Monday, September 24, 2007

What does it mean to "be" Peace?

In the tumult that is currently my life, I have been digging deeper into me. Maybe that's stirring up some of the turbulence. Hmmm. Anyway, I have been working on meditating, and focusing on the sayings 'As within, so without' and 'Be the change you want to see in the world'.

So I have been thinking and feeling Peace. It amazes me the new level of comprehension of my self-dialog. Man, it's no wonder the world has troubles - I keep having arguments with people in my head. And about trivial stuff, too. Anyone who's had sucess in getting the brain to move out of this mode, please share. I'm making progress but all tips and advice are welcome!

Meanwhile, this is a most excellent resource: Attract World Peace

Wednesday, September 19, 2007

NASCAR!!!!


Here’s me at a NASCAR race, in the pit at Spencer Speedway. And I liked it! The sound the modified stock cars make as they fire up, as they are all in a pack taking a flight around the corner, rumbles through every cell in my body - in a good way. Beth’s husband has been doing racing forever. He is the crew chief for a car, goes to the races to set up the car and work with it on the weekends. He was helping out a crew at Spencer, not “his” car & driver. I took some picks of the cars and the light had fade before I realized I hadn’t taken a picture of me, so Beth obliged with her camera phone.





The car, Chuck's #4

The car that Bob crews for is closing in on the final 3 races for the season, and currently is in first place in points. Beth & I are planning to go to Connecticut to see the last race in October.

A couple weeks ago, I went over to Beth’s on a Friday night with a movie. 30 minutes in, her phone rang. “Yes. OK. OK. Sure.” She turned to me and said, “We have an active fire. I have to go!” Hilton Ladies Fire Auxiliary supports the firefighters with beverages at the scene, and food afterwards as desired. So we headed out to the fire hall, where the other ladies of the Auxiliary were gathering. There was some milling around, and Beth and I headed to the store to get bottles of water and headed out to the fire. We carried the water in past the trucks and hoses and the paramedics to the scene.

As we headed back to the fire hall, I told Beth that she has been the architect of several of my firsts this year. She said “whaat?’ I replied: “Working at the Carnival, Golfing, NASCAR, working a fire, watching a Drum Corps competition, eating a 'garbage plate' …” She said “I never thought my life was so interesting!” Maybe I can make a business out of this – I’ll jump into someone’s life and show them how interesting it really is. Hmmmm….

Sunday, September 16, 2007

Final day at Yellowstone; on to the wedding!

July 19, our last in the park, we split up. John & Amy headed out to take a hike. Greg, Andrea, Gavin and I puttered our way through more geothermal areas and ended up at Yellowstone Lake.



Sapphire Spring




Yellowstone Lake

We picnicked, then swam for an hour. The lake is beautiful, cool and very clear. We headed out after the swim, got hot again quickly, and Gavin crashed in the way back seat. 30 minutes up the road, we saw an animal jam up ahead. Looked to the right and saw bison in the picnic area just off the road – so I quick pulled a Uturn and into the picnic area. And Gavin woke up nose to nose with a bison. He handled that pretty well.

The bison were all over the picnic area – rubbing their rumps on picnic tables, nudging down young saplings as they scratched their chins, rolling in the dust. We spent 30 minutes cruising very slowly through the area, snapping pics.







Back onto the main road and slowly cruised through the rest of the herd. Headed up to dinner at Canyon Village, which was pretty good.

Next awesome sight was the ‘grand canyon’ of Yellowstone. We spent an hour cruising through and gawking. On the way out, we saw someone else dive to the side of the road, so we followed – and saw a wolf running through the undergrowth. We think. It was gone so quickly. That night we wanted to get to the hotel before midnight, so we headed out of the park. Stopped for one major animal jam and saw an elk with full rack, and feasted our eyes on the glory of the park on the way out for the last night.

The next day was a zoom through Idaho back to Salt Lake, to get to the pre-wedding BBQ at the Alta Lodge out of Salt Lake. And we made it. It is a darn good thing that we’d been at 8000+ feet for the previous week. We hit Alta at 10,000 feet and felt woozy and weak all over again. Alta is in a beautiful spot. We enjoyed seeing more family again and the dinner was superb. There were 100+ guests staying at the lodge.



Greg & Andrea with the Alta backdrop

The next morning, all the guests scattered – the insanely fit ones like Zoe and her finance Peter, cousins Julie and Guy went for a run (and Guy lives in Australia at sea level!) We opted for a hike up to Cecret Lake. Beautiful spot, glad I went. But man, did I get out of breath!




High meadow – is there anything more beautiful?





The lake – no swimming, too bad.

I headed back to the lodge and Steve, Colette and their son Kayden did me the honor of coming up to visit. I had known them in San Jose, they moved to Salt Lake a year before I went to Germany. It was so great to see them. I was wondering how it would be, seeing parts of my previous life. It was great!

The Wedding was to start early evening. The plan was to hike up the hill – OK, mountain, across the road to a high meadow that Peter and Zoe wanted for their ceremony. Fortunately, the landowner objected (sorry, folks!) so we all went back to our rooms to put on our pretty shoes and headed to the lower patio for the ceremony. It was beautiful and with an incredible backdrop.







The wedding was great, the reception fun. We danced outdoors until the last possible moment and then humped out suitcases up to the van for our early morning departure. The flights home were fine. Gavin & I saw Shaun White (AKA the Flying Tomato) at O’Hara. He’s very cute in person – and tiny.

Got home at 5 p.m. At 8 a.m. the next day, I started a 1-month contract for work. 2 days later, my fridge died. I am so grateful that it waited until I was back, it didn’t have much food in it but it still would have been such a mess. So I slammed into work, working at a card table and folding chair, and having to put all my food in a cooler, and borrow a cooler, and replace my fridge. Thank goodness for American shopping – I bought a fridge at 8 a.m., for deliver the next day. Try that in Germany – no way. And my house got disordered all over again, and I spent time putting it together again. This seems to be a pattern! Of course, as Ilya Prigogene uncovered, a system comes to maximum disorder just before it reorganizes at a higher level. And the level it reorders at, I believe, has a lot to do with intent. Ya just can’t tell me that chaos theory and quantum physics don’t intersect!

Thursday, September 13, 2007

Now we get to Yellowstone


Dining in Jackson

The next day of our trip, Tuesday July 17, we had a breakfast of sourdough pancakes at Jedidiah’s in Jackson, where they say their starter is over 100 years old. Various of us tried to explain that to Gavin. We left Jackson and headed up through the Tetons and took in the grand sights along the way. Saw a moose! We encountered a sudden, cold rain storm in the Tetons.



Beautiful scenery on the Snake river.



Yellowstone lake, and fire scar from the fires a decade ago.

We rolled in to Yellowstone through the south entrance and headed towards, of course Old Faithful.

Got there 40 minutes before she was set to blow again so we headed out on the boardwalk in that geothermal area. It was now a hot day, and we were walking where the steam and hot mud come spurting out of the ground, Andrea and I sought shade!

Greg, Amy, John & Gavin on the boardwalk.






Gavin, Greg, and Amy

After the geyser blew, we meandered back to the lodge, got ice cream. Headed to the Old Faithful Inn, as John & Amy wanted to make a dinner reservation. So we took in the grand log cabin that it is, and ended up sitting on the outside deck for Old Faithful’s next performance.

Along the way, John & Amy explained the ‘animal jams’ we’d see on the road: all the cars pulled over because someone saw something. Elk, Moose, Bison, Wolves, Coyotes: ‘CMF’ they called them, Charismatic Mega Fauna. So, if you see someone pulling over, make the dive too! The driving in the park is tricky – narrow 2 lane road with animal jams spring up out of nowhere, and the drivers are all distracted trying to spot an Elk, or a Bison.

We drove out of the park and got to our motel for the next three days. Lord, it was not good. If you’re ever in West Yellowstone (a town in Idaho just outside the western border of Yellowstone park), DO NOT stay at the Yellowstone Country Inn. My room was scary bad, including goopy stains on the wall, tacky splotches on the rug, and moldy food in the corners. I didn’t stay in the room that night. Instead, stay at the lovely Moose Creek Cabins, just next door. A world of difference. Clean, pretty, and nice innkeepers.

The next day we all got up, trooped across the street to Uncle Laurie’s for breakfast. Great place; insanely good coffee. Cold brewed, said Turtle. He grinds it medium fine, and steeps it in cold water for 16 hours. Takes the resulting tincture (or is it decoction?) and puts 2 ounces in a cup, heats it up with hot water. Absolutely wonderful coffee, no acidity or bitterness. I’m sure I ate breakfast but just remember the coffee. Afterwards, we headed in to the park. Stopped at more geothermal areas on the way.



Gavin in front of Beryl Spring



From the back, John, Greg, Andrea, Amy (maybe you can see Gavin down low)

Ended up at a picnic area for lunch (which the great folks at Uncle Lauries had packed up for us.)






The boys climbed the postpile

and then we all went swimming in the Gardner river.





Bathing Beauty

This was the first river swimming I’d done since my last camping in the Sierra – it was so great, I could feel my DNA unwinding. After we dried off, which took about 45 seconds in the 97 degree 15% humidity wind, we hit Mammoth Hot Springs on the way to the Lamar valley.




Mammoth Hot Springs Geothermal area



It’s not snow!



Lawn Elk at Roosevelt lodge.



Dinner that night was at Roosevelt Tower, and the worst in the park. Very boring, white lettuce kind of food. But the hours in the Lamar Valley afterwards more than made up for it. We drove for about 40 minutes after dinner into the valley, which kept opening up and up.





There were clouds and a distant thunderstorm. We pulled over after sharp eyes (not mine!) spotted a bison herd across the river bank. As our engines cut out and silence descended, we heard wolves calling. The left side of the valley, then an answer a few seconds later from the right. Some of us tried yipping to see if they'd answer, but they were not playing along that night.



Sunset lasts for hours there. We stood by the road as night gathered, watching the unconcerned bison browsing. John, Gavin and I walked down the bank to the river to see what we could see down there. Just an amazing view.

When it was full dark, we marveled at the stars and drank in the silence and night air for a while, then headed back to West Yellowstone as the rain started. It took 2 hours to get back to the hotel. This park is BIG.

Wednesday, September 12, 2007

Stepping back in

Wow, It’s been a busy summer! Some months back, we got invited to cousin Zoe’s wedding in Salt Lake City, July 21st. So, in light of the past few family gatherings being to say goodbye to Mom, we decided to make this trip fun. So, on July 14th me, Greg, Andrea & Gavin piled into the car veryvery early and drove to the airport. Flew from Rochester to Chicago. Had a layover in the airport, it was fun watching Gavin see O’Hare for the first time. He handled it with equanimity, and liked the coolio rainbow neon tunnel between terminals B & C. (One of my favorite parts too.) And this was the flight in which we discovered that even if you have a flight from Rochester that’s flight # 217, and the flight from Chicago to Salt Lake is also # 217, you still have to change terminals and gates!

We got to Salt Lake just after lunchtime. Piled into a rental minivan, and headed to Evanston, Wyoming to meet up with brother John & his wife Amy. We did meet up, and that night had the delightful experience of going to the Evanston Rodeo. Hotter than Hades, and the rodeo performers were going all out. It was a quintessential American scene – the sun going down over the stadium, the riders kicking up dust.


Calf roping



Bareback rider, entertaining



Bull riding

During the ‘intermission’, they had 2 events for the kids in the audience. One was a ‘bunny scramble’. 3 rabbit wranglers brought out bunnies, and the kids all lined up on the opposite side of the arena.


The kids

The rabbits were struggling and kicking in the hand of their wranglers. (And Gavin commented that they had ‘sharp pointy teeth’, making the right hand motion; we’d just seen Monty Python and The Holy Grail the week before!) A whistle blew, the kids raced forward as the goal was to grab a rabbit, the wranglers let the bunnies down – and they promptly froze in place. The kids are racing, screaming towards them and you could just see the rabbits thinking: “if I don’t move, they can’t see me!”
The kids are getting closer and louder and closer and screaming and the bunnies wouldn't move. I was laughing so hard I had tears in my eyes. I still get a fit of giggles just thinking about it.


frozen rabbits

And the evening ended with the young girls barrel racing. It was so amazing to see a mite of a girl, maybe 8 years old, racing her horse around the barrels going hellbent for leather. They were so tiny!

The next day, we headed out to Jackson, Wyoming. Took our time getting there, stopping at Fossil Butte, a superb national park, and location where Dad’s framed fossil fish came from.


Fossil Butte


John & Andrea in front of a large slab of fossil fish


After browsing in the museum for a couple hours (what can I say, one geologist and a couple geology geeks among us) we continued on to Jackson and checked into the condo at the Snow King resort, and got to the square in time for the shootout; which sadly, they don’t do on Sundays.

Elk Antler arches at the square in Jackson

So we headed out to dinner. The next day, we got up and headed up to the resort and did the Alpine slide. Fun! We all spread out until about 3, met back at the condo to get dressed and headed out to the white water rafting trip. Whoo Hoo! Rafting on the Snake River that evening included a riverside dinner. Gavin got to ‘ride the bull’, sat up on the front of the 16-person raft for a couple of the class 1 stretches of the river. It was beautiful gliding along.

... to be continued.