It's been awhile.

It's been awhile.  Too long.  Too short.  In all reality, probably more of just what I needed.

Since 1 May I spent around 22 nights in my bed, and not consecutively.  Oiy vey, I know.

So, in light of that . . . here's a momentary catch up on how I found a way past the long and painful writer's block.  I have to say, when you write as much as I do and the words refuse to come . . . it is a painful stagnation, like being suspended in mid flight with the awestruck wonder of starring at an expansive world and a gut wrenching fear as the tension isn't meant to be stationary . . . too long and you'll snap, to never return from the motley flight of dreams, death, and a sliver of deafening reality filled with angst and self loathing.

So, I finally wrote again.  Passionate, funny, and filled from my core.  Damn.  Damn, what a sweet release.

Along the way there, I meandered Turkey for two glorious weeks in May.  My presentation was stellar, as I'm not a rookie at the rodeo, and my time and travels were wonderful.  My research  . . . also good.

Of course, scenes from the roadside of poppies in bloom and sunsets from an Ankara balcony tantalize the eyes long after the moment has passed.  

Ulus.  The far side, full of religious wares.  

Then I was home for a hot second, like a week, and Summer Camp for Nerds happened . . . the annual Louisville, KY APUSH read.

And, as you must, another bourbon passport was had.  Alongside my beloved old friend of Kentucky Bourbon Barrel Ale a new friend was found.  One chocolate mint bourbon martini with . . . a KY Bourbon Barrel Ale as a back.  Shut the front door.

Ironically, as with Turkey, my time was filled with work and an amazing rate of completed to-do lists.   And this year . . . the average birth year--for our exam--was 1997 and the secondary as 1998.  In 1997 a boy tried to give me his Grandma's ring.  In 1998 I graduated college.  An old lot of memories it was.  

48 hours home . . . Sunnyside, by the seven.  There was a cuss filled run that brought me there.  We've got some perks here . . . 

And 48 hours later, I meandered down to my parents for a week.  While there, I ran some deep country roads . . . the scenery made up for the wasps that always decide I'm chase worthy.  

And Sprocket--well Jethro as my parents named him--decided he was mine while I was there. 

Always home to me.  Always.

I came home in just enough time to my old friend debut on an off Broadway number "Town Hall Rising Stars."  It's wicked cool to know one of the dudes up there I tell ya.  Oh yea, Adam Potter is his name. 

Then I went back to CT, to drop off my car, but before I made another swimsuit.  Last year, I did this number.   It was too big this year.  Holy shit, I know.  This year . . . I said it fuck to body images and went with a two piece.  That not-so-little munchkin said she wanted one just like it.  Win in my book.  

It's the Papercut pattern, by the way.  The only changes I made was to make the back solid straps, since I didn't have a hook.  Stays the hell on.  Works for me.  

Ladies painted.  

Taught a tween to knit.  I did.  

And then my Mom wanted to go home this summer, and since I hadn't been to Grand Junction since I was seven . . . I joined in.

That's Mom and Me, at the winery in Clifton . . . the little, petite Western Colorado town she's from.  It's funny that when you go back to a place, region, or moment from years past how quickly rhythms of life come back.  I'm an East Coast girl these past years --well a decade and a half--and the slow, meandering pace of life eased back in as easily as the sunflowers growing like wildfires on the roadsides.  

And yea, that's my second Sabrina.  I do love that dress.  

When I was seven my Grandpa and I went up on the Monument.  He had a white, rickety truck, always stopped at Dairy Queen, and drove a little off the charts.  Later that trip, he took my cousins Micah, Jesse, and me up on the Mesa.  My memories of that: Micah bouncing like a fool, making race car noises, me holding Jesse who was clapping wildly.  Good times, for real.

Mom, Dad, and me took a leisurely drive along the Colorado National Monument.  We didn't make the Mesa, since the altitude levels bothered them both. It was just as beautiful as I remembered.  

Of course, that was a classic old Sunday style drive . . . much like my teen years after we moved to Mississippi (and later Georgia, Kentucky, and finally Virginia).  We did a lot of Sunday drives.  When we didn't do drives there was tunafish salad for lunch.  Funny how we remember some markers of youth and life so vividly.

What I won't tell you--oh hell . . . I even went to Sunday service.  And . . . I took communion for the first time in ions.  There was a moment of muscle memory coming back and the taste of what should have been grape juice strangling my face, my father chuckling, and then my learning my Dad forgot to put mints in his coat pocket.  Seriously? Every Sunday of my youth the man had mints in his coat pocket.

There were no mints . . . and the service . . . there are things we do for our parents and ourselves . . . the sermon was, without an exaggeration, a sermon entitled "Choices." It's message: that women need not have careers, and when they get married those must be put to the wayside in favor of babies and wifely duties.  Like I said, there are things we do for love.  Not blowing my pie hole in a church is one.  I did take a long drink at the water fountain and talk a short walk around the foyer--in the middle of said sermon--so that I could breathe, exhale, and keep the Barbie Doll smile alive for the congregation.  Oiy vey.

Then, all things end and Mom and Dad flew home.  I, on the other hand, took the train route from Grand Junction to Denver.  It was . . . well, take a look at a few snippets of five hours. 

I particularly love this one.  Her view.  My view.  

 A river runs . . . shortly after I crossed under the Continental Divide.

And academics always gotta be reading.

In Denver my agnostic daughters were glad to see me and see a chance to run in the fountains.  

Other things happened in Denver . . . and I should tell you to look to the left, as I started out on the Left Coast in the Pacific Northwest and for a near ten years I've been crafting a career . . . much of it is based on travel and travel writing.  Hence, #stampsinmypassports.

My other bestie, Jen, commemorated a memory with her longtime four legged pal Lenney . . . or Lenneybird as I called her.

There's some people pissed now . . . well, yea you may not want to continue.  Fair warning.  

I got home from Colorado, and while in CT cancer news, death, and  . . . the word that my divorce came through all flooded my senses.  FYI, the legal papers are still in the forever land of "being processed."  Never thought I'd be a divorcee.  C'est la vie . . . zut alors.  

I was out East for two weeks, arriving two days after a micro storm upended trees, graves, and pools.  Though, I also used the time to find my head again.  I do not apologize for the relative silence I had while out there.  I worked.  Worked some more. . . . Let the introvert in me recover for a moment.  

And then, two research fellows went to Boston for a week.  

The Port Jefferson Ferry gave us sexy hair.  

A stupidly expensive lobster roll.  The one's in PEI last summer were better.  Sorry Mystic, CT.  

Boston Commons, from the Suffolk University archives.  Wall worthy.  I know, I do good work.  

And Salem and Plymouth Rock  . . . the history nerds were filled.  

A brief stint back in Sunnyside, Queens . . . another run occurred.

And then . . . there was an excursion to Garrison, NY to do some social policy research.  Two PhDs went hiking . . . one in flip flops and one in Berks.  There were bug bites in places that haven't seen human contact in, well, awhile.  Yea, those bugs sure did get frisky.  

Sunsets and waterfalls.  And . . . we drove 20 minutes to nowhere to find a CVS.  We were happy run back to civilization . . . which, we also attempted a scenic drive home.  The Palisades Parkway is, as Tanfer dubbed it, the Rape Highway.  There ain't nothing there, but miles and miles to get lost and not found.  

 

And  . .  . I'm in paperback!

For which, that night . . . relished in joy and finally commemorated 23 years of existence.  I'd been thinking about it for twenty.  I found a perfect design, merged two together, and changed some colors . . . Lupus is a bitch, but that anchor won't weigh me down.  In 1992, at sixteen, I was diagnosed.  Let's face it, Lupus ain't going nowhere . . . especially as the rash has been an unwanted friend more often than not again.  

So tats two and three happened.  Yup.  

There's a couple of train rides, a quilt, a sweater, the insane reno I did on my apartment sans AC (on the hottest days of the year when I was home), a few book reviews, and a few other things from the summer . . . but all in all . . . busy is good.  My endless notes and jots are forming pages now . . . now that my mind is over the strike and emotional roller coaster of the past year or so.  

Home.  Well, until I'm in New Hampshire for three days in October.