mountain madness

Ya ever feel dislocated somehow? I had a rad day...i don't work until friday morning, thats aces. I packed a snickers, some red vines, a few bottles of beer, a lighter and chapstick into my backpack. i tuned my beaten up koa wood guitar, placed her in her cheap old case with broken buckles and threw her in the back of my rusted out honda with bald tires. i crossed my fingers as i turned the key on my honda and started her up...drove away from my temporary shelter here in Georgia and just drove. I knew what i wanted to do. i wanted to find a place off of a mountain trail where i could look out over the blue ridge peaks and valleys and just chill. so i did. i ended up off a trail in the Chatahoochee National Forest. it's harder than it looks to walk a narrow mountain path and carry a guitar. i managed without slipping and falling to my death. i continued walking the muddy trail all the way to the side of the mountain which was still getting the noon-day sun. spotting a dead tree with plenty of "sit and drink beer and play guitar," room i made myself comfortable. alone. cold bottle of new castle in hand, my guitar sounded perfect bouncing off of the valleys below me. it was kind of one of those "perfect" moments. peaceful (with the exception of a jake brake in the distance,and what i am assuming was sasquatch climbing the trail below me rustlin the dead leaves.)picture perfect. but it wasnt. i sit, i stood, i sang songs to the trees staring out at them pretending they were an audience of 500,000 anxious fans. i made a phone call to a friend. i sent a few text messages, i sat and stared at my boots. i ate my snickers, i took a photo or two...and then, nothing. i experienced a quiet peaceful moment on the side of a mountain off the Appalacian trail, but i did it alone. the past year has led me to understanding myself a bit more. what i have come to conclude is that yes, i am an adventure seeking indivdual. BUT...i dont get pure joy doing things alone. im a sharer. i wanna go places with people to meet people, to be with people, to talk to people and to pretty much understand people. thats the sort of thing which entertains me. i get so bored with myself. i need interaction, companionship and to ability to share and experience moments like the one i had today...with more than just myself. just like when i lived in oregon. it was freakin beautiful there. i hiked, i biked, i went to little breweries, i experienced a ton of oregon's sites and sounds. i went and played at open mic nights where no one knew me. i spent thanksgiving morning at a 5k run for charity, and 5 days a week when i wasnt working i walked the dogs, did some gardening, and stayed at home writing songs and playing guitar. those were awesome experiences, but i did them alone. i had nobody to share those stupid moments with. i left oregon missing the people i worked with at REI, but that was about it. i couldnt stay in a city living a life which was predominantly lived alone. i need people. i love conversation and interaction. i thrive off of it. i guess alls im tryin to say is that life is freakin awesome..the places i have gone ,the things i have done, are some pretty amazing things, but those experiences dont add up to much of anything worth taking with me unless they were moments shared with a group o friends or an individual. so cheers to that. i hope that 2010 brings me the opportunity to continue to experience new places and events....WITH the people i love and care for. wherever that may be.

All these notions swinging through my head creating emotions.

Stirring the stammering of words that fail to fall from my mouth which usually never stops jabbering i find myself sidestepping to get closer and farther away from you. you have magic tastes, a sense of adventure which causes me to venture outside of what i know to be good for me, for you i may just be someone to call. call me downright distant since taking a leave of absence from my midwest reality show life that had me lugging around baggage and weekend benders like it was something to be proud of. the trick here isn't so much to be noticed but to take notice of one's own power and wisdom to make better choices in life. life presents me with ample opportunities to tell people of who what where when and why things happened or took place whether on a summer night or a snow day in 92, but my ears tend to tingle almost to the sense of burning from hearing so many stories thrown in my face and my job is to digest them and nodd. my digestive track is off set since being here where we are given three squares a day but my appetite decided to take a hike along with the majority of my adult obligations upon entering into the woods...where i could lose myself in the trees streams and rocks and i have. i had...very important people who mean the world to me, which i still have but am finding that the face to face value of a conversation has become fleeting and not so existent since being gone. and that is the loss of my monumental gains since chasing and finding a painfully rewarding life here.

Confederate owned gas stations

hummmm...hemmm...i cut my bangs the other day. it's not easy to get an appointment with my hairdresser i have gone to for the past 9 years. she lives and works in Des Moines. I did however, promise her that if i ever make it to stardom for any reason and i need someone to do my hair, she will be hired. living in the woods and working with children aint quite "makin it" so for now i am my own stylist. To my (somewhat) surprise i noticed a few extra grey hairs pokin' around my forehead. Mind you they are totally uninvited and although i have asked them politely to leave, they insist on staying, and are now inviting their like-minded friends to join their colony on my head. it makes me feel a few things. A: old, and B: dignified. kinda. Like i'm sorta proud to have them, but sorta not since i can generally pass for a 13 year old on most days (and in the right light) Whatever though...they had to come eventually. I tell my eight girls at camp that those hairs only appeared after meeting and living with them. Partially true indeed. Speaking of my girls..I had the delight of navigating a 15 passenger van down the winding mountain roads of the Appalachia-parts of Georgia last week. 5 days in the middle of nowhere. Suches, Georgia is home to another Eckerd camp, and a proudly displayed "confederate owned" gas, ammunition and panning for gold station. Honestly. I could go on and on about the thousands of stairs and slippery rocks we scrambled over as a group to reach the top of Amicalola Falls, or how we braved the vertigo of a 200 ft long suspension bridge in the pouring rain over the Tullulah Gorge, but that nature kind of stuff is hard to translate well with words. I mean, don't get me wrong...it was all BEAUTIFUL. Breath taking lay of the land was in endless supply in every corner of Georgia that we visited, but my favorite story has to do with what i lovingly refer to as the "red neck gas station."
So it's about 9 AM on a Wednesday, rain pounds the windshield of the Dodge 15 passenger van full of "bad kids" and two chiefs. (they really arent anywhere near bad kids by the way...they just like to joke that that is how they are seen by people.) anyway...so we have my ipod hooked up to the radio and some random and completely inappropriate Brittney Spears song is blasting out of the speakers. My girls are all singing and bouncing along with the music as i pull the van under the awning of the red neck gas station and prepare to get out. I pause Brittney for a moment and as i do 8 snide comments and sighs of disapproval are heard in every little corner of the van. "Oh my god Chief Sara, that was like my faaaavorite part!" the girls don't get to listen to music at camp, so the fact that i just put Brittney on pause almost has them hurdling the van seats to strangle towards me and my ipod. (yes...my ipod just so happened to have ONE Brittney Spears song on it, sue me.) after calming the masses and assuring them that Brittney would soon return, i venture out of the safety, comfort and very liberal atmosphere of our van and walk into red neck paradise disguised as a gas station. i meander towards the walk-in coolers passing by glass cases full of blades, belt buckles and confederate thongs and finally catch a glimpse of the iced coffe drinks. salvation is mine as i grab my caffeinated beverage and head back to the counter to pay for it. "Debit please." i say as i hand the nice man with a volunteer fire fighter shirt, camo hat (with fish hook attached) and giant dip in his lip my card. "Umm..ya gotta purchase enough stuff to be 5 bucks or more for us to charge yer card maa'm. " Looking around the store from where i stand i state "well then surely must be sumthin i can find me a good use for in here" and i head to the confederate clothing and supply section. Upon browsing i decide that my good friend, Klob could use a nice set of confederate flag pot holders. I snatch the dusty pot holders from their rack and go back to the nice man standing at the counter. We talk weather for a brief second, i ask about directions to the nearby suspension bridge, sign my debit receipt and thank him as i walk out. Hopping back into the driver's seat my girls are cracking up at the fact that i actually bought dixie pot holders. I remind them that it was THEM who told the only black girl in our group to "get down!" as we pulled up to the gas station in the first place. So with Brittney back on and blaring we haul the van about a 1/4 mile down the road and start up the winding muddy trail to the suspension bridge. The nice man at the "gas station" said it would be about 3.5 miles to the bridge. at what feels like about 5.5 miles we decide we are lost and turn around to head back down the mountain. I assure the girls that this time i will get more accurate directions from the red neck gas attendant and we WILL find the suspension bridge. Pulling the van back under the awning i put her in park. One girl shouts "hey wouldn't it be funny if like, you did the same thing and bought the same stuff like ground hog's day and totally freaked out the attendant?!" Hmmmmmmm.......i sit for a few seconds digesting this and reply with...."Whyyyyyyy YES! it WOULD be funny!" Ya see, my job is awesome for this very reason....I am often encouraged to act younger than my age as to keep my girls entertained and enjoying life. So that is what i do. I climb out of the van, walk into the gas station and head back to the coffee drinks. i pay close attention (once again) to the knives, buckles and dixie thong and then locate my iced coffee drink. i walk straight faced back to the counter and place the drink in front of the clerk. He looks at me somewhat confused and states that "You need to buy enough to charge 5 dollars on a debit card here." "Well then surely must be sumthin i can find me a good use for in here." i state as i head back to the confederate section. laughing my ass off in my head but re-enacting the scenario to a T i pick out another set of confederate flag pot holders and walk back up to the man at the counter. Cocking his head to the side while ringing me up he asks "is this some sorta groundhog's day er what?" I finally break a little smile, ask him about the weather and then tell him that I am back because we got lost on the way to the bridge. He gives a good hearted, but still a bit confused chuckle and goes into more detail on the trail that leads to the bridge. I walk out thanking him once again for my purchases and back to the van. Inside the van my girls and co-chief sit perched on the edges of their seats just waiting to hear what i did. I show them the pot holders, pull out my second iced coffee and they start bustin out laughing. They all can't believe that i "actually went through with it," but what fun is it to NOT do something like that and instead just talk about doing it....i'll tell ya...it ISNT fun. And that folks was the highlight of my trip to Georgia last week. Haa....Klob...those pot holders are in the mail.

Wranglers and horses make me happy.

At the the top of every Christmas list I made as a child was "Horse" in the number one slot. I never did get a horse seeing as how my family lived in town, but I still have'nt given up on the dream either. Here in Tennessee there are horse farms, stables, and riding pavillions every 1/4 mile it seems. So I was quick to make a good impression on a few people who own those said places and we are now officially friends. Yep, even got their cell phone numbers stored. Mr. Dwight is one of the cowboys who has taken me under his duster. He told me that just by lookin at me he could tell that I wanna get up on a horse and let it loose for the hills. He's pretty accurate in his impression of me. There's hardly anything in the world that can compete with the exhilirating feel of riding a horse at a dead sprint. A few years back when I went to Idaho for a week long cattle drive I was convinced that I needed to pack up all that I owned and go live in the hills on a cattle ranch. Not because I like cows, but for the sheer fact that my job would be to ride a horse around hundreds of acres every day. (Hell...after this gig is up that may just be the next thing I decide to do.) The horse i had in idaho was amazing. She was a big black mare about 14 hands high. Fitting enough was her name, Blackie. That horse was a machine. I remember getting into the saddle my first time on her. I was a bit nervous because I had been warned that she was a pistol and loved to run. (Totally what I want in a horse, but sort of nerve racking when you put into context how powerful a horse is and how delicate certain parts of the human body are such as the spine, brain, heart and ego) She proved the hype that she had been talked up to be and with a slight kick to the gut she took off on me like a firework on 4th of July. I held on and in the 10 seconds it took me to regain my boot in the stirrup we had covered about 50 yards of dirt road. My best bud, (whom i lovingly refer to as "loser") was also mounted on her horse, BM. Now you may be thinking bowel movement, but it actually stood for Big Mare. Not an understatement either. She was a few hands higher than Blackie, but she was a little lazier. Loser would kick her and mush her on like a sled dog, but the horse just tended to go at her own pace. The only thing that would get BM moving was sighting a cow who was strayed from the herd, or walking neck and neck with my horse, Blackie. When we would be coming back from the hills after driving cows all day our horses would end up neck and neck on the home stretch back to our cabins. They almost acted like teenage boys riding bikes around showing off really, one would get a little further ahead of the other (by only a nose even) and the other would speed up and move farther ahead, this competeitive walking they would do soon turned into trotting, galloping and finally sprinting. From there the only thing Loser and I could do was hold onto the reigns for dear life and laugh as trees and rocks passed by us in a blur. After getting our horses into the barn and brushed off we would bow legged-ly saunter towards the cabin for a home-cooked meal provided by the family who owned the ranch.

Now, 4 years later I have found those down home, hard-workin country folk again. They are a different family with different stories, but they still represent a part of the U.S. which I find attractive. They get up early, work hard all day and spend their free time with their family and friends playing good music, eating good food and having great conversations. I'm thinkin' that if this job and lifestyle I am living continues it may be sooner than I expected before I got my life long Christmas wish. My fingers are crossed.

I hear ya....

I was told by the locals around here that saving snapping turtles on the side of the road is a worthless cause. I'm not sure I liked being told that. Nothing is a worthless cause. Be it people, animals, plants, or old clothing some things just need a helpin hand and a second chance. I sorta feel like that's my "purpose" sometimes. I mean, I don't wanna sound all crazy or anything, but it's just how I see myself. My mom has been telling me for years about how all of the places she worked, or the people she had met were all a part of a bigger purpose of hers, and i couldn't agree more. Ya know what I mean? Like I'm a tool. Haa....not like I'm a tool, but an instrument. I feel like a mirror. I am a mirror of who you are. You need validation that your feelings matter, come hang out with me and sip a glass of vino on my porch. Bring it, I wanna hear, I wanna know, I wanna let you know that this/ that/ he/ she/ you are ok. I'm always up for giving ego boosts as well, or slapping your retarded delusions back into reality.
On the same hand, I'm not good at breakin peoples hearts. Never have been. I feel like that chick from that movie with Keanu Reeves. (which one i have no idea but i swear he's in it) Let me explain...It's like I'm here for a purpose and once that purpose has been fulfilled then I gotta go. Like a friggin fart in the wind I feel like I need to go help someone else. There are dozens of big hearted friends I leave behind me when I leave. Be it leaving KC, Des Moines, or Portland there is always a sense of loss competing with a sense of accomplishment and gratefulness. everywhere I go (even in airports/ public restrooms/ and at gas stations) I met such wonderful people. Potential life long friends, soul mates, role models, you name it....I meet em. I don't even set out to meet them either. It just happens naturally. My ears have heard some of the saddest stories being told by almost complete strangers. I have made life long bonds with the greatest people of the face of this earth who I only know once a year for a few days down in New Orleans. I can still remember the first kid (6 years old and living in filth) that I wanted to take home with me and raise. I was 17 and working as a missions trip volunteer on an Indian reservation in South Dakota. His name was Chris. Then there are the few, the proud, the ex- boyfriends. All of them with awesome redeeming qualities and lessons learned on both sides of the fence. Still some of the most kind hearted men I know and still my good friends. Then there is the often confusing, but ultimately hilarious fictional family of mine. My grandfather from Boston (not really my grandfather), My mother from Seattle (not really my mother) and my father from Boston as well (definitely not really my biological father). These people were (and don't get me wrong when i say this) supposed to be acquaintances. But once again they ended up being a bigger part of my life than i could have ever predicted.
So i guess what I'm saying here boils down to this: although I may not be around, I still remember and care about each one of you. I still tell stories about you to my new friends, and you are forever archived in my memories. I just gotta get a move on and you're comin with. So if ever you feel like talkin' or hanging out and shootin the breeze just gimmie a call or stop on over to my place on Catfish Farm Road and we can have a chat.

The ways we talk can be corn-fusing.

It took me a few days to catch onto the Cajun accent my friend, Sammy has. It's actually really pretty. Kinda a mix between a southern bell and a drunk. Ya know? Kinda slurry and all mushed up sounding words, but with ease and fancy. You gotta know Sammy to fully understand what I mean, but it is beautiful.

It didn't take me more than a minute to peg the Boston accent spuing out of the mouth of my friend , Michael the first time i met him. His accent fell from his mouth with much profanity. It reminded me of a cow chewing cud, really...there were "trademark" Bostonian words that kept coming up like "ovah heeah" and "wick-it nice." There's also something redeeming about a Boston accent, especially on a guy who's pointing at you with his cigar, head cocked and shaking around a rum and coke at the same time. Now that's classy.

Today I am still baffled by the deep southern accents of random people I have met in Tennessee. Yesterday while I was at a bluegrass festival, I ventured outside of all the action and stopped to chat with a few good ol' boys outside of a bar called the "Recreation Room." Swear to God one of them was wearing full bib overalls and had a piece of long grass jutting out from the side of his mouth. I was really only stopping to talk to them in an attempt to find the nearest ATM machine, but when I left I was more confused than when I showed up. The only thing I could understand in our short time together were the words "o'er thr." There were many hand gestures that confused me even more, and instead of smiling and saying thanks I just kind of tensed up and gave them the solid thumbs up and a smile. I really didn't know what else to do. I also never found that ATM machine. I'm convinced they were sending me to a slaughter house or a cross burning. kidding, kidding, kidding....kinda.

I'm not real clear on the means by which animals talk, but they seem to be screaming at me lately. Call me crazy, but I have made it my own personal duty to successfully remove all at-risk snapping turtles from the roads near where I live. You may think there are only a handful, but today alone I helped two. The first one needed assistance getting back into his little ditch near a cattail filled pond. When I attempted to help the second one I soon realized he needed no help. He was dead. I thought about building him a small raft of twigs ( which I would set a flame) and floating him out onto the small pond by the roadside for a proper viking turtle funeral, but instead I left him where he ly. Point being, I felt pretty proud about helping those moss covered dinosaur-esque heathens out of the way of a barrage of Peterbilts and Mack trucks. With the feeling of doing justice to the animal kingdom for the day I cruised back home in my little Honda. That's when it happened. Whap. A freakin' bird flew into my windshield and narrowly escaped certain death when at the last minute he tipped his wings up and made a defensive maneuver to avoid hitting me all together. I glanced into my rear view mirror to see him flip up belly over back a couple of times before coming to rest on the white painted shoulder line of the road. "Ah hell, i better go back and take a picture of him too." When I got back to him and got close enough to take his mug shot I saw that he was still very much alive, but stunned. He blinked about 47 times in the 10 seconds that I sat staring at him. I'm guessing he was morse-coding to me "What the F#*! are you and why are you staring at me with that shiny thing in your big hand and hey! wait?! aren't you the same a-hole that hit me 3 minutes ago?!" I'm just guessin' that's what he was thinkin,' but I could be wayy off. Regardless, I took his photo and helped him to a nearby fence post where I guessed his chances of getting eatin' by a rat snake would be far less than on the roadside where he had been laying.

Does blue grass smell like blue?

New Hampshire, Michigan, California, Florida, Kansas, North Carolina and Iowa. All of us twenty somethings have descended upon the green blue grass of Raleigh, North Carolina like a stealthy morning fog that sits on top of a warm spring lake. Were practically ninjas at this point. We have been taught the art and "zen" (if you will) of splinting a compound fracture, team restraining, and how to treat a snake bite. And no, you do not suck out the poison OR piss on it. I mean, you can, but it wont do anything but make your buddy's leg/ arm smell like piss. Although if you were proficient in your knowledge and identification of lethally poisonous snakes and one such as your everyday bull or rat snake (non-lethal) bit your friend, it would be pretty freakin hilarious if ya did pee on them. I'm just sayin.
Down the street from the house my brothers and I grew up in was a prime location for herding snakes. Every spring these little worm sized baby garter snakes would writhe in and out of the long grass that surrounded a rusted up man hole cover. The man hole itself was large enough for...well...a man to easily fit into. hence the name i guess. Anyway, my brother and a few of his dirty faced friends and i would sneak up on the snake den and then ambush the little squirrelly things. The snakes would panic and go every which way and our grubby little calloused fingers would scoop them up and shove them into jars, pockets, and pop cans. They were perfectly harmless and the only negative aspect of the whole scenario was the god awful smell that garter snakes leave behind after you handle them. I would compare the stench to that of rotting vegetables being stir fried in ammonia. Hard as hell to get off of your hands too, no matter how much spit and dirt you used to clean yourself. We pretty much just carried the snakes around with us for the day. We named them, had them race each other, and probably pointed out that "my snake is faster than your snake" and other completely irrelevant and useless information which small children seem very adamant in sharing with other small children. Eventually I stopped herding snakes and few years later and decided I was afraid of them instead. Overtime that fear completely disappeared and last spring on a bike trail in Iowa I found myself once again making a pet out of a wild bull snake for the day. He was a good sport and made one hell of a entertaining prop whenever things got boring on the trail.
Hmmmmm.....I always get way off track from what I want to write about, but this will suffice. I guess what I really wanted to write about was how great the people I am working with are. They have huge hearts, creative minds and selfless attitudes. I think we should all be cloned and sent to different parts of the world and perhaps the quality of life everywhere would become better. Damn that makes me sound like a friggin hippie, but hell....it's true. Three more days of training left before were turned loose like a rookery of albatross to parole our camps in search of emotionally needy children. Fingers crossed all of this material gives us more tools to help them when we get there.....