The Blog: Spellbound by our own imperfect lives...

I drove to Canby on Friday to make lefse with Mom, a sister-in-law, and two cousins. We had a great time and lots of stories were told. I took a walk Saturday, past the places I remember from my youth. Like this one.  I'm typing this on my phone at the music festival. I am not a one-finger typist, so this will be short. 

It's been a wonderful weekend. The weather is perfect, the mosquitoes took a vacation, the music is great, and the park is filled to the brim with happy people.  Yesterday, we collected almost twenty stories.  Some about water, but we had no rules. I think there is one entitled The Fart Heard Round the World. And so it goes.  We'll be here another day, soaking up sun and music and magic. 

It's going to be a busy weekend with a road trip then Rock Bend Folk Festival where our project, 600 Words, will occupy a booth to collect stories. The weather forecast is glorious so what could be better? I'm testing my ability to post pics and text via email so I can post "from the road"! See you on the inter webs.

Update Saturday, September 3 Today is my 60th day of sobriety.  I went to an inpatient program on July 5th and spent 30 days there learning about addiction, reflecting on my experiences before and after my addiction reared its head, sharing things about my life and sharing in the revelations of others, and developing a 30 day foundation of sobriety. It was a profound experience in many ways. For the most part, sobriety has not been difficult for me, so far. It might get more difficult, certainly, but at this point I am grateful that I have had few urges to drink and those have been fairly easy to deal with. Yesterday, I subbed in a special education classroom in the same school where I taught for most of my career. At the end of the day I went home feeling a little out of sorts and at loose ends. What do I do with a sober Friday afternoon? I settled on 30 minutes of hatha yoga with a DVD and then a nice dinner out with my husband. I had planned to make dinner but I thought...

I've been going for walks regularly with Gus and Regis. Regis likes to be out the door so I have to set my alarm for 5am. Not a bad schedule since I have always enjoyed the early mornings and it helps regulate my sleep to have a schedule like that. Not to say that some mornings, I am not cranky at 5am. Just a little. I love the first picture. The cloud bank that looks like mountains, the hazy sunrise, the geese. Beautiful. The sunrises this past month have been spectacular. Looking out over the valley as the sun peeks over the horizon is a wonderful way to greet the day. It's hard to be cranky looking at this. Last night we went out for a Mexican dinner with Tom and Betty. Good food and good company. We told a lot of stories and had a lot of laughs. We ended the evening by sitting on the deck at Westwood which was enjoyable until the mosquito battalions moved in.  I subbed yesterday in the school where I used to teach. It's always a nice experien...