to have a veg-out day in front of videos but couldn’t find the wallet when she got to town so she couldn’t get a card to rent them. So instead she bought a pumpkin pie and some heavy cream and worked on the computer. Working isn’t my ideal birthday but then that’s me for you.

While Sage was having her birthday I hung out with Paul from about 9:00 - 6:00. It was without question the best day we have ever had together. We made a big batch of pasta together, ate some and then packed the rest, along with a bunch of water and other treats in a backpack and headed up the mountain for the first time in months (the last time I went up I carried him in the sling!) He did a great job walking from the yurt to half way to the top before the grass was too tall for him to bear and I carried him. Then he was tuckered out (of course!) and so I carried him much of the way home. Some of the high points were my finding a great vine full of without a doubt the best wild grapes I’ve ever tasted in my life. We packed about 4 bunches in the pack and ate them all afternoon. Then a half hour or so later walking through a cedar grove, Paul called me back to where he was to share some juniper berries he found with me. I tried in vain to find the ammonite fossil on both the way there and back. When we got back we had a great time just hanging around the yurt, playing games and traipsing around the woods. There were no power struggles, no tears or anything - we just got on perfectly all day despite his hardly having nursed. By the end of the day I was blissful and he seemed so too. We made a batch of refried beans and made Sage two burritos. I dug up a candle and hid it all in the corner. Then we went to get Sage - telling her that we were ready for her to come home (I just wanted to surprise her with the birthday burritos) and when she got home I lit the candle and sang happy birthday to her. But as all things come to an end I recall at the height of my bliss remembering having read how big crashes always follow big highs and so it did - a sort of bizarre sadness came over me for a couple hours after. Of course that could have been a caffeine crash - I had three cups that day after several days of one weak cup to conserve coffee (Sage bought some for me with her birthday money.)

In internal news I’ve been meditating almost daily now and it’s been really helpful in evening out my temperament. It helps to have had a place to go other than the yurt. Kitey’s been away and has let me use the tipi while she’s out. It’s a nice place to meditate with few unnatural distractions (the birds and bugs I have no control of).

Yesterday we had a blast - we went with a friend and her daughter to visit some horses she knew. After she took the kids for a ride Sage and I got to ride as well - me for basically the first time. The horses were beautiful - and enormous. I came up to the shoulder of the mare, who we rode. I never rode before so basically I was lead around to get used to riding. We did what we all jokingly termed “Attachment horseback riding” - bareback without a bit (with something that worked gently by applying pressure their nose) and allowed them to graze some (discouraged by most riders) as we rode. It was an amazing feeling to be carried around by such a large animal - willingly as she could have easily removed me from her. As I’ve been in a philosophical sort of mood lately of course I saw it all as a metaphor for life. That as we “ride” through our lives thinking we’re controlling where we’re going we are actually only encouraging them to go one way or another and that our lives are powerful things that could throw us or go suddenly in a different direction if it so desires. Also, you have to guide your life gently - you can’t beat your life into submission and expect it to gratefully carry you wherever you expect it to go.

I’m still reading a bunch of books at once and actually enjoying it too and seem to be absorbing a great deal more than I’d expect. So far I have bookmarks in Breath Sweeps Mind - A First Guide to Meditation Practice Edited by Jean Smith, The Continuum Concept by Jean Liedloff (what seems to be what has inspired the whole Attachment Parenting movement, Compassion in Action by Ram Dass and Mirabai Bush, Chop Wood, Carry Water by Rick Fields et. al., and for entertainment I’m reading On the Road by Jack Kerouac which isn’t so fun as a chronicle of a series of wild road trips as it is a touching description of a friendship between two young men. I’ve also started Ethics for the New Millennium by the Dalai Lama though I haven’t read enough of that to really consider myself to be in the middle of it or anything - I’ve just read the introduction. I’ll try to do some reviews before too long.

Paul and Sage are back from a walk now and so as they finish up their nurse I’m going to finish up this entry. We’ll be off to dinner at a friend’s place this evening and probably be seeing Kitey as well so you may be reading this a ways after it was actually written.

We all had a hand in it…

Submitted entry: …in the death of our laptop that is. Two nights ago I opened a can of orange juice and offered Sage, who was working on the computer, a drink which she happily accepted. Meanwhile, Paul and I were reading on the bed. Minutes later Claire, who was outside, yowled to be let in. Paul said “Let Claire in.” and Sage went outside to get Claire and I turned back to our book. When Sage came back I heard the door shut, and then an expletive. I looked over and saw what had happened. The door’s slamming had jarred loose the empty gift box that the books that Paul’s grandad had sent from amazon.com. The gift box fell onto the table where the computer was knocking the orange juice over onto the laptop. The keyboard went out immediately and after cleaning it up and opening it up and wiping everything off it got progresively worse. Now it won’t even turn on. So it seems everyone had a hand in it - me for putting the box precariously up on the cabinet, Sage for leaving the juice next to the computer, Claire for crying to come in at that moment and Paul for asking Sage to let her in. But in the end I think the OJ did it - shorting out the motherboard on the computer *groan*.

Then Sage had one of her Small Fits(tm) and spent an hour or so crabbing about the situation we now find ourselves in. I’m looking at it as a lesson in the stupidity of assigning blame which I can be notoriously bad about in the wrong mood or situation.

But it’s not all bad. We can use our desktop, albeit at the house, to work on and have found an auction at Ebay for another used laptop like this one (we can just take the old hard drive out of the dead one and be up and running in minutes - and we have 2 batteries and a charger for it already). And as a small advance on this writing job is due sometime this week we’ll be fine just without a laptop for a few days which is something of a drag.

Not a complete drag, though - yesterday Sage, Paul and I had a lovely day. We went to town in the morning to pick up a few things - gas, toilet paper, pasta, flashlight, etc. Then we went home for Paul’s nap. When he woke up we all went to the cave near here (about a 20 minute drive). We had a good time wandering inside while Paul climbed on the rocks and pretended to be a dragon. Then we wandered around outside (I keep forgetting the camera when I go here) and enjoyed the day and view.

Then we got home and Sage did some dishes and got water while I did a little wood gathering and hung out with Paul. Then we were bad and ordered pizza to be delivered. Yes, Sage and Todd still do that even in the country. However in the country we still have a 5 mile drive to pick it up (we’re 15 miles from town and they have a 10 mile delivery radius).

Last night was the second of two cold nights in a row. It’s been in the 30’s both nights and promises to be in the low to mid 20’s tonight. The wood stove is being a blessing as usual keeping the yurt from being cold at night and toasty warm in the morning when we stoke it up. I seem to be faster at getting wood this year and amazingly there’s as much dead wood available as there was last year that I thought I depleted.

Thursday is Sage’s birthday - her plan is to have a sort of day of vegetation with lots of baths and videos while Paul and I hang out. In the past when she kept her journal people would ask for our address to send stuff but we were a bit nervous about it. Now we’re a bit more comfortable as we got a PO box. We’ll give the address out on request (but not publish it online to avoid junk mail) and also she’s set up an amazon.com wishlist. Thanks to everyone who’s already given us presents from the wishlist!

We’re in that funny time we always seem to find ourselves in now too. Today we haven’t a dime - okay, some change in a bag. (and sadly no coffee either - it’ll be a sleepy few days…) But we’ve got tons of food and a tank full of gas and about 100 library books so we’re happy.

Today I’ll be off to do more wood (maybe after a nap if Paul’s up for the nap first) and possibly a trip to see if there’re any persimmons down at the creek. I’ve had a few this year so far but not from here.

In other news we’ve also decided to make a trip to Minnesota this January sometime on a small vacation for a week or so. Only Sage and I are crazy enough to want to spend a week vacationing in wintery Minnesota. I’m a little disappointed we didn’t have the money to go to Journalcon this year though - that would have been a ball and it would be fun to see the northeast again.

Oh, speaking of that, Sage and I had a talk a few days ago and I’ve made a decision early. We’ll keep a residence in Missouri now indefinitely so Sage doesn’t have to worry about our moving but that we can travel lots as money permits and still do the summer away from the Ozarks thing which we’re all excited about.

And as Sage is tired I’ll end this journal entry here and help her out with Paul. They’re about to do some painting with watercolors and I can’t miss that no matter how tired anyone is.

Pretend it didn’t happen.

Submitted entry: I want my son to grow up feeling comfortable outside the corporate consumerist culture. All I need to find is a nice little New England village to raise him in and a good business to support us while we do it. That’s an example of what Kitey and her friends call Ccosmics (sic). I had to stop and ask Sage for a good definition: Okay - “a Ccosmic is a fortune cookie, a social commentary, an inside joke, an outside joke, and something indefinable” says Sage. Most of them are a sentence or two, often incisive, insightful, incendiary, inflammatory, interesting and indescribable. But they’re a wonderful mode to write in when you’re trying to put your finger on something and are in the right mood. Sort of a Zen version of freewriting. I came up with that one towards the end of the funk I was in a few weeks ago when I realized that I am here because I know I’m uncomfortable outside the corporate environment and I’m uncomfortable outside the corporate (and school) environment because that’s not how I grew up. And so I’m here to make it more likely that Paul will be able to be comfortable in many situations. That he won’t require the social rewards of praise from bosses and teachers, raises, attaboys and other assorted insincere (or even sincere) dreck that I have been craving since I left the working world. And it starts as soon as one gets to school. Look at your 2nd grade daughter’s spelling tests. Find one that she got a C- on and find another that’s an A. What’s the difference? The A paper gets a sticker, gold star or a simple “Great Job!” on it while the C- paper doesn’t have anything but the grade (and perhaps, as my teachers often were wont to do, a “poor” or a frowny face). This constant good boy/bad boy results in my case in someone who feels disappointed that there’s no gold star for getting a box of wood, no quarterly bonus for sweeping the floor and no dinner out with the boss for hauling water. In that sense I feel quite unprepared for the real world of taking care of ones’ self. That’s not to say that I don’t think praise is a good thing or rewards for that matter - simply that indiscriminate and often insincere use of them has made me jaded. I even notice that attitude pervading how I feel about the site when I’m not mindful of it. I often feel disappointed when I don’t get email after putting up a journal entry or new section or the like. And why should that be? I truly did not start this journal as a forum for people to see what a great job I’m doing and for them to tell me all about it. However, it is changing. For example, these days I’m working on installing Linux on the laptop and making quite a lot of headway. And I have no reason why I’m doing it except that I want to do it and it sounds like fun. And it’s moving along quite nicely and I’m having lots of fun going from short term goal (rebuild the kernel, get the mouse to work, make the sound happen, make the network card work (still working on that one) but having no long term goal or reason for doing it. And frankly it’s been one of the most fun things I’ve done in years.

I think much of that feeling also comes from not having a particularly close or supportive family. as well. This realization came to me a few nights ago in a dream I found interesting. I was at the Dogstarr Cafe - a coffeehouse/restaurant next door to The Morning Call the newspaper I worked for before moving here. I was in line to order something and ran into my old boss. I asked him if he had anything for me to do there (I think I was going back to work there) and he said “Of course, I try to always keep a place open for you.” Then he disappeared and I realized that I was not really ready for it. I have grown a sort of bushy beard, my hair, formerly cut short (with the clippers even on the sides) is now down between my shoulder blades, and I no longer own any suits (the three I owned for that job I used first as packing material to get our stuff here and then donated them to charity.). So I walked down the hall to ask one of Sage’s relatives if I could borrow a dress shirt of his.

It became clear to me as I thought about this dream the next day that in many ways I (and I bet lots of others) saw my company as a sort of surrogate extended family. In my case I believe that there wasn’t much difference in the way my family operated than a company. There was little physical affection, no discussion of difficult issues (unless they impacted budget or long term family (corporate) goals). Interpersonal issues were equally taboo at home as at work. The only difference was that work was more predictable. I always knew, for instance that my boss was sober (though other people I might not always be sure of).

So that gave me some insight as to possibly part of why I felt like going back to work after the Florida trip (for a family reunion and visit to a friend). I missed my “family”. Pretty funny, huh?

Had an interesting experience a couple of days ago. We all went to Springfield to the library and at the end, while Sage checked out books, I took Paul to the restroom to pee. As we walked in there was a person in the first stall, the second stall was left open (taken by a man in a suit soon to be mentioned) and we took the end stall. Just as we finished we heard a scream from the first stall while the person in it banged angrily on the wall. Paul got a bit nervous and asked “That person doing, Daddy?” - I said I wasn’t sure and started to go just as the man in the suit got out of his stall. Then as we were leaving the person in the first stall said “help” in a slightly calmer voice. When the three of us, Paul, me and suit got outside suit turned to me with a scared expression his face asking “What was that all about?” So Paul and I left to find Sage. As we told Sage the story it occurred to me that were it not for hearing the person talk after Suit came out it could have easily been Suit and wouldn’t that have been interesting? Then another interesting thing happened. I remembered that the person in the first stall had brown shoes on and I started looking at the men with brown shoes looking for the person from the bathroom. I realized that I was looking at some people with brown shoes and thinking “Not him, too clean cut” or the like until I caught myself. Very interesting, I thought, I had an image of how the person looked based on how he dressed, looked and even walked that had nothing to do with reality. Trippy, huh? Incidentally, it wasn’t until later that it occurred to me that I didn’t have to actually be the person to go back in there to offer help (frankly I was scared - especially when Paul and I were both there) - we could have asked someone else - a library worker, for example and I regret not having done that. Another conditioning - if something happens outside the realm of the usual, pretend it didn’t happen.

I did something a few days ago that I haven’t done in literally years. I reviewed and cleaned up my resume to submit to an employer. Don’t worry, though. It isn’t what you think. It’s for the writing job that’s coming up. I have no plans to actually go anywhere. Well, at least not for business. We’re hoping that this next job will fund another road trip north for the winter (who else would go north for the winter but us?) and also another trip to Florida in the spring.

In other news, the wood stove is installed, and as you’d expect, it’s now about 80 degrees outside. But regardless it’s all done. I do want to beef up the gasketing on the door so that it seals better (and will thereby run longer at night) but that’s coming later.

So that’s the long and short of it all. I’m going to end it here for now and get a bit of writing done on the travel article before the paying work takes up too much of my free time.

Saying Yes and No

Submitted entry: Okay! Uncle! I give up! It’s time to install the stove. It’s not terribly cold outside right now, or inside for that matter but it’s cold enough. Today it’s not meant to go above 55 degrees and it will be in the high 30’s tonight. It won’t be terribly uncomfortable but by the same token it will be really cozy and nice to have the stove in. So our plan is to get the stove in on Wednesday. Today we’re going to town to pick up a few things - tofu, peanut butter and a few other staples. We’re also going clothes shopping for winter clothes for all of us. We’re a little short on warm clothes this year after overenthusiastically donating most of our clothes to a local charity thrift store (we’ll probably wind up buying them all back today *grin*). Then tomorrow we’re off to Springfield for a playdate with some friends (and we’ll watch one of the children tomorrow for a little while). The on Wednesday we’re going to take Paul over to the womens’ land to hang out with his granny and we’re going to prep the stove for the year and gather a bunch of wood.

Meanwhile life has been a lot better these days - I’m enjoying myself quite a lot. I’m reading a really inspiring book called Callings by Gregg Levoy which is really resonating with me. It’s about how one’s life is filled with “callings” toward passions. Things that we really want to do but feeling comfortable in the status quo we ignore them. And as I did this I realized that I very often have ideas for things I want to do but very rarely actually pursue them. So why should I expect that any great idea for what to do with my life should come up when I can’t even listen to these smaller callings. So anyway - I’ve started a list of things that I’ve already thought of and have committed to myself to actually use that as a to-do list whenever I feel I need a project (as I often do - especially when paying work is slow). Here’s what I’ve got so far:

• Make miso
• Make tofu
• Make kimchee (from the above three you can see I’ve got a thing for fermentation
• consider I worked in large scale mammalian cell culture (fermentation) for over five years)
• Build tandoor (clay oven for baking)
• Walk the long trail (a hiking trail that goes from the southern to the northern border of Vermont) with Paul and possibly Sage
• Hike Appalachian trail (a trail from Georgia to Maine) as above
• Write travel articles and/or books about above
• Write to Bill Coperthwaite of the yurt foundation
• Build a small round straw building (hut)
• Get solar happening at the yurt
• Finish travel article about Florida trip
• Build cookshack
• Build outhouse
• Buy and install oven or stove/oven combo

So you can see that the list is pretty diverse - some of them can be done in an hour, others like the Appalachian trail would take 3-6 months and really wouldn’t be able to be done until Paul gets a little older - like 3-5 years old. Just having that all written down is really an inspiration.

Meanwhile work continues to go better - at least in theory. I haven’t actually got the work in my hands and am not actually working now but should be soon if all goes well. Then we’ll be moguls again *grin* for a few weeks. I got another call a few days ago asking if I wanted another job which would happen after this one and I agreed to it should it come through. The interesting part is that I was also offered the opportunity to travel to the Boston area to do some on-site consulting for three weeks. And despite how much I love New England and the challenge of working in that industry I couldn’t figure out a way that would be right for us now - even with all expenses paid and a good amount of money earned. I do think, though, that it could work in a few years to do this. When Paul’s old enough, for example, to understand what 3-4 weeks means and to also understand what I mean when I say I’ll be gone except for evenings and weekends and that he and Sage would be in a hotel and apartment while I worked. But when he gets older, he could really enjoy a trip to a city to see museums and the like with the travel and living expenses basically paid for. So perhaps in a few years I’ll take it on - maybe work a couple months a year or so (spread over 2-3 jobs) and live off the money earned for the rest of the year. I just like the idea of it - the whole unorthodox working arrangement of it all.

Sage and Paul are having a nurse now but as soon as they’re done we’re going to start on a big batch of pancakes (Paul’s hungry and crabby and was delighted when I suggested the idea). Then after that I might cut a little wood with him outside if he’s up for it. Paul’s really coming along in the language area - he’s talking up a storm in sentences, telling us what he likes - stories, foods, books and also has marked his turning two not by learning to say no, but by saying Yeah! You have no idea how much you depend on yeses and nos until you see what it’s like before and after.

And so I’ll wrap this up here as they’ve been nursing for a while and I’d like to turn the computer over to Sage really soon to work on her projects.

Black Coffee in the Shower

Submitted entry: It’s been a full day already. There are some days here where you look up in the late afternoon and it seems like all you’ve done since waking in the morning is made some lunch somewhere in the fog. But today was different. Today Sage woke up at 6:30 and was on the net for a while at the house while Paul and I slept in to about 8:00. Then when she got back we packed our books, I went for a shower and we were on the road for Springfield to two of the big libraries there.

Showering this morning really reminded me of a simple pleasure I had all but forgotten. Some people like long, lingering baths with lots of bubbles, maybe a few candles and incense. Not me. I’m a shower kind of person. I’d much rather have a 15 minute shower surrounded by steam than any time in a bath, hot tub or whatever you might suggest. Partly it’s because at six feet tall I have yet to find a comfortable home bath. But mostly it’s purely visceral. Showering clears my mind, makes me think better and wakes me up. But the simple pleasure I had forgotten was that of having a cup of strong black coffee in the shower.

Sure, I discovered this pleasure under less than inspiring circumstances. About 10 years ago I was living in a shared house with 3-4 other guys and weekends were very often spent drinking until the wee hours and listening to classic rock by the likes of Jeff Beck, Yes and others. The morning I discovered showering with a cup of coffee I was hung over after a particularly rousing night (you could tell how much we drank by our progression through the music - we’d start the night with Yes or maybe Eric Johnson, work our way through Deep Purple and Black Sabbath and if we’d really had a lot to drink we’d end with Judas Priest - let’s say that night was a Judas Priest evening). I have always found that coffee helps a headache as does a hot shower on the back of the neck. This morning I thought that I’d try the two together for maximum effect. And, embarrassingly enough, I tried one more remedy at the same time - another beer. Fortunately for all of us only the coffee and shower combination really stuck otherwise this might be a totally different journal with different readers (or the same readers reading for different reasons). And so this morning I found myself in the shower waking up with a cup of coffee for the first time in about 2 years. I always feel the really inspired in moments like that.

So after I showered we took off for the library. After a short detour in town for breakfast (a rather uninspiring one of french toast, potatoes and coffee).

I got interrupted and sidetracked and now it’s 11:30AM on the 21st)

So anyway, we spent a great day in Springfield, and loaded up on even more books, and CDs. I got a card (we were only using Sage’s) and so now we can have up to 100 items out at any one time. I think we’re close to that now. It’s amazing how differently the yurt feels when we have a ton of books, either our own or someone else’s. It’s hard to imagine us living in a home without books.

When we got home it was nearly 4:30 and so we put the laptop battery in to charge and then I went back to the yurt to start dinner. Sage did some work on the computer at the house. Since I was tired from the trip I just threw together a Bengalore Phal of tofu and a little rice. And having installed some recipe cataloging and menu planning software on the laptop I threw away the recipe and saved it on the laptop (which was with Sage). Fortunately I had a vague memory of what the recipe required and so I made it from memory. Both Sage and I agree that batch was among the best ever. Now if I could only figure out what I did differently!

After Sage ate, I played with Paul for a while and Sage had a bath at the house. By the time Sage returned, Paul was ready to nurse to sleep and Sage also was ready for bed (it was only 8:00 but as it’s getting darker earlier in the night we’re all getting tired early). Note: upcoming technical drivel - I’m indenting it so that those of you who aren’t interested can skip it easily…

I, meanwhile, removed Redhat Linux and installed Slackware Linux. I liked this one much better as far as installing went. Redhat was much like Windows in that it didn’t tell what it was installing just how far along it was. Slackware was the opposite. I had no idea how long it was going to take but it told me what every package it was installing was for and asked me if I wanted to install each optional one.

So finally, around midnight I got the whole thing installed, got XFree86 configured so that I had a graphical interface and the mouse worked and called it a night. Sadly, as far as my mind was concerned that was only the beginning. It was an effort just to pull myself away from the computer instead of staying up a couple more hours fine tuning. And so my mind got it’s way too - I slept really lightly and dreamed all night about what comes next - rebuilding the kernel so the soundcard and PCMCIA stuff works and installing the network card. I’m excited to start in again when I can - probably later this evening. Oh, and the verdict is that I found that Redhat’s distribution running Gnome was way slower than Slackware’s for some reason.

The weather has flipped back and forth over the past several days, probably prolonging this minor cold we’ve all had. Yesterday morning it was warm, then the wind switched to the north, clouds rolled in and a chill breeze came through. Last night it got down to 40 degrees but still not really cold enough for the stove to be installed unless in the search for a warm morning we want to have a stuffy yurt all day as the temperature goes to the 80’s during the day. Today the wind switched back to the southeast and it is a gorgeous, clear and sunny day.

Interesting observation today too. Having been up too late last night and not really sleeping well or very much last night I expected to be a zombie today but instead I’m feeling pretty chipper. I do feel tired, don’t get me wrong, but it doesn’t seem to be impacting my productivity. If I could bottle this phenomenon and sell it I’d make a bunch of money. Of course, it could be bottled. I’ve been taking multivitamins (with ginseng) for about a week now.

That’s about all for now, I think. Sage is on the laptop so I can’t put this up yet (Paul’s off with his granny) and so I might heat up a little of this morning’s scrambled tofu (dissolve 1 tbsp of vegetable broth powder in about 4-6 tbsp of olive oil, fry a pepper, onion and about 6 cloves of garlic in that, add a pound of tofu and mash it. Mix in dried herbs (oregano, thyme, basil, pepper and dill) and a little chili garlic paste and serve with toast) make another cup of coffee and read a little.

I must remember the beans. I must remember the beans.

Submitted entry: Dinner’s cooking already - I love it when I have it together enough to make dinner really early. Okay, so really it’s lunch cooking extra late. The pressure cooker was running for nearly the full hour it was meant to go before I realized that I hadn’t put the beans in. I’m not too crazy though - I put in lots of veggies and water.

Today’s been a strange day - I can’t actually place why. Perhaps because we’re out of our routine. I worked a little in the morning before Paul woke up and did a little after he did while Sage was around. Then for much of the day Sage was doing web work. I’m pretty inspired about what I’m working on right now - I’m writing a sort of travel article based upon our recent vacation. I’m tired of reading travel writers leaving their families behind for no apparent reason and so I am writing my own family-inclusive piece. Okay, so it won’t be read by as many people as Paul Theroux or have an accompanying TV show like Michael Palin and hasn’t really got an exotic destination (Florida is about as exotic as it gets). But my piece will have something that many books by the likes of Paul Theroux, Bill Bryson, Peter Jenkins and Pico Iyer do not have in theirs: a full family complete with toddler (enjoying himself no less). I’ll be offering tips as to how we made it not just bearable but fun. I really think that most people in this country at least, view travelling with children as a chore at worst and something to be avoided at best.

Of course the other reason it feels like a strange day is that we’ve completely rearranged the yurt yesterday. Every piece of furniture has been moved, including the sink and stove. And we’ve added a really wonderful shelving unit to the kitchen counter that effectively doubles and organizes my kitchen space. On top of that we’ve brought in a really comfy couch (I can’t believe all this fits either). I was really overwhelmed about moving the kitchen but it was surprisingly easy as it’s in three modules. I just disconnected the drain on the sink and the propane and slid it across the room then fished the drain and gas line out the side of the yurt wall (between the yurt wall and deck drip edge for those of you (I think there are about 4-5 now) who actually live in or are considering living in a yurt.

Yesterday I also had my first coaching session with Julie Jordan Scott of 5passions.com. She focuses on helping people define one’s life purpose more clearly and thereby have a better idea of how to live their lives in a more passionate and fulfilling way. I highly recommend her if you’re the least bit unclear about what you’re here to do or are feeling like what you’re doing is not for you but you don’t know what is. She’s a perfect fit for the job and does it well. Thanks to Amanda for putting me in touch with her!

I also got another acupuncture/chiropractic treatment recently. That, too, really helped emotionally. All the sleeping in strange beds on the trip seems to have put my neck and back out as I had about 5 different vertebra out of alignment and a few other problems all adding up to poor blood flow and cerebrospinal fluid flow to my brain (you’d think that it was still the problem considering how I forgot to put the beans in the pressure cooker!).

The second battery for the computer, meanwhile, continues to be a blessing and something we have no idea how we did without. Sage and I have literally been able to work as much as we wanted whenever we wanted without having to be concerned about power. Several times we had both batteries ready to go leaving us about 5 hours or more that we could work if we felt like it all without recharging.

In other happenings, Sunday Sage was feeling really exhausted (Paul was nursing a ton the night before) and so she wanted to nap. Paul and I got in the car and drove about 20 minutes away to a national forest where there’s a pretty big cave. He and I went in and took a flashlight along. We’d been once before when he was young without a flashlight and thought it was about 6-7 feet high by about 12 feet wide by maybe 50 feet back. This time, though we discovered I’d been totally wrong. We walked to the back and saw that what I thought was a wall was actually a hill and at the bottom of the next there was another hill into a similar chamber. At the back of this chamber the tunnel appeared to continue further. We walked in about 100 feet or so and then Paul had enough and wanted to go out so we turned around and went out. When we sat outside he confided that he was scared of fire. I think he remembered a book he has where there’s a dragon (that doesn’t breathe fire but lives in a cave) and another book where there’s a dragon that breathes fire but lives in the open and figured that this one could also have a dragon in it and that dragons could potentially breathe fire. So we walked back to the car and as soon as we got there he was ready to turn around and go in the cave again. He was disappointed that we went home instead but I promised to go back someday. I like exploring there with him as this cave is all clay on the bottom with gentle slopes and not many rocks so it’s a great place for him to explore without our worrying about his falling down a hole or on a rock. I’d like to go back too as I’m curious as to just how far back it does go. Kitey and I have talked several times about what a great place to live it’d be. It has a great feel to it - homey in a strange way. And as I said it has the clay floor which would be easy on the feet. Sadly this is a national forest and so while I may try it out some night it really isn’t a place with any real long term potential. Still, the idea of living in the earth is attractive - naturally climate controlled, cool in the summer, warm in the winter.

Speaking of climate control, that’s our next project. The stove needs to be readied for winter, holes patched with stove cement, gasketing put on, hooked up to the chimney again (and cleaning the chimney). The nights are really lovely now but the mornings are quite cool. The high today was supposed to be about 90 (I doubt it actually got there) but it is meant to be in the high 40’s tonight. I’ve certainly changed my idea about how cold it has to be outside before heat is necessary. It has to be a night below 40 before I worry about starting a fire and if the day is sunny and above 40 the yurt warms up nicely in the sun and doesn’t need a fire until the evening. In Bethlehem, we’d keep the thermostat set to whatever allowed us to sleep in our shorts and t-shirts - a wasteful practice in retrospect as we’d be having the heat on when it was 55 out! Last winter we were overwhelmed about putting up the chimney and weren’t really in a financial position to do it until mid November and even that wasn’t bad. Again it was just the mornings after you got out of bed that was hard. How do you think nomads in Tibet handle living in their tents after the fire goes out? It’s not about having good heat it’s about knowing how to take care of yourself and dress (yourself and your bed) appropriately. Which is not to say that when it is in the 30’s I won’t be thrilled to have a crackling fire in the stove.

And it looks like finally the pressure cooker is done - beans and all this time. If Sage brings back the catfish from the freezer we should have quite a feast tonight.

A couple of pigmy rattlesnakes.

Submitted entry: I know this isn’t the frequency everyone, myself included, would like but I only do what I do and this time I’m not even offering an excuse. It’s been quite a week here. The beginning of the week I felt really down. More of the usual, actually. I don’t really know what I’d like to do for a career (when I grow up? *grin*), and I’m still not very fond of the Ozarks. Okay, there are lots of neat people around and lots of trees and a few hills but I’m terminally sold on New England I think. I prefer the terrain, the trees (and the smells of all the particular trees), and the weather of course. The people are very different there than here too. More liberal, definitely and we appreciate that. Also, if you can believe this I miss being close to major cities. Here we’re 90 minutes from the nearest medium city (pop 160,000), Kansas City (if I could find a good reason to go there - I don’t hear much good about it) is 5 hours away and St. Louis is 6 hours away. I’m used to, even when we lived in the middle of Vermont, being able to drive a couple hours to Boston or Montreal and NY City was only an hour and a half from Bethlehem.

And as far as “career” goes, I’m really stuck mostly when it comes to home business. Web design is okay but it isn’t as fun for me as some of my old jobs. I really have always enjoyed problem solving - people with problems with pharmaceutical equipment or project management or even computers. Pharmaceutical validation has been good in that I got lots of different challenging projects, though to do that a lot usually requires frequent travel and long hours. For a while it worked great to do the document preparation from home for a big project that I was working for but when budget problems happened for a client I could no longer be afforded.

So I felt really down and defeated. I don’t really like living in this area and am not really happy with my “job”. I’d even been losing some sleep over it, waking in the middle of the night worried about the future which is something I never do. I was particularly worried that since I don’t like it here and don’t like the work I’d have to leave the area (and/or go back to the working world) to be happy. And I was further worried that I was particularly stuck since I was unsure if Sage would go if I needed to. And so I felt my options were all horrible. Stay here and be unhappy, go away without Sage ( non-option in my opinion), or go to a “real” job and never see Paul. As you can imagine those all were horrible options and I feel unequipped to be happy living here.

Anyway, Sage got really frustrated with me a couple of days ago and while Paul was away with his granny had what she might call a “small fit”. She was really frustrated that I couldn’t be happy here and in particularly tense moment yelled “FINE! Let’s just go to Vermont then!” That was a hard one for me as you might not have suspected. After all, if I thought I was unhappy for a particular reason and then were presented with the possibility of changing that reason I could find out some unwanted information. In particular, that I was unhappy for another reason and then we’d have moved for no reason.

It was a long, horrible time. I can’t say as I’ve ever had a harder time in my life. I felt that every possible way out of the situation was almost as undesirable as the current one. Finally, as always happens, there was a breakthrough (facilitated by our leaving the hot yurt and sitting outside) where for whatever reason Sage and I started understanding each other better. She changed from a person who was just being angry at me and voicing that instead of giving the help that I kept asking for into someone who really was trying to help. She gave me a few ideas for things I could do that I would enjoy, some of which were pretty inspiring. And she told me that if I needed to go she’d be willing to go with me. That, of course was reassuring. And so we left it that I’d give my best effort to manage being happy here. (My theory is that if I find something I enjoy doing here and makes enough money to travel some I won’t mind it so much) And if, by next summer, I still didn’t like it here I could exercise the option that we’d look elsewhere, a community in the northeast or even one nearby, or some other living situation that would allow us to operate basically as we are today, being home with Paul for the most part all day.

So I passed the information on to Kitey who digested it for a while and then we had a long talk about how I’m feeling and let me know that she understands what I’m trying to do. She talked about “Bardos (sp?)” as described by Tibetan Buddhism, in particular in the Tibetan Book of the Dead. The concept in the book of the dead is that there are 100 gateways or bardos that a dying soul must go through. All are difficult and they have one choice as to how to deal with them. Get through them (they don’t last forever) and grow or turn back.

We also had a funny talk about how my situation is similar to that of many stereotypical housewives. When there isn’t pharmaceutical work (more often than not that’s the case) Sage is mostly the so-called breadwinner and I do the support work, hang out with Paul, cook, etc. And so my talk with her sounded much like a stereotypical housewife saying “I feel unfulfilled!” and of course the frequent response in middle class homes is either “start your own business” or “why not volunteer?” Which, funnily enough are two of Sage’s suggestions. That was a really funny observation to realize. Further interesting, though was our subsequent discussion about how we often perceive roles in a family - provider, housewife, child, etc and that we don’t necessarily have to fill those roles at all and can instead create different, more useful ones.

So anyway - after all that I was feeling quite a bit better. It was helpful to have some ideas for things to do now to try to feel better (and that made me feel better right away) and possibly more comforting to me was knowing that if I can’t figure out how to be happy here that we can leave and that there’s even a defined possible endpoint - next summer. I feel both more motivated to try again to enjoy it here and at the same time at peace that if this doesn’t work out that there’s a defined end to it.

And interestingly enough, the day after we figured that out, a letter came asking if I was interested in a big pharmaceutical technical writing job that starts near the end of the month. This one could pay for a lot of improvements here (solar, computer hardware, etc.) and also provide for some more travel and several months of living expenses. I’m glad it came when it did - after we worked all that out, lest I find myself only being happy when I’m distracted by a big job and the prospect of having money to do things with.

I’ve also started a dialog with Julie Jordan Scott of 5Passions.com after a reader suggested that I might find the site helpful. So far it’s been really inspiring to look at and I’m in the process of scheduling some coaching from her as we speak.

On the home front I also got inspired to make some new food which has been fun. I got several cookbooks from the library and have scoured them for recipes. So far I’ve made only 2-3 of them but they’ve all been successes. Very easy successes in fact. Two of them were simply “fry some veggies in a pressure cooker, add beans and water, cook for an hour and eat.” You can’t get any more easy than that. And they were surprisingly tasty too.

I don’t know if this is the way this area is normally but I don’t remember the following from last summer. Up until recently it’s been pretty hot and rain-free. And along with the heat have come some of the creatures you’d expect of the desert. While we were gone, they found two scorpions at the house. Before we left I was walking to the house and heard a slither into the bushes. I stomped to see if I could see it move, get it to move further away (I figured it was a snake and the vibrations would drive it away) and to also see if I could see what it was. Instead of more slithering I heard rattling. I thought it might be a rattlesnake but hadn’t heard of them being around here. Then two nights ago Sage was at the cooler putting some ice in when a small (18 inches or so) snake slithered across her feet. She did the same thing - stomped to get it to move away, thinking it was either harmless or a copperhead. Instead of fleeing, it coiled and rattled and she ran to the yurt. I went to the cooler later and removed the plastic and the rug that we covered it with to keep out rain and sun which probably made it an attractive snake hangout (we can cover it up when it rains if necessary) and haven’t seen them since. Now I did read on the web that this area (we live in a sort of microclimate within the Ozarks) is home to not only lots of lizards but roadrunners (I’ve seen 3 since we moved here) and stinging scorpions and pigmy rattlesnakes. So perhaps they’re not so unusual. But I’ll say I am not used to having so many threatening creatures around. Where I grew up only the weather was a worry or maybe a bear though I never heard of people having trouble with them. Oh, and deer and moose if you’re driving a car. But since we’ve moved here we’ve encountered several copperheads, several brown recluse spiders, a couple of pigmy rattlesnakes, a black widow spider and (not first hand, fortunately) two scorpions. Oh, and we’ve been warned to watch out for tarantulas as they’re around too. I am really not used to that. Of course some people would react to months of subzero weather and icy driving in the same way so I guess it’s just choosing what threats you’re most comfortable having around. And of course when we lived in Bethlehem, there was a fair amount of gun violence in the city and in Allentown where I worked there were several shootings near where I worked - to the extent that they’ve installed bulletproof glass in the first floor of the building where I worked.

That last paragraph where I say “Where I grew up …” reminds me a lot of some books we’ve been reading with Paul lately. He’s grown really fond of the Magic School Bus series (books not television) and asks us to read them over and over. And so far they’ve been really great except on one account. In both books we’ve read so far there is always a moment where the teacher does something crazy like jumping out of a hot air balloon, asks the kids to follow and inevitably the kids say that it was a dumb idea but they did it anyway. In one book they even say something like “We thought it was an unsound idea…but she was our teacher.” This attitude is one of the many reasons that I want to homeschool Paul. This blind acceptance of authority almost to the point of deification. I want him to realize early on that everyone is a human being and we respect not out of position (since that rarely matters, witness The Peter Principle - the principle that everyone is promoted to an appropriate level of incompetence) but out of respect for actions and knowledge and that he still can retain independent thought. Blindly accepting teachers, politicians, religious leaders and other public figures gets so many children (and adults) taken advantage of and those books illustrate that school plays a big part.

One thing we’ve done recently to give us more time on the computer is to buy a second battery and a charger. We’ve had it for a day now and are already getting spoiled. We can hardly use one battery up before we have a second ready to go. So effectively we’ve gone from being able to work 4 hours/day to having unlimited time. What a deal.

I’ve also been playing around with Linux lately which has been a blast. So far it’s been reasonably difficult to learn but equally rewarding. I always enjoy setting up systems, even with Windows so setting this up has been especially fun. It hasn’t been much faster than Windows but on the laptop it’s been great - Linux uses noticeably less battery power than Windows does.

And, finally, happily enough, autumn is definitely on the way. The leaves are falling (mostly due to the drought though) and the nights are cool. It was 49 this morning and promises to stay below 80 today. And so we’re already getting ourselves ready for winter. I tried to get stove cement to seal up the woodstove last week but it wasn’t on the shelves yet (next week I’m told it will be) but once that’s done we’ll be putting the stove in and probably having small fires at least in the cool parts of the morning.

And speaking of batteries, I have to go get the other one and so I’m going to upload this entry then and bring the battery back for Sage to work the afternoon away.

It’s been 15 years since I’ve seen her, after all.

Submitted entry: I suppose it must be. But really, I have an excuse. It’s been extremely busy. You’ll see below. Oh, and on top of that for some reason I haven’t been terribly inspired about writing lately. Who knows why. Oh, and on top of that is the same phenomenon that got me in trouble in college. I would go a long time without going to a class and then would be embarrassed to be seen by the professor walking in after skipping three weeks of class. Okay, I wasn’t embarrassed about the journal - more self conscious but you get the idea.

So what did you miss? All of August, except, for the August 3rd entry I never uploaded.

The busy-ness started about a week after the August 3rd entry when Sage and I went to a breakfast buffet. I hate breakfast buffets but I figured I was so hungry at the time I wouldn’t care. And true to form, I didn’t. I ate like a pig - biscuits and gravy, lots of bacon (the dry crumbly kind that always is in the breakfast buffets), french toast sticks, piles of potatoes and 2 eggs over easy (they weren’t in the buffet but they’d make them for you to order. After that we spent a day with friends.

About 7:00 I started getting awful intestinal cramps that I blamed on overdoing it at the buffet. However three hours after going to bed I woke up - for the night - at about midnight with horrible cramps. The next day I hardly ate anything and felt a bit better and made mistake number two. Starving and thinking I was feeling better I ate a big meal of ramen and hot sauce with some canned veggies. This was a horrible mistake as the hot sauce burned horribly and I was up all night with more cramps.

This went on for about a week and a half. I kept thinking I was getting better but a few hours later I’d be feeling horrible again. Finally, just a couple days before we were to leave for Florida I’d had enough and went to town to visit a doctor. The answer? Campylobacter infection probably from the over (way too) easy eggs. Three days of antibiotics and I was good as new. Two hours after the first pill I felt noticeably better. So I’ve resolved to never have eggs out again. That could have as easily been salmonella and I’d have been in terrible shape. As it was it was a horrible week.

The day before we were to leave for Florida I woke up excited. We’d already loaded the car up and were itching to go. Then I listened to the weather on the radio - a high of over 100 was predicted with heat indices from 105-110. After a short talk with Sage we decided to leave a day early.

So we got in the car about noon and drove until we got to one of the most dismal towns we’d ever been to - Blythesville, Arkansas and stayed the night. Paul loved the hotel and danced around the room for a while while we figured out dinner.

The next day we drove through Arkansas, a sliver of Tennessee and the entire length of Mississippi. Highlights of Mississippi included finding out just how scarily the people driving the trucks carrying house-trailers drive. It felt very much like we were invisible. Not only that they swerved all over the road! We also passed by a town (which I regret not visiting) called “Hot Coffee”. After an entire day of driving we were exhausted and arrived in Gulfport not a moment too soon. We took our coupon books out and tried to use them at a couple places. No luck - convention in town. Then we went to a cheap dive and looked at a room - too creepy and smelly. Finally we relented and paid $65/night for a room. As soon as we checked in we changed into swimsuits and crossed the road to the beach. What a great beach to visit with a 2 year old. No matter how far we walked out it was never over our waists (and that was way out). Paul was in heaven from the moment we got there. Then to make him even happier the beach was in the flight path of a nearby airport so every few minutes a jet would fly over really low and send him into dances of joy.

The next day we resolved to get to Florida and after a moderate drive we got to Panama City Beach. This was the first night our hotel coupons (the ones you get in the books in rest areas) paid off. It was just the end of the season - school had started - and so we spent five days and four nights in a motel right on the beach for $129.99. Paul swam every day in the ocean and the pool and loved chasing seagulls down the beach. It was a great way to rest up after our big drive the days before and give Paul a break from driving before the family reunion. The water was a bit rough the first couple of days so we could only let our feet get wet but the rest of the time was heaven. The water was clear, emerald green, and warm as bath water. We spent a ton of time in there. The first day we really went in, though, I met my first, and hopefully last jellyfish. This one, called a sea nettle I later found out, brushed up against my arm and chest and left enormous blistery welts. The pain was pretty incredible - like a second degree burn. Fortunately we had the laptop and in about 15 minutes I looked up on the net how to treat them. The best is supposed to be a paste of meat tenderizer. Second to that was benadryl. And it just so happened that the day we packed I grabbed a tube of benadryl thinking I might need it but not having any idea why. After a half hour of having that on it was pretty near painless.

The reunion was a ball. We saw just about all of Sage’s family - over thirty of them. Paul did exceptionally and loved hanging out with everyone. However, to preserve everyone’s privacy I’ll spare the gory details.

About this time last week Paul started having trouble sleeping and decided not to eat much of anything, preferring to nurse instead. We took it as a sort of signal that he was ready to go home and sure enough started eating better the moment we drove away. I think it was stressful for all of us, who have such a child-friendly yurt, for him to be in a house where expectations were different - not touching certain things, eating at a table with everyone - many of them strangers - at an appointed time. It was a lot to expect of a 2 year old.

One thing that happened while we were there, though, was that my technical writing job that paid for the whole trip was put on hold for a while. My client’s client was having budget problems. I could be upset and worried about money now but I refuse to be. Instead we’re really excited about paying way more attention to our web design business.

So the first day we drove all the way to Atlanta and stayed the night there and after seeing the labor day traffic (we passed five accidents that day) and looking on the map we decided to take a short detour and visit a friend of mine from high school and her family.

It was such a trip! When we were both in school, despite both being in a class of about 30 or so and even sharing a mutual friend, I hardly knew her. About a year ago she heard a tape I made for that mutual friend with a song that I mixed (Sage’s writing along with some music samples that I will put up here someday) she wrote an email to me. Turns out she is raising her child in much the same way we are and has really similar values to us in a lot of ways. So Sage and I had a really great time with her and her family while we were there. It did, however, make me feel old. After all, it’s been 15 years since I’ve seen her - last time I saw her she was a sophomore in high school and now she’s a mom which, of course, means I’m getting old. I’m seven years away from my 20th high school reunion and I remember how old I thought my father was when he had his 20th! Anyway - we had a great time - it’s always great to meet parents who share similar values and approach. Given the small number of families such as ours we know and probably the small number of families like ours we don’t know it’s always great to get together and be able to support one another. We also got to sit and chat about the website we’re going to be doing for her business which is teaching art to children but with a really unique and in our opinion inspired approach. She also plans to offer online workshops through the site. There’s a page up already that we put together but are hard at work to get the full site up. I encourage any of you in Eastern Tennessee with children to get in touch with her - your children will thank you.

It was interesting, though. I have to admit I felt a bit envious. She’s really got her life together it seems and has something she really has a passion for to spend her life doing. And she’s great at it. Sometimes I think I lost my passion sometime around college when I realized that I wasn’t really into becoming a doctor but instead was doing what was expected of me. It wasn’t so bad when I was working as I was at least doing something I was good at though I wasn’t particularly passionate about it. And I’m not even sure what I want to do. I just feel rather uninspired in general. Not that I’m miserable - I enjoy doing web design but I feel like there’s something I would really love to be doing out there if I could just find out what it is. Of course, the lack of something like that may be a good thing after all. Right now I really feel I need to be paying attention to being a dad. I certainly haven’t learned everything there is to know to be the best possible dad I can be.

Anyway - two days later we got home and not a moment too soon. It turns out that there was a heat wave the whole time we were gone with highs up to 110! The day we got back we brought fall home with us and the high was around 70. There’s still a little summer left according to the weather but it looks and smells like fall.

When we got home we realized, too, how glad we all were to be here. We didn’t miss anything of “civilization” and were glad to hear the silence, smell the earth and see the trees. The cats gave us dirty looks but before long they were forgiving us and cuddly as ever.

One big thing we noticed was how stressed we all were about having to keep track of Paul in someone else’s house, or hotel room. Seems like we were always thinking to ourselves “Where is he?” and watching out for knickknacks, electrical appliances, outlets and anything else dangerous to him or our hosts stuff. When we got home we realized that we’ve got this place so child-friendly that we didn’t have to watch him every second. Just hearing his voice somewhere was enough to reassure us that he was okay and nearby and not getting into anything he shouldn’t because there isn’t anything to get into at his level. It was lovely. And he appreciated it. He ate dinner with us as he used to. He fell asleep in minutes instead of taking an hour or more of fidgeting, asking to nurse, getting up and down and fussing and instead of waking up several times to nurse in the night (his worst night was seven according to Sage who that day was exhausted and drained from being awake and nursing most of the night) he woke up only once - his usual. Yes, it’s good to be home. The only bad thing is that I think I’ve picked up a cold and so I’m kind of low on energy and have a sore throat. I’ve been putting the echinacea to myself today as well as vitamin C and zinc lozenges to see if I can avert the worst of it. I certainly don’t need a flu like we had before.

I felt reluctant to commit to a long term stay here.

Submitted entry: As we thought we’re extremely busy and I almost feel guilty for taking the 1/2 to 1 hour it takes to write an entry as it could be used to make money for our trip to Florida. At least now we’re working in the positive. As of yesterday we paid back the advance my company gave me and did 2 more hours of paying work. If I can do four hours every day for the next four days or so we’ll be able to afford to go to Florida. If not we’ll have to figure something else out.

Web work, as expected has been steady during this time too. We’ve got two new sites to design, are nearly finished with some additions and changes to Teeter Creek Herbs and just uploaded updates to Whole Heart Publications among other things. This week is the closest we’ve come to having a “real” work schedule though we’re always flexible as to when we start and finish so we’re not punching a clock or anything. And we’re still hanging out with Paul. Yesterday was a great example. A friend of ours was getting the new house she’s moving into ready for the big move-in, moving stuff, cleaning, etc. So we had a playgroup there. She cleaned off and on, and Sage and I worked off and on and there was always at least one person available to play with the kids. During that time Sage got about an hour of work done, I got four hours done and many things were moved and cleaned in the house. It was really interesting too because the kids really got it. They respected the working ones and let them work or helped as best they could and were happy to play with the available parent(s). We had such a good time.

And despite working a lot we also went to East Wind on Sunday and had a ball hanging out with our friends and meeting the new kids that are there. This Sunday promises to be even more fun as there are even more kids visiting. I had such a good time - a good portion of the time Taleisin and I hung out with Paul and two other toddlers, visiting the garden and munching on fresh tomatoes, visiting the baby chicks. As usual it was a wonderful time.

And on Friday we went to visit a potential client who later this week became a definite client. We’re looking forward to doing the new site for them and it should be interesting. But the unique thing about this trip was that Sage and I went alone - Paul stayed with Kitey for the day - all told, 9 hours (it was about 2 hours away). He did great and we did too. We did great on more than one level too as we figured out something that we’d been trying to work out for a while.

See, everyone on the land here had a meeting and we were asked if we were planning on staying for a long term time. Given our past, looking for land and talking about moving to a community or other land left people unclear as to what we’re planning on. So anyway, we didn’t have to answer and we didn’t.

I felt reluctant to commit to a long term stay here as of course I don’t like the summers here and would rather live in New England. Sage and Paul, though, definitely benefit from living near Kitey who prefers to live here.

So on Friday Sage and I talked it over on the trip up to our meeting and I think we figured out a solution.

Our plan now is to stay here long-term. Not necessarily for life or anything but not leave next year. Well, except in the summers. The tick, chigger, and mosquito filled hot and humid miserable nothing worse than a Missouri (Misery?) summer.

Where will we go in the summers? Who knows? Though Vermont is a very likely choice. The plan would be to get a yurt sitter for the three months we’re gone - someone to feed the cats and hang out with them and all. Then we’d drive north for three months, find a cheap (as in $350/month or less) place to stay - possibly a hunting camp or whatever. Those of you reading this journal for a while know that we’re not in need of a great number of amenities. By summer we’ll have bought solar panels and will be able to power the computer by them so we’d only need to figure out a net connection and a way to get mail. At that point we’ll have our office completely mobile. So our idea is to find somewhere cheap to live with cool summers (as in not often in the 90’s). Vermont comes to mind, as does New Hampshire, Maine, upstate New York, Canada and possibly northern Michigan, Minnesota or the like. As I said it could be a hunting camp, apartment sublet in a cool college town, house in the country, caretaking arrangement, and probably other ideas I haven’t yet thought of. Anyone here who has any ideas is encouraged to pass them on.

Today’s plan is to help our friend move some more (as soon as Paul wakes up) and then head out for the Library Center again. I’m making some chickpeas and rice to take along for the ride (we’ve been so good about not eating out lately!) And so I’m off to do that.