Vancouver Pride '06

front porch of my new house:)

from my new, beautiful camera

one of the funniest sights I have ever seen...

Those are freshly shorn, juvenile llamas peeing in synchronization.

The beautiful bikes!
This was my exciting injury after almost all the blood was cleaned up...in other words, after we all started calming down:)
This is Zeek, my new cycling coach, and Emilene the child that brought us there in the first place.
This is the view from our host's deck, a resort on San Juan Island. The three of us slept out there until I opted for the couch at about 2am.
We ran into a friend on the ferry and got all silly touristy asking strangers to photograph us:)

Picnic, the cat, is the guard-dog on this farm. He doesn't seem to comprehend that chickens are birds and so, they are quite good friends:)


The peacock couldn't seem to decide if he wanted to show off for the camera or knock me out with his big ole tail. We had a couple of close calls:)

More from the farm...

Lake Serene, sight of the hiking wedding

This is the beautiful dog Lady - she lives with the newly wed couple. I think that it is possible the hike/wedding was her idea because she definitely had the most fun charging up the muddy hills and climbing around all the fallen nurse logs.
Lake Serene is about 30 miles from Everett. My friends Julia and Aspen, see below, called me on Wednesday of this particular week and asked if I wanted to go hiking. They didn't mention that the hike was the beginning of a wedding adventure upon which the ceremony was held at the top in the beautiful, cold, wet mist. The fog was so thick, we couldn't see a lake at all. In fact, it was like being on the edge of the world which is an interesting metaphor for marriage in itself. I, odd as it may seem, met the bride after the ceremony for the first time. It was great fun and an amazing hike totalling about 9 miles.

These are my housemates:)

summer has come

I am moving on to one more new home tomorrow. The place I am moving to is kind of a dream come true. Instead of paying rent, I will be eight miles out of town in a farmhouse feeding horses, chickens, peacocks, and cats every day for the next little while. My friend Tonya is house-sitting for the owner who is vacationing in France and is so laid back that we have access to her whole house, car, and animals.

I am incredibly nervous about staying in Bellingham. Should I be in Alaska? I don't know. How am I going to bike a minimum of 16 miles/day just to get to email for the next month? I don't know. I do know that I have made some amazing friends here in the last month or so and the possibility that this might become home won't leave my mind. My gut says to go to Alaska, be adventurous, take whatever you can get, but that is the way I have always done things and I am thinking that the adventurous move now is to stay put.

So, with confidence that addressing one's fears only brings good things, I am moving tomorrow to the edge of town.

With any luck, there will be pictures within a couple of weeks for you to share in the beauty of this simple farm over-run with buttercups.

Sometimes, it can take a while. Sometimes our principles are without body, meaningless amidst their brave words.
Sometimes we take that death-defying leap reminding ourselves to breathe before hitting the water, and other times all we can do is breathe, and hope for the best.
I will pray with each additional exhale that the world will fall that much more softly into its place, and that all my peers, in this game of life, find their places at the table without too much trouble.
Love,
Natanya

Mom, this is for you:)

Okay, this is for those of you who were eager to see my new hairstyle. It's surprisingly difficult to photograph oneself and be satisfied with the pics, so excuse the glamour shots above if they don't seem right to you.

This is Michelle's baby boy, Samuel Jonah Dionne Sharpe. It is almost impossible to get a picture of him without a goofy face so there you go:)

This is hula hoop dancing!
Kelly is the master having done this crazy style of dancing for six years now. She is amazing to watch.
There are other pics of me facing the camera, but I don't look like I am dancing so I picked this one instead.
This is my friend Lina-lotta, a Swedish exchange student here at Western. (These pics are thanks to her camera:)

This is the view to the North and South taken by me hanging out my window. Campus is amongst all those trees on the hill in the background of the picture below. Check out the windowed corner of the furthest building in the picture above - that is the climbing wall at the Y. I, often, watch people climbing while eating breakfast:)

For those who will never see it in person, these are some snapshots of my first fantastic apartment in Bellingham:)

a break of sorts

I know that it seems like I disappeared, but I didn't really. Seven days ago, I could have been intercepted at the Jill Epstein bed & breakfast just outside of Chicago. Oh, and that gorgeous day in Seattle the day before, I was there too. What? the followingTuesday? all you had to do was stop by the Boca Barwood swimming pool...I mean I was right there doing my daily 1/2 miles browning the back of my neck under the Florida sun. oh yeah.. at the moment, I am sitting in the sunshine, down the street from the Daily City Bart station and had the most fantastic San Francisco dinner last night.

I mean, it isn't that hard to find me...come on:)

As a break from my studying, I just checked into the Sitka Soup, Sitka's local paper. Here is one of the treasures that I found (no author mentioned, in case you are curious).


December 15, 2005

‘Twas the night before Christmas -- throughout Sitka Sound
Not a creature stirred anywhere on the fish grounds.
The hootchies were hung in the wheelhouse with care
In hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there.

The swabbies were nestled all snug in their berths,
Dreaming of boat shares they soon would be worth.
And Mom in her Hellys and I in my Tufs
Had just set the hook where it wasn’t too rough.

When out in the spray there arose such a flapping,
Till I found what was up I wouldn’t be napping.
Athwart to the starboard I jumped with some dread
Threw open the porthole and stuck out my head.

And what should the dark waves I visaged now feature
But a mythical skiff drawn by eight ocean creatures.
With a little old captain so lively and quick,
I knew in a moment it must be St. Nick.

More rapid than eagles his denizens came
And he whistled and shouted and called them by name:
Now, Coho!, now Humpy!, now Ling Cod!, now Orca!
On Herring!, on Dolphin!, on Gumboot!, on Tuna!
To the top of the swell, to the top of the squall,
Now dash away, dash away, dash away, all!”

As the whitecaps that drive before a big blow,
Those fishies rose out of the waters below.
Right onto the deck of our boat up they flew
With a skiff full of toys and St. Nicholas, too.

And then in a twinkling I heard on the deck
The slapping of tail fins in one steady “thwack!”
The scraping of metal, the screech of the latch
And there was St. Nicholas, in through the hatch.

He was dressed all in rubber, in greens and in reds,
All covered with slime and remains of fish heads.
A duffle of toys he had flung on his back
And he looked like a fishmonger opening his sack.

His eyes how they twinkled, his dimples, enchante.
His stomach the size of the ferry Le Conte.
His smiled in the shape of a boat front – the bow –
But he smelled like a section of seldom-scrubbed scow.

His gut was bleached leather, the tone of a bellyfish,
That shook when he laughed like a bowlful of jellyfish.
He was corded and gnarled, a right salty old tar
And I laughed when I saw him, in spite of his scar.

He spoke not a word, but went straight to his craft,
Depositing goodies for all, fore and aft.
Then, laying a finger aside of his neck
He swept himself upward, back out on the deck.

He sprang to his boat, to his mates cried “We’re legal!”
And if that little skiff didn’t soar like a seagull!
But I heard him exclaim as he sailed into space
I’ll be back! Russian Christmas is here in
12 days!”

Virtual Reality

Well, I am finally here. In MY apartment, sitting alone at night staring out the rain-washed window. The lights of Bellingham are thrown against my windowed wall with every raindrop and I relish in the lack of noise. How sweet the sound of rain. Simple rain.

I am so awed by this posession of space that I can sit and dwell in my thoughts for hours on end;postponing reading, postponing human contact...postponing air. My virtual community reached via Verizon tides me over 'til the next session of homework where I converse with professors that I have never met about subjects I have never experienced, and I write on the tablets of my mind questions for another day.

I press resume on the little white machine to my right and the ocean flows again drowning out my new noisy town while I sit on my bed eating an apple in the first bowl that ever belonged to me and I have to admit, I am liking this newfound material wealth and the virtual world I can currently be found within with the touch of a button. Just press send.

The adventure of adventure

…and finally, I drive my way out of Albuquerque. I took CB all the way to grandma’s and kept right on going.

The Santa Ana’s have already passed me off to the Zias and I find myself lined by red sand walls leading the way to Cuba. Apparently, just as the pioneers experienced, not all who pass this way, survive. Here I sit writing out my modern sensitivities attempting to aptly punctuate this shrubbish landscape when nothing is more apt than the double white cross watching from the side of the road, framed with colorful funereals - those flowers we only give in combination after death.

And onward I go. God only knows where I will sleep tonight.

The next sign to pull me off the main road says Walatowa pueblo and it is like another world. Hardly enough room for a car, the adobe homes criss-cross the land and the crinkly dark-skinned people look at you with suspicion. In this old fashioned paradise, you must remember the taste of the Walatowa with your heart. It is against the rules to record in any other fashion.

I spent one of the most painful nights ever in Jemez last night. Determined to prove the humans wrong, I pulled my tent out of the truck and settled the only bit of flat land that I could find in the ever encroaching darkness. I had every right to be afraid for my hands, my feet, and my safety. I was, to be frank, colder than I ever expected and regretfully, I almost paid a somber price for my ignorance.

Envisioning the perfect campsite from Spence Hot Springs as the sun was slowly swallowed by one tree lined hill after another, was not exactly the reality of my sleeping situation. It is true that the blanket of stars I was pitched under was remarkable. I counted six meteors in less than ten minutes and that might even be a record for me. It is true that the Rio Guadalupe sang a beautiful song as it rushed underneath its icy cover, and it is true that I was eager to sleep outside with the wild ones, even if it meant being slightly uncomfortable.

On the other hand, when you are sleeping, or trying to at least, on the side of a concrete barrier, ten feet from the road and it is colder than fuck regardless of the three layers of sleeping bags you find yourself buried in, the stars and the river become a secondary, rather superficial, experience.

I found the only way to truly warm up was to rejoin the truck and to drive without destination until I no longer winced with pain exuding from my hands and feet. When I returned for take two of Natanya’s winter tenting adventure in the Jemez Mountains, I added a wool sweater, long underwear, a scarf, and socks to the already overdone, in any normal place that is, stock of warming props. I began to manipulate the layers of synthetic genius around me just so, and was almost immediately rewarded An hour later however, I found my body shivering again, and this time I had no more ideas. I resigned myself to the elements and passed into a form of delirium, typical of those who place themselves in tents on mountain sides in December without the proper equipment.

I did all of this to see the canyons surrounding me glowing red first thing in the morning.

It is true that I missed the sunrise. By the time I awoke, there was no red to be found and the wind blew what looked to be snow in my eyes as I stuck my head out the zippered door.

Time to pack it up. I could not have been more eager to get out of that place. I ignored my hands as the pain began again promising myself that it was just a couple minutes more until everything was in the truck and I could relish in the internal warmth. But, I waited too long, and as I sat 1/2 mile down the road hanging from my seatbelt retching out the driver’s side door in response to the pain, I began to question my sanity.