I’m neglectful but I’ll try to make up for it.

Dear Arizona,

I wrote this while I was sitting in the airport and right before I was going to post it they announced, “A group, please line up, etc.” so it’s a bit late (a theme, I know…) but here you are-

“I’m sitting at the airport and realizing that right before I fly back into your warm, desert lands is not the time I had imagined updating. I had imagined updating when school started, where I talked about my new program and starting my job at the computer center, how the house was, beginning my own musical project, and the beginnings of fall. I imagined posting pictures of the leaves changing and the house-warming party we had. I imagined explaining how strange it was to walk the streets I had walked all summer, but now they were damp and my sun-kissed skin was covered with sweaters and tights.

I imagined updating after the initial back-to-school hustle to talk about the frustration of my new schedule and how the rain came suddenly and how our house was changing already. I wanted to update you on my musical theater program and what I was learning. I wanted to write to you about how hilarious it was to me that other Greeners saw me outside of school and called me the “computer center girl”. I wanted to tell you all about how I joined an Olympia band called Isaac Rother and the Phantoms and it was rockin’.

Even during weeks 4 and 5, when I was so stressed and overwhelmed with real life being (can you guess?) real, I wanted to write and update you. Our house was changing roommates, my birthday was coming up, my schedule for work was becoming normal, school was picking up and I found myself having something I had to do every day of the week. School, work, band practice, performance group practice, catching the bus catching the bus catching the bus…

My birthday came and we had another party, Leah White visited me twice from Arizona, Sean and Harrison both moved out and Sydney and Owen moved in. School began to settle a bit more. Thanksgiving break came and I stayed in Olympia, ate a really amazing dinner at the Guest House with beautiful people, and then ran around the Snoqualmie forest in only my undies with people I love for a few hours. After the break, there were only two weeks of school left and they went by in a flash. Luckily, the stress of week 4 and 5 (which was due to me staying on top of everything) made it so weeks 9 and 10 just slipped on by. I got a little stress-sick as the cold came in stronger the last week, but other than that I turned in my portfolio the last day of class and then got an incredible evaluation from my faculty. I was able to pick up a lot of hours over evaluation week at work, and I’m still really happy to be working there. The house settled and the snow came, two days ago.

I really did imagine writing these thrilling posts with pictures and details of life, but I just never found myself having the right words to say. I didn’t know how to describe the way the sunlight has changed, as fall crept in and then winter whispered right behind it. I still don’t know how to explain the dynamics of our little house which holds a family inside it and all of these different personalities and energies. The people that are in my life are new and old, but they’ve all really helped me progress in a way I didn’t expect to.

I will see you in a few hours, sweet desert. Usually I send my love, but this time I’ll send myself too.

xox, E”

ps. A picture I took in Snoqualmie, WA the day after Thanksgiving.

Welcome back, hello October.

Dear Arizona,

This post is some-what of a tease, because I am in the middle of typing out the notes I took in my last seminar class and don’t have the time I need to truly write out a post that explains how incredible this summer was. But, I have not forgotten and I apologize that I neglected to write for the last few months.

I send my love!
Meows and all that other cat jazz.

(Oliver, my summer house’s cat, in the middle of the afternoon in August)

A new chapter, beginning. Moving out and moving forward- summertime.

Dear Arizona,

Today I walked out of my tiny, safe closet home for the last time. It was both exciting and terrifying, meaning so many different things to me. I’m not really sure it’s actually hit me yet, my first year being totally over and my summer beginning.

This day was really stressful, on my ankle, my head, and my heart. My friend, Jesse, got me through it by helping me take the weight off of my ankle and my head (literal and metaphorical, respectively). After we moved my last bits of stuff, saved over as my “summer house”* items, he drove us downtown and we got some coffee and chatted about feminism**.

*Did I mention that I am definitely living at this sweet, beautiful lady house for the summer? Right next to the co-op with some sweet souls and a cat named Oliver (how Summer 2010 of me haha. Also, Oliver is temporary for the summer like I am so we are living-situation twins).
** I have been reading a lot about feminism (as true feminism for the greater good and not hating things and calling it something it isn’t) and sex positive attitudes (which isn’t just ~~have sex! but a lot of really important things to know about life and our culture.)

Now, I’m sitting in Café Vita and relaxing a bit. This year ended in a way I really didn’t expect, and I’m learning to live in a new way. It’s all okay, of course, and like I said before I am totally excited about the times that lie ahead of me and the people in my life. I’m excited to be out of the dorms, even though that room became my safe place. It became my home and I feel like a lot of really important mental, emotional, and spiritual changes and revelations happened inside of it. But, I am happy that I never have to listen to the same Kid Cudi song play boomingly-loud from the room above mine. I’m glad that I never have to hear the toilet run after someone flushes and forgets to fix it. I’m glad that- HOLY SHIT I JUST SAW SOMEONE ON A BIKE HOLDING ONTO THE BACK OF A TRUCK AND RIDING IT THAT WAY WHAT THE HOLY HELL THAT IS ABSOLUTELY TERRIFYING WHAT. hahaha uh… anyway. I’m happy that I’ll live somewhere with a yard and a kitchen. And I’m exited for next year, finding a place to live and meeting new people and learning about musical theatre and its culture. But first, I am excited for summer.

I am exited to go home next week and see all of the people I have missed so much in the last (almost) six months. I’m excited to go swimming and pet my dogs and listen to my nephew baby-babble for the first time in person. I’m excited to see Caleb and Sarah and Emily and hang out with them and drink too much coffee. I’m not looking forward to the heat, but it will be nice to feel something so normal and deeply rooted in me. The heat is apart of my desert bones, and while I don’t plan to spend too much time directly in it, it will be nice to see some unforgiving sunshine for the first time since I left. It will be nice to go driving by myself with the windows up and my favorite mixed-cds in. It will be so nice to hug my whole family and walk barefoot on my living room carpet and eat dinner at the dinner-table.

I’m excited to come back to Olympia in early July and look for a job. I’m excited to tattoo as many people as I can and really work on that craft. I’m so excited to live in this house, this summer. I’m excited to get to know these ladies and live right next to the co-op. I’m excited to start jamming a lot more with my friend Scott. I’m excited to go to more summer shows and walk barefoot in the grass. I’m excited for my ankle to fully heal so I can go running again. I’m excited to explore more forests and go to Seattle and to look for a house come the fall. I’m excited to paint. I’m excited to get a Washington library card, so I can check out books on tarot reading and astrology and nature.

Life is changing again, even though I still remember last summer and the pre-move butterflies vividly. I can hardly imagine where I’ll be in a year from today, who I will have met and connected with, the things I will have experienced, the ways I’ll have grown; life is so real even though I never feel like I really get it. I would have never expected to have had the year I did, a year ago today. If you would have asked me, sitting at my little mall kiosk in my all-black uniform, I would have never said I expected to find an Olympia Family the first night I got here. I would have never expected to fall out of love after a night spent underneath the shelter of the trees. I would have never said I was going to write a book or connect with the moon or dance freely every Wednesday.

This year was life-changing, which may be cliché and dramatic. But it was. I couldn’t have asked for a better, more perfect year.

A girl filled with the world standing for the last time inside a room empty of all that makes it a home.

I’ll see you next week, AZ. Now, time to live out of my backpack and sleep on couches for a week. Meow.

xox e.

The Beginning of the End, my Left Leg, and Smoothies.

Dear Arizona,

It’s June! My last month as a college freshman and my last month living on campus/ in the dorms/ in my tiny closet home! (Okay, well, actually… if I am able to move into the summer house I have my fingers crossed for then the room I’ll be staying in will be smaller than the one I’m in now. But! I’m totally okay with that. It’ll only be for the summer and I plan to get a job and go on many sunshine adventures so what would I even need a big room for?!

I can barely believe that it’s already June and my life is about to change again! Pack everything I own into boxes 2.0! It makes me a little anxious and nostalgic (already), but I’m also really excited as well as looking forward to going back to Arizona for the first time in almost six months! Luckily, I have my project all finished and ready to turn in. All that’s left are my evaluation edits and- I just found this out tonight- one more tiny essay reviewing my entire year. The only big thin to stress about is packing, which was a little stressful to begin with but then…

This happened! This being my “stage two sprained and displaced” left ankle, as said by the ER doctor. This also being the inability to put any weight on my left foot and needing to use these (painful!) crutches and wear this robot-boot. This also also being a very innocent (and yes, sober, which they asked me at least ten times at the ER) time jumping on a trampoline in some slight drizzle rain and landing on the outward-left side of my foot while, coincidently, the trampoline lost it’s major give (due to an accidental “double jump”/ “jump steal”, terms by past friends-and-me but known by new friends as well.) and all of my weight went into my sideways foot. Which then made me promptly fall over and sit in shock, wondering if that loud crack I heard was my ankle breaking in half or not. But, fortunately, it wasn’t! So, I just have the boot and crutches, which I will be “on and off for a while”, (also said by ER doc). But, it takes about a month and a half to heal, so for the next six weeks I’m going to be really careful. Which is why I’m making smoothies in my dorm at midnight on a Saturday.

Tonight’s smoothie is a very flavorful vegetable-fruit mix that I came up with myself. If you look at the first picture you may notice it’s quite green! That’s from the vegetables: cucumber and basil leaves off of the plant I have growing in my room! The fruit I have in with that is one whole, small banana and one peach. There’s a little coconut water in to help with the blending and some raw agave for sweetness. It’s delicious but definitely has a… different taste to it. None of the ingredients are very prominent unless trying to taste it, which I really like because all of the flavors really went with the other. It’s got a very refreshing taste to it but the basil give it this subtle spicy hint. I recommend it to you, desert home, especially because it’s getting so hot there. Oh! It would be great as a frozen bar!

Hah. Anyway! I want to share two other smoothies I’ve made recently.
The first being a chocolate almond smoothie that I made post-workout this last week. It contained almond butter, dark chocolate almond milk, and then two small bananas. SUPER delicious and an extremely satisfying treat after a long run.
The second one was inspired from a vegan website’s “Pin-avoca-lada”. Mine contained: coconut water, half of an avocado, a banana, and orange-pineapple juice. Also really refreshing and pina colada-y! Definitely a success. Some time I want to try it with more of a coconut taste and actual pineapple.

Okay, yeah. So now that I’ve spent a good amount of time writing about smoothies… hahaha, I think maybe it’s time to retire to bed. Goodnight, AZ.
xoxox
E.

Speaking that poetic nonsense, the dribble of words typed out to express right now.

Dear Arizona,

I can feel summer coming when I cross the street, the heat of the asphalt screaming. Once upon a time, as I was driving with a friend in Arizona, he said, “I hate being in the city during the summer. It’s so much hotter. The sun is reflecting off the pavement and the buildings and the cars.” I never thought of that, until he said it, and now whenever the heat sets in I can think of nothing but.

I’m downtown, drinking iced coffee after iced coffee, scribbling words about my personal life in notebooks but mostly typing words about my academic life into Microsoft word documents. Earlier, Cora and I went on a “date” in a place I went on an “actual date” (or a date until it wasn't a date, and how funny the whole perception and definition thing is when it comes to reality in this world, because from the outside if seemed like a date but on the inside we both knew it wasn’t) and I got the same thing but we sat at a different table.

The coffee shop is playing funk record after funk record (as I drink iced coffee after iced coffee as I write essay after essay. My whole life, one big “usual”, “regular”, and “repeat”.) and lately funk has been playing everywhere I go. It’s like a spring time soundtrack, and I feel like my high-waisted, cut-off shorts from Sydney give me a disco groove that allows for these funky fresh tunes to soundtrack this wild flower’s growth.

The Spinners. It’s written on the side of my hand; the end of it- the R and the S- are rubbing away and I’m wondering what that ink smudged on.

Summer is coming and soon enough I’ll pack my room up in boxes. Keep your sandy fingers crossed for me, dear desert, because there are some summer plans I’m really hoping will work out. (These things involve: juice, a nook and cat, perpetual ink-covered vibrations, and local vocal adventures as well as exploring adventures. I don’t want to jinx it so I’ll just stay cryptic.) Summer is coming and I am going to take my nieces and nephews swimming. Summer is coming and I’m going to roll around in Washington grass.

Back to coffee writing coffee writing coffee writing.
Today is my friend, Zachary’s birthday. Happy birthday, Zachary. I’m happy we talked on the night hike the first night on campus (what seems so long ago now) even though we couldn’t see each other. You are a sweet soul.

Love you, AZ.
See you in less than a month.

xoxox e.

When It’s Almost Been a Year: how to keep a place beautiful.

Dear Arizona,

It’s been raining this weekend for what feels like the first time in weeks and I’m constantly so surprised how comforting the sound is, even now, months after walking up and falling asleep to it.

I’m almost done with my freshman year in college. Whenever that thought runs through my head I quickly push it away because I’m not sure if I’m ready to think about and deal with that yet.A year ago at this time I was stressing out about finals, my graduation speech and song, and social interactions. But now I can’t remember if I graduated on the 27th of May or the 29th. (I feel like it was the 29th but my memory holds the 27th as something special.)

I’ve been here for a year, almost. I mean, maybe not a four-seasonal year, but a school year. I’ve been calling this small room my home since September. Sometimes I hear myself saying, “I’m going to go home first and I’ll meet you after,” and it sounds both strange and just right. I haven’t given up my home on Fillmore St in Arizona, yet. But, I’ve changed my definition for home. I’ve split it into two different things, where one is the place that I sleep tonight and one is the place that I dream of. (I still wake up confused, sometimes, wondering where the light is coming from; I think the noise my suit-mates make as they get ready for the morning is coming from the living room as my dad plays with the dogs. I can close my eyes and walk around any room in the house I grew up.)
I’ve been here for a year, almost, and it still occasionally gives me the same feeling I got when I visited for the first time, in April 2011. There are times that I find myself taking advantage of this place and it’s beauty. I’ll spend all day inside or sleep during a sunny afternoon. But, I try to catch myself when I do that, I once I do I can see it all over again; misted rain and walls of green trees that wrap me up and and breathe me in.

On Saturday Sydney, Cora, and I spent an afternoon together. With the end of the year and the stresses and commitments we all have it’s been a little harder to all have free time together, or at least- for me it has been. But we told secrets on Cora’s bed, our heads near the window and our legs fighting for room because the dorm beds are too small for six adult legs. Afterwards we went into the forest in search of a tree I’ve come to believe can only exist in the presence of a certain imagination. Sydney took us to her secret nature-journaling spot, next to a little stream with buzzing mosquitoes. To get there we had to climb over fallen logs and through ferns that grew around-and-despite the toppled trees and I told myself as I walked across one of the logs (Sydney went first as our guide and as she stepped onto it she said, “This one’s the tricky one”) that this was a reason. This was a moment to write about and to remember in a year. Because if I can remember that moment then I can remind myself and have more. I can keep myself from getting too stuck and complacent in this place, which is anything but. If I can remember the three of us sitting next to that stream and batting the bugs off of our bare legs as we drew on Artist’s Conks (mushroom, super cool, check it out if you dare) then I can return, again. Even if I never remember the mudded pathways to the shelters made from sticks and crook trees, with trivial treasures piled into an alter and mobiles made of pottery-leaves I will remember going off the trail to find them. I will remember the three of us laughing as our legs got scratched and our shoes sunk in mud; as we ran along a narrow trail while howling and yipping, feeling free as the wind we ran with.

That night, after we got back to campus to play some music and hung out for Evergreen’s 40th Anniversary, a few of us went to this “Wilderness Party” (which was totally ridiculous but awesome in its own very weird way) and I took a moment at one point to look up – it was a New Moon so the sky was clear and dark- and think, hey, thank you for this being my livf, Universe.

And now, with the cloudy grey light coming through my window, I’ll say it again. Hey, thank you for this really great life, Universe.
Love you, AZ.
xoxox e.

A Jumble of Thought: Week 7, Static.

Dear Arizona,

I was right when I thought that no matter how much I’ve been working this quarter, I would still reach my point of WHAT IS HAPPENING IN MY LIFE RIGHT NOW? . So, yeah, here I am. Sitting in Sizizis, drinking an iced black tea with amaretto. Cora is sitting across the table with me also doing her work, and she just finished interviewing me for a podcast about women with tattoos that she’s doing for class. I am planning on finishing all most all of my written-project work today, as I will be in this little coffee shop cave all afternoon. So, yeah, I’ll make this update quick.

First, I woke up before nine today (which is a major feat for me), worked out, and then got ready to come here. I realized while working out that my mental dialogue has changed during the hardest point in my work out from previously, “Ughh I hate doing this when will it be over?” to “Woo! I can do this! I am going to feel great after this!” and that in itself has been a huge factor in being able to keep up the schedule I’ve created. I have been working on clearly my head of all the “psychic junk” a lot recently, and it’s a practice I hope to develop into a healthy habit.

Second, have I mentioned that a few weeks ago I accidently dyed my hair a wine-red color? The box said “warm red auburn” but it definitely came out with subtle burgundy hues. Also, this weekend a few of my friends were dying some chunks of hair blonde and there was a little solution left over so I dyed my eyebrows blonde…. hahaha uhh. Yeah, so m eyebrows looks like this now:

They’re already growing back brown and I’ve been filling them in, so don’t freak out mom and dad. I gotta’ make a few crazy choices in college, right?

Third. I got some pictures from my disposable camera back last week. Here are a few:

And fourth, I have been tattooing a lot lately! So wonderful and great to be doing this. I love it.

Okay, the end. I know that was scattered and crazy. It’s time to work again!

My love, my good wishes!
xox e.