pinching myself

Before things get too crazy, I thought I should sit down and lay down a record of the developments that have occurred so far with our move to Santa Barbara. If I don't do it now, I probably won't do it for another month So even though it's difficult to gather my thoughts sitting in the disarray that has taken over our house, I will attempt to relay what has happened over the past few days.

Just before we left for our house-hunting weekend on Friday, I received a call from the director of a non-profit counseling center where I had applied for an office manager position a few days earlier. He asked if he might take 30 minutes of my weekend to try to get a feel for who I was, since he was mainly looking for someone with the right personality for the job. I agreed and quickly packed some halfway presentable clothes for our meeting.

Saturday morning, we grabbed our messy handwritten list of properties to check out, stopped at a local bakery, and began our hunt for a new place to call home. After sitting in a property management company's lobby for half an hour just to find out that the properties we were interested in were either not viewable or already rented, we were excited to go take a look at an apartment close to downtown that was being rented out by a local guy named Mark. At first glance, this place already started to make us smile. It's in a 4-plex that was built in 1925, has all hardwood floors (except for the cool, vintage black & white tiles in the kitchen and bathroom), and has loads of character. We got to talking with the landlord, a friendly, laid-back guy whose family has owned the building for 25 years, and he mentioned that we were only 3 blocks from the Santa Barbara Bowl. Jon and I both shouted, "we saw Radiohead there a few years ago!" To which Mark replied, "I was at that show too! I am crazy about Radiohead!" We took another look around the place, and decided to email our application when we returned to the hotel. We looked at a couple of other places, but none of them made our hearts get up and dance a little like that great old apartment on Anapamu (pronounced A-nuh-pum-moo).

We left our friends Josh and Sarah at the hotel to take naps (Jon and I really wear our friends out), and drove to Montecito where I was set to meet the director of the counseling center. I was warmly welcomed by him, and we had a lovely time filling each other in about ourselves and the organization. I won't go into too much detail about it, but I was thoroughly impressed by what they're doing in the community, and started to really get excited about the opportunity to work there. My interviewer asked what the address was of the apartment we wanted, and after I told him, he replied, "You know, you'll be able to walk to work. The office is 4 blocks from there." That pretty much sealed the deal for me. I wanted the job.

Sunday right before we were going to drive to the airport to come home, Mark called to offer us the apartment. We accepted it without hesitation, sped over to his house and put down our deposit. Today after the director of the counseling center checked my references, he called and offered me the job. I start a week from Tuesday. I'll help out with preparations for a big fundraising event they're having on 10/7, come back home to finish packing, move down, take about a week off, then start working again.

There's a huge park a couple of blocks from our new place. We rested there for a while on Sunday afternoon. Here's a picture of one of our new neighbors we found there.

finding good things

We just returned home from a weekend in Yosemite. Considering that it was a spur-of-the-moment getaway, it's amazing how it all fell into place. We found one available tent cabin at a great "rustic mountain resort" called Yosemite Bug, a cheap, fun place to stay. It did me a world of good to spend a few days not caring how I looked, being away from my computer, and in a starkly different, beautiful environment.

Saturday morning, after savoring every last bite of our blueberry buckwheat pancakes at the cafe, we swung our rested legs into the car and drove into Yosemite Valley. We hadn't been there in about 6 years. It is truly a facinatingly beautiful place. When people first set their eyes on something as enormous and magnificent as Half Dome or El Capitan, they turn into children again for a moment. There is nothing you can do but stand there and be filled with wonder. Some of the peoples' faces I saw looked almost puzzled, as if they were thinking, "Can this be real?". We drove further into the heart of the park and stopped in Tuolumne Meadows where we found the trailhead that led to Cathedral Lake.

Jon and I had a whole lot of thinking to do over the weekend. We'd been presented with a real opportunity to relocate, and although it wouldn't involve moving terribly far from where we live now, it isn't a matter we were taking lightly. No longer was this possibility a creation of our assumptions and imaginations -- it was there in black and white, right in front of us, and right within our reach. So while we hiked up the sometimes steep trail that led us to thinner and thinner air, we talked. We squinted to look closer at what was in front of us, and stepped back, to the left and to the right, trying to see this opportunity from every angle possible. Then the actual scenery around us really started to show off, so we reacted the only way a person really can in the presence of something this beautiful -- we stopped and let this surreal world amaze us.





By the time we made it back to the car, we had made a lot of progress toward a decision about whether or not we should pack up our cat and move. Being out where the air is so free of pollution and the land is so uncorrupted and uncommercialized by humans had a remarkable effect on our states of mind. I don't remember when we had been this calm before.

After another delicious dinner at the cafe, we stayed there in the lodge where Jon read and I wrote in my journal. Sitting comfortably with our herbal tea, we spotted a game on the shelf and decided to give it a shot. While we trash-talked our way through two action-packed rounds of Skip-Bo, we quietly heckled the band playing just outside the doors on the deck. How can someone actually be into reggae? I'm sorry, I know I'm a music snob, but these guys were horrible. No, Mr. Lead Singer going overboard with your reverb levels, I am NOT feeling "irie", so please stop asking!

Before I stop, I have to say -- if any of you friends ever want to hike up to Cathedral Lake and want a couple of tour guides or just a bit of company for the journey, give us a ring. We're available most weekends and only charge a small fee.

For more photos of our weekend, go here: www.flickr.com/photos/69635962@N00

maybe it's too late

A few days ago, I was planning on writing about the idea that we are capable of more than we think we are. It was something I was learning in my own life, and thought it would be an encouraging thing to put out there. But my confidence started to give way, and my mind was taken over by an army of all-encompassing negative thoughts. It was very unsettling, to say the least. Who let these guys in? I don't know how to defend myself against thoughts I at least partially buy into. I found myself wanting to push them all out of the way, but at the same time, turning my ear and allowing myself to look for evidence of truth in these self-defeating words. How easy that was was even more unsettling. I really DO feel that I have wasted much of my life. It DOES seem like the mistakes I have made and missteps I have taken could reach around the world and back. I DO feel hopelessly stuck in an unstimulating, unfulfilling life, and I have no idea where to go from here.

I want to do more than just survive from day to day. There is an unignorable urge in me to be out in the world, affecting and influencing people on a larger scale than just a handful of co-workers. I know that's the direction in which I need to go, but today I am just spinning around, batting at these terrible thoughts, unable to take another step in any direction.


This photo doesn't go well with what I wrote, but I'm going to use it anyway.