Just a preview.

I'm in the middle of nowhere in Arizona with no cell phone signal and no laptop, and barely enough wifi to write this. And I'm thrilled about the lack of connectivity to the outside world. But I do want to share with you at least a taste of this roadtrip. I'll write properly when I'm in civilization again. 

Can you find me in the above picture?

This last one is a proper view of Death Valley. Simply incredible. 

Have a minute? Give this a read.

A fantastic piece about the ways and woes of internet feminism. So very very relevant and clever. Read it here!

Sometimes, children are just the best.

Don't get me wrong. I'm sure that many parents - and, well, other normal people, too -- would also attest to the fact that children are frequently also the worst. But today, children have rescued me twice. Twice. Each time, from horrible, spiral-y and contagious moods.

First was this morning. I tried out a new class at the gym today - part of my trying new classes is to have a workout that I don't direct myself. But honestly, another large part is to try and meet people my own age. Honestly, where ARE all the recent college graduates?!? The folks a bit younger than me are probably all up at the university being students, all the ones way older than me are all around and all part of groups already - and the 22-29ishorevenmaybe30year-olds? Probably, they're all at home watching Grey's Anatomy and writing blog posts about how they don't know anyone and how finding a job is hard. Guess I'm not as special as I think.

Anyways, I'm trying to meet folks my age at the gym and I thought a workout class would be great - you socialize before and after, and if the class is particularly hard, you have a free excuse to talk to strangers (which, really, in our culture, is not a common thing - especially if you are not trying to hit on someone) - nothing unites people like adversity! So, those are my reasons. Last week, I tried out yoga and pilates - and I found sixty-year-olds in yoga and intense, wirey 40-year-old triathaloners in pilates. So, two strikes. I thought MetCon, or metabolic conditioning (please -_-), known to be a super-intense class with loud pop music remixes would be the one. Turns out, I got early thirties - the discussion all around me was of children's first t-ball practices and what the husbands were up to. I was huddled on my mat before the class, knowing that not only was I not going to find my own group* and knowing that the workout was going to be really hard, and just generally feeling bummed. And then a person walked in - from her reception, she must be someone who usually attends the class but hadn't recently, and the reason why not recently was in her arms. One of the tiniest babies I've ever seen. And the mother stood in front of my mat, her back turned to me as she spoke with her friends in the class - and I got to see the little baby's face peering at me over his mom's shoulder. His tiny hands. His amazingly thick and dark eyebrows. It was amazing how much that little bright face helped me.

And I survived the workout. Somehow.
*Most of my friends are, in fact, older than I am  - plenty up in the 30s. But those are people that I already had something in common with - be it hometown, studies, etc. It's just that starting a new friendship with someone in that age group is hard.


Fast-forward. It's evening, and I am strolling around the closest good-grief-we-take-ourselves-far-too-seriously natural foods store. A few things had been requested by the other residents in this house and after dropping my grandfather off at dinner with a friend, I was wandering through the aisles. I had every thing in the cart that had been written on the list. And I was facing the prospect of dinner at home alone- not necessarily a sad prospect. I like cooking for myself - hell, I really know what I like! So usually, those meals are great. But I didn't know what I wanted. And then, all of the thoughts were coming in. You're alone. You don't know what you want to eat. It's gonna be a sad and pathetic evening. Alone. You. Etc, etc. Finally, I panicked and resorted to my Hungarian roots (and I don't mean genetic ones - I don't think there's any Hungarian in my ancestry. I mean I went back to that which I did frequently in Hungary) and bought a large cucumber and some hummus and headed for the check out. That transaction went smoothly enough, and then I was schlepping the big bag across the parking lot to my grandfather's car, when I saw something.

In a dazzlingly rainbow-striped sweater stood a girl, must have been around six years old, with the door of her mother's car swung wide open, blocking the path to my driver's side door. When I got there, I asked if she would mind moving so that I could get into my car. And this is what happened.

"Hi. Would you mind moving over? I have to get into my car."
She turns around slowly, and grins. "Hello! uh... Bonjour, madame! I love speaking in French."
Me, taken aback but smiling. "That's fantastic. Moi, aussi."  She smiles at me.
I moved around her to the car door, her mom was ushering her out of the way but she breaks away and says, "Hey!! I really like the color of your car!"
Me, laughing. "Thanks! I really like the colors on your sweater!"
Her, huge grin on her face, "Thank YOU!"

I couldn't help but smile on the drive home.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go and watch some Grey's Anatomy while eating hummus. Goodnight.

Hiking Between Big Basin and Highway 1

Wow.

I've been coming to this place so many years to visit my grandfather but now I finally feel like I'm getting the chance to know it for myself.

A Foggy Evening on the Westside

From the Top of Montevina

We went on a lovely hike today - from the top of Montevina Road to downtown Los Gatos, a tiny town in between San Jose and Santa Cruz, up in the mountains. With a lot of clouds in the sky and some drizzles on the ride up, we thought we might be slipping and sliding and being generally damp the whole way, but it ended up being quite the beautiful hike.

The drive up.

The clouds across the valley.

Potential mountain lions? (We didn't see any)

The road onward!

Intrepid hikers.

View of the valley.

Gorgeous, Tolkien-esque woods around us as we walked down and down and down.

Instresting

The above is what either I or my sister used to say instead of 'interesting' when we were young. In any case, my dad and I have been having lots of conversations about mindfulness and meditation this morning, prompted for one by this article in the New York Times and also by our talks about going back to Thailand. We've been toying with the idea of revisiting the meditation retreat in which I participated when I was there -- six years ago. Hard to wrap my head around that.

With all the yoga and the rolfing lately (scheduled my first real appointment!) I have been thinking quite a lot about mindfulness and my own history with meditation and things like it. Santa Cruz does that to you. When I went to the 10-day silent retreat, I was sixteen. And it was a changing experience. I wonder what it would be like now.