Week 7

Day 42: Sept 21, 2014

I woke up early this morning so I grabbed my yoga mat, my camera (just in case) and my water bottle and headed out to climb on some rocks and do some yoga. I ended up mainly just wandering around off the trail but I did climb on one rock and did about 15 minutes of yoga. It was really nice and surprisingly calm. I was out for about an hour when some of the remediation guys came through clearing the trail. Apparently there was a blast happening in the quarry so I grabbed my stuff and headed back (I was ready to go anyway). Then, since it is Sunday I put on my jersey and prepared to watch my phone for updates. The Packers lost but I did finish my second sock so that kinda made the loss a little easier. Since I finished one knitting project I had to start on a new one so I found a sock pattern that uses fine yarn (I have some that I need to use). It is going to take me way longer to finish this set of socks. The needles and yarn are finer which means that every stitch takes just a little bit longer because I have to be more careful that I don't break the needles. It also takes longer because it just takes more stitches to make an inch of fabric. Everyone came home today so the village is once again full. It makes just sitting around more fun when there are more people to sit around with. Plus there are all sorts of fun stories to hear and talk about. After dinner but before eucharist, Alex, Leah and I hung out on our porch and talked about life. It was such a great chat and the view of the valley didn't hurt.

Tonight was the 21^st night of September so, of course, we had a dance party where the headliner was September by Earth, Wind, and Fire. It was glorious and since I don't have to work tomorrow I was able to stay up for the whole party plus the cereal/water break afterwards. I mean we are all back in our rooms and it isn't even 11pm yet but it was so much fun. It is nights like tonight that make me wish I didn't have to get up crazy early in the morning for work. I mean, if I went to bed at this time every night I would only get about 5 hours of sleep a night. I could do that once in a while but I definitely could not make a habit out of it. Such a wonderful night!

Day 43: Sept 22, 2014

HOBBIT DAY!!! So apparently it is both Bilbo and Frodo's birthdays today so the village celebrated with first breakfast, second breakfast, elevensies, lunch, afternoon tea, dinner, and supper and, of course, we kept coffee break in there. The morning was basically solid meal times. So many mealtimes yet so little time for them all. I spent most of my day off finishing up my art work for vespers on wednesday. I represented the story of Jacob wrestling with an angel. Do you have any idea how hard it is to draw two people wrestling without making it look sexual? Well it is quite hard but I did it! Vespers tonight was very interesting and really got me thinking. Steff, one of directors, did the “sermon” and talked about “flung”peace. You know, the moment when you go from freaking out (internally or externally) to suddenly feeling peace as if peace was flung at you and suddenly hit you. It was so interesting that I felt the need to grab a pencil and paper and write down what was going through my head. It was kinda crazy.

After vespers, the twenty-somethings gathered for a little goodbye party for Katherine and Aly. They were here all summer so we decided that it would be nice to gather and celebrate that. We ended up sitting on the porch of one of the lodges, laughing and talking. It was wonderful. Sometimes sitting and talking with friends makes for the best of nights. I can tell that I am on “Holden” time though because when it was 9pm it definitely felt like 10pm. I left a little later than I wanted but it is just so hard to leave a good time. The coffee cart was calling from the distance and I knew I had to sleep before it reached me.

Day 44: Sept 23, 2014

Back to the grindstone, literally. One of the first things I did this morning was turn on the coffee grinder. It is staying dark for longer. Usually there is some light starting to find its way out before 6am but today it was at least 6 before there was even a hint of light. Wow, though, when the sun started to rise it was so beautiful. The clouds were lit from underneath with a yellow/orange hue. It is times like these that I am so amazed that I get to live in such a beautiful place. The coffee cart was pretty normal except at the very end of the shift. That was when about 20 Forest Service people came along with the normal pre-closing rush from Holdenites and so it was crazy. I think I made two pots of coffee within about 10 minutes. The coffee could not come out fast enough. Times like that, though, are what make the whole thing fun. It adds some adrenalin to the end of the shift when I am about to fall asleep. The rest of the day was pretty normal although it did take me almost an hour to count money. In the afternoon I went to the Craft Cave, took a nap, knit. There was a talk about cougars today though and that was pretty awesome. There were even some cute kitties in the presentation. It was really interesting and made me a little less weary of them. They really don't want to mess with us. They may watch us from the shadows but we are not worth it for them to attack us. The night ended with Riley, Mark, Benji, and I watching Miracle. I ended up staying up later than I probably should have but whatever, it is a great movie.

Day 45: Sept 24, 2014

Well, it seems as though it is Mayfly mating day. There were a ridiculous amount of them up by the lights this morning. It was gross and cool all at the same time. For some reason, I was just exhausted today and yet I still went down to the clay studio after lunch to mess around with clay. I ended up making a mug but I don't know if I am going to keep it. Once I finished up there I pretty much went straight to my room and took a 2.5 hour nap. It was pretty glorious. Before dinner, we had another wildlife talk so today I learned about wolverines! Apparently there is a wolverine named Sasha who lives in our area. They are really secretive so I probably will never see one but it is cool to know that one is out there. The evening was filled with staff meeting and Arrested Development. The staff meeting was long but the Arrested Development was funny so it all evened out.

Day 46: Sept 25, 2014

It was another foggy, wet day today. It was constantly drizzling and the valley was filled with low hanging clouds/fog depending on where you were. I played in the clay studio a little this afternoon and had a pretty busy evening. First, I tie-dyed a Luther sweatshirt that I found here. It was sun-bleached so it need a little sprucing up. Then, I went directly to a meeting about possibly starting a knitting group. Following that meeting I went to a talk about wolves which I had to leave a little early so that I could fit in dinner before I had to be back at the clay studio to teach some hand building (which I didn't end up teaching because everyone wanted to be introduced to wheel throwing. I was perfectly ok with that). From there I went immediately to Vespers and then straight to work in the bookstore. Luckily tomorrow will only be at least as crazy. (I am being sarcastic. I am not looking forward to tomorrow.)

Day 47: Sept 26, 2014

VIP day! Ok so here is why I was not excited for today. The day started out normal: open coffee cart at 5. But then we started to have all of the traffic that normally bypasses the village come though the village (they are working on the bypass road). This at least made the morning interesting because I could watch the trucks and such go by. Then, at 11:30, the VIPs came into the village. This means that there were an extra 100 people in the village and I was open for an extra 3 hours. That makes for a very long “morning”. However, the “morning” did end on a high note. The cross country team (two guys) went out for a meet so we had a little pep rally for them before they left. It was pretty great, especially since it was a great chance to embarrass the boys. I was able to take a little nap in the afternoon but then we also had the installation service for the new pastor which means that vespers was an hour instead of a half hour. There were two good things about the extra long service- more time to knit and the bookstore was closed tonight so I did not have to work the extra hour after vespers. That would have been miserable. It was still a fun day, though. I am exhausted, but it was a pretty good day all in all.

Day 48: Sept 27, 2014

It was as normal a day as possible. I do think I might be getting/have a cold though which might interrupt my hiking plans for tomorrow.