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Journal (The Ember Update)

Wednesday, July 28

Assateague

We were invited by Alan and Faith to spend the 4th of July at a large group gathering at Assateague Island State Park. There were about 100 people, all loosely connected by common friendships, tented out on three adjacent group campgrounds, just behind the dunes that line the beach.

We were spared the usual terrible mosquitos until the last night, but we did see plenty of the wild horses Assateague is famous for (sorry, no horse photos). A large tented cooking/eating area was the meeting place for the group's activities, which included a raft race, daily happy hour, tie-dying, bonfires, a talent show, etc. Kevin and I spent a fair amount of time off the island too, since, well frankly, Assateague only has so much to offer …

We had a terriffic hail storm just before leaving for the beach (this is my mom's back deck). The little "deer" at Assateague are an Asian elk called sikas. This mushroom was growing out of some horse droppings. Cars seemed to avoid it (the mushroom, not the dung).

Me in my new bikini (which I returned — the paint on the rings peeled after one weekend's wearing!). The colors in our beach fire are caused by flame crystals on treated pine cones. Just after taking this photo, two park police appeared seemingly out of nowhere, questioned us, and eventually told us to move our fire below the high-tide line (which we promptly did). This ferocious shark was made out of a bendable neon-like plastic/wire tubing and hung in the meal tent. Some relatively recent technological invention; I guess I'm behind the times.

Three cabin visits

Cabin visit 6

Kevin beginning to clear these bushes in the cabin's back yard. He then burned them in our firepit. While we were sitting around the fire we became aware of a new-to-us scary-looking insect, the Dobsonfly. These are photos of two, one with singed wings.

Prettty view of the valley on an atmospheric morning. Out at our woodsy campfire, smoke defines the sun's rays. Near our special place we gathered firewood, covering the top with pieces of tree bark and weighing the bark down with rocks. This approach seems to have worked well in keeping the wood pretty dry. And here are two more mushrooms … aren't they supposed to have red spots? Last is a well-designed road sign we'd not seen before. Nearly every time we come home from the cabin we try to find a new way to drive, often ending up on little country roads.

Cabin visit 7

We've put candles all over our special spot in the woods, and here are a couple lit in their nooks. On our way home this time we came across this vast quarry, blue in the evening light. For a sense of scale, the truck in the last picture is hidden in the wide shot (third) … it's tiny and in the lower left hand corner obscured by a tree branch.

Cabin visit 8

This last weekend at the cabin, my mom joined us for her first visit in months and had a great time relaxing. A fine mist of very light rain hung on the mountainside, punctuating the artistry of spiders. Gossamar grass webs sprinkled the lush yard like patchwork. One draped off a stone seat we've built by the fire pit. There were pretty webs in the woods I couldn't get my camera to focus on (damn it!), but the last web was the most spectacular. The third photo shows the web face-on, with the natural ring of dew-drops clearly defined. Fourth shows the web from the other side, at 3/4 view, to show the weight of the drops.

Peaches and the Potomac

Traveling to the cabin, Kevin and I came across a "Pick Your Own Peaches" sign. For $8 we could fill a bag, garnering around 25 fruits at varying stages of ripeness (so they don't all go bad at once). There was a veritable zoo at the farm, a calf being fed milk (better than dried cow's blood!), the emu running back and forth and eyeing me over the fence, then three guinea fowl, and peacocks which I didn't manage to photograph. We did pick up two beautiful peacock feathers in the grass (this find was a benefit of walking the short distance up the car path, rather than getting back into the car and driving to the closer parking area like everyone else!). I made a yummy peach pie that weekend.

Two Sundays ago — at about 5:30 pm — we decided that we wanted to go hiking. By 6:30 we were heading out on foot along the Potomac, wearing long sleeves because we'd forgotten the mosquito repellant. It being another wet summer, there's been a lot of water through the area, leaving endless piles of bleached logs and other debris along the river (the most Kevin's seen, and it reminded me of dramatic changes in Havasu Canyon in 1992, after the big flood). We climbed over this debris for most of the hike. In shadier areas we found more cool mushrooms. (One of these days I'm going to have to start learning identification and names … Gina says the middle picture is probably of wood ear mushrooms.) As always, we looked for rocks to add to our collection, and this large piece of purplish-bluish pumice was an awesome find!

The downside of this hike was that I got stung 4 times by some kind of flying insect(s). I've never had a "bee" sting before, and I can see why people run! The first sting was about 15 minutes from the car. I had just taken a phone call from Dorian, and heard a sudden loud BZZT and then a crushing pain in my eyebrow. I flung my arm across my face, my eyeglasses went flying, and I shouted something like, "FUCK! Something just stung me!" I got off the phone as quickly as I could muster (biting my toungue against the urge to keep cursing), and we hightailed it off the debris and into the woods to make it to the car as quickly as possible.

At the car we took off the hot layers, jumped in and started out to the main road, me with an intense, concentrated headache. We paused to take a photo of a little tunnel we pass through, I started to turn on my camera, and I saw an insect land on my hand. As I panickingly tried to brush it away it stung between my pinky and ring finger, and in the ensuing evacuation of my car I was stung twice more on the shoulder. I don't know if it was the same insect, and maybe I flung it into my hair where it remained for 15 minutes (possibly trying to "sting" my hair), or if another insect entered my car later.

Wednesday, July 21

Journal Keeping

I feel like I'm getting burned out on keeping this journal. I guess I've felt that way a while now, only I love to look back on this from time to time. Some of you have heard me tell the story of throwing away 8 years of my childhood/teenage journals because of my first husband's criticism after he read them … and then losing my later journals in the flood. This is a journal that would be hard to lose. And what I'm really burned out on is computers in general. I'm tired of spending eight hours a day at them (and loathe to turn mine on at home), but that's not going to change any time soon!

I've been thinking a lot about my life direction. My friend Abay reminded me of a book that's been floating around Wunderland (and many have heard of) — Rich Dad, Poor Dad — so I decided to read it. It presents some interesting information and I bet my Dad would have enjoyed discussing it with me. On one level the book appeals and on another I cringe. It's made me re-examine my opinions on capitalism (and socialism, democracy, etc.), and think more about how I can more effectively create change.

But then my defeatist side thinks, is it futile? In the face of the mass of humanity who uproots and deficates on our planet with nary a thought, I feel very small and pointless indeed.

Luckily I'm not much of a defeatist — I prefer to conjure up solutions. People do appreciate my activism, and I know I have a positive impact. Some of the laws I've protested have been changed or defeated, others I've liked have been implemented. And according to Jim Hightower there are lots of other people like me, more thank you'd think! I remember him in Utne saying that 70+% of Americans actually hold progressive perspectives. I'll have to look back at which issue that was.

The latest Utne mentiones this web site on the Renaissance Soul. That's me.

Crime

About 3 weeks ago, good friends of mine got robbed in the middle of the night, in their single-family home, at gunpoint (one of the three guys had an automatic weapon). Luckily no violence occurred and they're safe. I've never known anyone personally have something like this happen to them. Hearing about it was frightening and I'm still concerned for their safety. (They live near Laurel Mall.) They lost around $1000 worth of cash and property, but the robbers seemed to think they had lots more money and valuable property, which my friends didn't. This apparently caused a great deal of tension and frustration on the part of the robbers, but luckily my friends were unharmed. She's in school, he works at a grocery store, and while they're a distinct minority in their particular neighborhood, they have a friendly and welcoming relationship with their neighbors … and someone made wrong assumptions about their possessions or class. It's very scary.

…

Friday I was driving home from work, turning left onto my road, when an older model Ford Explorer started encroaching on my turn lane (clearly marked). The guy was right next to me, he looked at me, and then he pushed the side of his car into mine <insert sound of cars making contact>.

Then he decided not to stop. He ran.

I followed him for a little while (he wasn't exactly speeding, he just refused to stop) … until I called 911, read them the license number, and was told to cease following. Naturally, I just got the word yesterday that the tag was untraceable, which means if I decide to fix my car it'll cost me a $250 deductable.

The Explorer left a lot of paint and scratches on my New Beetle's passenger side fenders (both front and rear), the door panel, and the running board … down the whole side of my car. My fenders must've pressed in some, then popped out. Only the running board is dented and cracked. The guy almost seemed to do it on purpose, and if he was driving illegally and was in just the right mood, why would he care? Fucker.

Since the hit-and-run took place a half block from home, I'm playing with the idea of camping out at the intersection for a couple days around the time of the accident, to see if the vehicle comes through. If so, and if I establish a pattern, I could try asking the police to stop the car. But is it worth the bother? Would the police even help with such information? I guess I could try it one day and see if the vehicle even appears. But I don't feel like confronting the guy. Who knows, he might be the gun-toting silent angry type.

Friday, July 9

Origins 2004

While it's not in slide-show format (I just don't have the time!), please see my Origins Travelogue for all my best photos. As usual, here are a few to whet your appetite.

Clicking on a thumbnail takes you to my travelogue.

I have LOTS of stuff backlogged, but my internet connection at home is having some mysterious problem I've not had time to fully solve.

Things have been especially crazy busy here with being away most recent weekends (we spent the 4th of July weekend in Assateague), and with fighting a local community effort to have our property annexed into a nearby town, which could raise our property taxes significantly.

Can I run away now?

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