To the lover of wilderness, Alaska is one of the most wonderful countries in the world.

John Muir

John Muir certainly is right. Alaska is full, chalk full, of wild and scenic places. It is a mecca for all outdoor sports and recreation. I became enthralled with the idea of living and working in Alaska because of its mountains and wildlife. However, I am finding increasingly more interesting things to do here outside of backpacking and glacier viewing.

It has been a late spring and a late summer. Consequently, the snow is still covering the upper (and sometimes lower) portions of the trails. More than once, I have been turned around by gobs and gobs of snow. And my healthy fear of the massive brown bears has stymied my drive to hike and backpack alone in these mountains. Therefore, I decided to have a weekend in the city of Anchorage.

Katie, Carolyn and I bought tickets to the Marshall Tucker Band for Thursday night and trundled to Anchorage after work. The concert was a blast and it turns out that I know more Marshall Tucker Songs than I originally thought. The crowd was full of bikers and baby boomer revelers and some young hicks. I am fairly certain that the entire band was toasted upon arrival and the tight pants of the lead guitarist and the long scraggly hair on all of them made the concert even more entertaining. At one point, all of the band members except Marshall Tucker himself, took off for a smoke or something. The venue was fairly low key and so Katie and I were able to get right up close to the stage and even stand next to Marshall Tucker while he was taking a break. We wrapped up the evening at a bar that could have been the Union Club if it had a live band and a dance floor.

Katie and I stayed the night with an old roommate of hers in Anchorage. We borrowed bikes and took the town by storm the next day. We went into the little touristy knickknack shops and the salvation army and the native arts stores and tried to do a tour about John Cooke but found we couldn't pay attention. We perused the parks and sat and people watched and smelled the salty air. After awhile we found Glacier Brewhouse and partook of their beer sampler tray. We tried ten beers in all including a plum lambic and raspberry wheat beer as well as an imperial blond ale and an imperial IPA. There beer was good but not great. The atmosphere was excellent and the bar tender made our day. He had spent a lot of time hiking in our neck of the woods and we discussed different trails.

Then we took a massively long bike ride out to the strip mall area and visited REI, where I deposited a lot of money in what I like to think of as a fine investment, a pair of fire boots. It sounds like the trail crew depends and expects to go on fires every year. I have grown out of my old fire boots so I figured I better replace them. I hope that we go on a fire now, because I have some pretty kick-ass boots. I opted out of the conventional whites or hawthornes because the arches are too high and got some La Sportivas that look silly as hell but are just as comfortable.

We also trekked to Value Village and the Salvation Army as well as an excellent Italian restaurant with a salad bar. The price shock has been a bit crippling when it comes to me buying produce so I haven't had a healthy dose of veggies since I got up here. The salad bar was great and just what I needed. We adventured home on our bikes at around 9:00 pm and made it home just before the rain started pelting down. We had hoped that her friend would be around to drive to Costco or a grocery store but she wasn't so we hoped on our bikes again with our backpacks and took off for a grocery store in the pouring rain. I bought 25 cans of veggies and spaghetti sauce, a huge thing of peanut butter, 10lbs of apples and 5lbs of carrots as well as 2 quarts of yogurt and some couscous. My pack was heavy. I shall not be buying 25 cans at once again. The uphill on the way home was interesting, to say the least...

Katie and I stayed up late listening to music on youtube including North To Alaska, which is a song I had never heard before.

Saturday morning Katie's friend's family took us fishing in Whittier. You have to take a train tunnel in your car to get there and traffic can only go one direction at a time and if a train is coming all the traffic has to wait for the train to pass through. Whittier is where all the Princess Cruises stop off and everyone in the community lives in one giant apartment complex. The scenery around the bay is breathtaking and multiple glaciers spill into the ocean in the area. There is also the world's second largest seagull rookery.

We set to the sea and laid shrimp pots in a secret place and then went to another secret place and fished for chum and king salmon. We got skunked on the fish but we kayaked and chatted and watched the eagles and listened to music and sat silently and contemplated the wonder of the land around us. Katie and I felt ecstatic to be so lucky as to be in Alaska fishing and kayaking and boating on the ocean. Kayaking was the most liberating thing after biking...to move of my own volition at a high speed and little effort to move without the graciousness of a car ride and the power of my own muscles. It was wonderful. I am becoming really serious about finding a bike and a kayak to use on the Kenai lake now. We had a lot of shrimp in the shrimp pots and I got way out of my comfort zone when I ripped their little heads and legs off. Their bodies still jerk after they have been decapitated. It was a horrible experience at first but then I realized that I was harvesting food and that these shrimp would be wholesome food in the end. I got a chance to drive the boat and grounded the lines on a sudden increase of ocean depth. Oops.

We had a successful hitch hike back to our home thanks to a spunky FWP intern from Texas. And we had a wholesome dinner of shrimp and pasta after oogling our sprouting garden. The broccoli, peas and radishes and beets are all sprouting now! I ended up joining some other folks at a show in Cooper Landing. The crowd was overwhelming but the music was good, some mix of samba and African drumming jam band. It made me very nostalgic for the samba dances in Missoula but the crown was different and I danced on edge and hung close to fire, enjoying myself but missing the energy that connects us all. There is something strangely hollow about the people who have been here for years. I find an affinity to my fellow first years but feel isolated and distant from the others. There is something that I can't put my finger on that makes the energy of Cooper Landing a Moose Pass less accessible. I shall cogitate on it more and in the mean time find joy in my fellow dorm mates who find delight in the smallest of things and wonder in the very act of being in Alaska.

Next weekend is the Solstice and a great festival at Moose Pass. I can't wait because I think the music will be great and the attitude will be positive. I may even enter a pie in the contest.

NORTH TO ALASKA

Jimmy Horton

Way up north, (North To Alaska.)

Way up north, (North To Alaska.)

North to Alaska,

They're goin' North, the rush is on.

North to Alaska,

They're goin' North, the rush is on.

Big Sam left Seattle in the year of '92,

With George Pratt, his partner, and brother, Billy, too.

They crossed the Yukon River and found the bonanza gold.

Below that old white mountain just a little south-east of Nome.

Sam crossed the majestic mountains to the valleys far below.

He talked to his team of huskies as he mushed on through the snow.

With the northern lights a-running wild in the land of the midnight sun,

Yes, Sam McCord was a mighty man in the year of nineteen-one.

George turned to Sam with his gold in his hand,

Said: "Sam you're a-lookin'at a lonely, lonely man."

I'd trade all the gold that's buried in this land,"

For one small band of gold to place on sweet little Ginnie's hand.

"'Cos a man needs a woman to love him all the time."

Remember, Sam, a true love is so hard to find."

I'd build for my Ginnie, a honeymoon home."

Below that old white mountain just a little south-east of Nome."

Where the river is winding,
Big nuggets they're finding.
North to Alaska,
They're goin' North, the rush is on.
Way up north, (North To Alaska.)
Way up north, (North To Alaska.)
North to Alaska,
They're goin' North, the rush is on.
North to Alaska,
They're goin' North, the rush is on.

Everyday seems to have a theme song. Sometimes it's the same song day after day. Sometimes it is the same day song after song and some songs seem to fit everyday. This weekend's song was Wagon Wheel by Old Crow Medicine Show or Bob Dylan or whoever you would like to give credit to. If you don't know it...you should find it.

Heading to the south from the land
of the pines, thumbing my way out
of North Caroline, staring at the road
pray to god, I see headlights. Well,
I made it down the coast in 17 hours
picking me a bouquet of dogwood floweres
and I'm a hoping for Raleigh, I can
see my baby tonight.

It went like this. Katie, one of my dorm mates and co-conspirator in the quest to see and do everything there is to do in Alaska plus, thumbed our way out of Moose Pass with nothing more than our backpacking gear and a vague plan to hike a trail on the tundra and then attend a music and arts festival in celebration of the Kenai river. We caught a ride from a co-worker straight away. He dropped us off at the meeting of two highways where the Forest Service has an interpretive van set up. We visited with our co-worker rangers who were stationed there for awhile. They had a scope focused on some mountain goats on the hillside. They are looking fairly scraggly. Then we walked and walked and watched and watched as the single passenger cars rolled on by. We were picked up about a mile down the road by a lady, who in retrospect, was quite emotionally distraught and probably drunk. We ditched her as soon as we could using the excuse that we had to pee and wanted to explore a short nature trail. We were picked up shortly thereafter by a Georgian halibut fisherman and he was pleased as punch that there were some girls out there with the guts to go backpacking on their own. Humph!!!

We were planning to hike on the tundra from one highway to the next on a 5 mile long trail and past 4 lakes. As we started off on the faint trail, we were attacked by mosquitoes. So many mosquitoes we were choking on them and as we batted at them and dodged our feet began sinking further into brown red muck. After a couple hundred feet or so, soaked to our calves, itchy and a bit lost, we turned back to come up with a plan B. It was obvious that the muck and the mosquitoes and the ever disappearing trail was going to make for a very miserable experience. So we pulled out the map and found another promising trail. It was a trail that I had been working on for the past week and led past some scenic falls, great views of an ice field and a back country cabin on a lake. So we hitched a ride back towards from whence we had come and began our new hike. It was a very pleasant hike through spruce and birch with plenty of views of craggy mountains and glittering snow fields. We set up camp and dined and explored the area. At around 10pm or so we were visited by a very disturbing sound. It was something like a whining moo. We were a bit startled and thinking it might be a moose or a baby bear or a distraught mama bear looking for her cubs, we banged pots and pans and made as much noise as we could. The noise ran off and it sounded as though it was a big animal. It may have also been a big bird...hard to say. The noise returned two more times in the night and banged and clanged it away. We did see a small black bear on the hike out, so maybe that was what the noise was. It did seem like our camp site was right in the midst of an animal thoroughfare to the lake.

We hitched a ride into Soldotna with some Moose Passers and there we found our way to the Kenai River Festival which had live music by Southern Comfort and 6 dollar salmon dinners complete with potato salad, tabbouleh, muffins and bread. We browsed the local crafts and participated in some kid's activities. There were some folks with eagles and owls milling about and a lot of interesting people. We had a grand time and I felt a little bit infinite. Then we ran some errands, i.e. picked up groceries and stuffed them in our already full backpacks. A new brewery had just opened up next to the grocery store so we checked that out as well. As far as I can tell, they make excellent beer and it will continue to get better. They had a great unfiltered hefeweizen and a wonderful vanilla bean porter. The decor was really creative and we met a nice old couple to drove us half way home and invited us to stay in there guest cabin whenever we wanted. We got a ride the rest of the way home from a guy that I do stream watch volunteering with. When we got home, we were exhausted and happy. Hurray!

Katie and I planted a garden this week too. The garden plot was already there from dorm residents prior so we fixed it up, mended the fence, pulled our the weeds and transplanted the perennials and planted us some peas, broccoli, kale, scallions, zucchini, cucumbers, carrots, beets, radishes, spinach and Swiss chard. We are also going to plant an herb garden in an old rusty wheel barrow taking up space on the compound. We have been watering it with buckets and a colander because we don't have a hose. It is a great little project and we are both glad to have something to take care of this summer.

Our next adventure will be making sourdough tonight. I got some starter from a gal on my crew and revived it. We are trying to come up with a way to grind our own flour. We are also scheming on brewing some beer, probably an amber or a hefeweizen. Work...well...work is work and the tempo will be changing soon. The Russian River opens for fishing the 11th and so we will be changing projects. I am excited for a change that is for sure.

Well, I gotta get a move on before the sun
I hear my baby calling my name and I
know that he's the only one
and if I die in Raleigh, at least I will die free.
So rock me mama like a wagon wheel,
rock me mama anyway you feel.
Hey mama rock me.
Rock me mama like the wind and the rain.
Rock me mama like a southbound train.
Hey moma rock me.

This is just a general I made it here and I need to exclaim and hoot and holler and rejoice in every way possible post. I don't really know anyone around me yet to do a celebratory leaping dance with, so I'm doing it here!!!

It is gorgeous here!! Tear-evoking...breath-taking, wild beyond belief and absolutely just exactly and not at all what I had thought. had a great bird's-eye-view of the wilds as the plane descended for landing in Anchorage. I was blown away by the blankets of snow on the craggy peaks and glaciers spilling into the bay. The land looked frigid and cold beneath. And to be honest, it is kind of frigid and cold out. They tell me that I have arrived with the good weather and for that I am grateful. The temperature surely has not risen above 60 and the snow level is about 20 feet above my head. One lake that I passed on the bus ride to my new home was halfway covered in ice. On the bright side, however, the sun is up for 20 hours a day, I spotted a baby moose and two baby rabbits as well as numerous leafing plants and budding flowers and the sun is warming. I also talked to several people people who were planting their gardens this week. So it looks like I will experience spring twice this year.

I was fortunate enough to spend my first weekend with Sarah Slauson and she indoctrinated me with a fine Alaskan wedding. Sarah's brother was getting married (informal, the ceremony was in a back yard and began two hours late). My major contribution was taking over the sewing of the groom's vest from the bride, who was dead set on him wearing that vest but still hadn't showered or make-upped. So I offered to help and had only intended to do some rudimentary hems and then hand it back over to her for the more complicated process of fitting and button-holing. In the end, she took long enough and ceremony was late enough that I, with the help of Sarah, ended up fitting and sewing the groom right into that vest. Very fun, indeed.


I took the bus from Anchorage to the Kenai lake work Center. It is half way to Seward. The work center is where I will be living and working for the rest of the summer and it is surrounded by craggy snowy mountains and flanked by an amazing powder blue lake that curves and stretches for miles like and "s." I am awestruck everyday. Montana is certainly a scenic place that instills many with wonder and awe but I have never seen anything like this valley or like the chains of mountains rising from flats around anchorage. As we drive the roads, I feel as though the wildlife is going to explode upon me. The potential for wildlife, the wildness, and the propensity for people to be oogling wildlife on the side of the road etc. makes me feel like I am in YNP, only less parky or touristy and more like holey shit...this place is a wild place and doesn't have park borders. I haven't seen much in terms of large wildlife but I have heard of plenty sightings happen right around where I live and work. From the chatter around the compound, one would think that human-bear interactions were everyday phenomena. I am a bit reticent to have an actual close-up interaction myself. I had rifle and shotgun training last week and we practiced shooting a charging bear target in the face. The real number of maulings is very low but I am still a bit worked up about encountering an aggressive bear. I went for a run to a lake the other day and brought bear spray, at a co-worker's suggestion. It was a great outing and I almost went for a swim but the wind blew cold and I opted out of it (very un-rachel-like, i know)

I got to go on a lovely hike yesterday with another co-worker. We took her dogs and made our way to a petite little lake. On the way the dog got itself into some baby bunnies. I am not sure if they will survive the dog-chewing but they were sure cute little things. They weren't bleeding externally so perhaps they will make it.

I have encountered some really nice people up here and I am really hopeful for a full and exciting summer. The work will be unlike anything I have done in the past. Strange, you say, and I think so too. However, my crew will spend the next three weeks constructing boardwalk on the world's most fished river, the Russian River. Construction includes the use of ATVs to transport our numerous electrical tools and saws, generators and manufactured boards and railings. The district gets most of its funding from this project and has spent the last 12 years on it. Moreover, they are all veterans of the trail crew and have the routine down pat, like a well-oiled machine, they are. I am the only new person on the crew, am the only clueless one and have asked some pretty novice questions. There is a lingo to living up here and I haven't quite caught on so the short-cuts need to be explained. However, I need to relax into the fact that I am clueless, it is my first week, after all, and I should be allowed. After June 11, when the fishing season opens and the Russian River will be lined with fisher-people shoulder to shoulder, our crew will move onto other projects. In the past, the crew had a big project elsewhere and established a base-camp with giant stoves and wall-tents and ATVs etc. and worked for 8 days and then had 6 days off. This may not be the case this year. I know we will have at least one eight day hitch. In one way the break from tradition may be good. I will get to do many projects on many different trails and therefore see more of the district, instead of being pigeon-holed into one trail and one project. On the other hand, I will only have three days off in a row, and for someone relying on public transportation to get around the state, three days is hardly enough to get to Anchorage and back. However, there are many adventuresome folks with cars in my area and I am hopeful that we will be friends and have shared outings.

In fact, my first shared outing was to a bar to see some co-workers perform at an open mic. I have also been on several more hikes up to a glacier and as far as the snow will let me go on nearby drainages. I went backpacking with some fellow dormmates last friday and that was really fun. I had volunteer orientation on Saturday morning at 7:30 so I had a very early morning hike out. I sang and told jokes outloud and realized that I can only remember 2 or 3 jokes so if you have any good ones you should let me know.

I am also gearing up to fish. It is inspiring that everyone here does it and I think I will be able to find many mentors and teachers. I have found some folks interested in fishing with a novice such as myself, which is heartening. My volunteering is a for a project called the Russian River Streamwatch. It is a group of folks who go out to the Russian River in the peak of fishing season and pick up trash, inform people of rules and regulations and generally act as a Forest Service presence in the face of what they "combat fishing." Folks line this river shoulder to shoulder during the salmon runs and it can get ugly. Dead fish, hooks, bears, dogs, children, gun fights, you name it. I am volunteering because I want to see the circus for myself as well as to get an opportunity to meet some people from around the area. All of my fellow volunteers have been around for years and know the ins and outs fairly well. One couple are the campground hosts for the campground right across from where I live. We chatted for a while and the husband has offered to teach me how to fly fish on the river that goes through the campground. Fishing starts on the 11th, so I will let you know if I get hooked :)

I am very happy to be here right now and have just crossed Alaska off my list of life goals (cheesy, but true). It feels very rewarding and I can see myself being happy here for the next 4 to 5 months. Perhaps the work may not be as challenging as I expected but I live with some really cool people and we have all sorts of plans from planting a garden, to learning spanish, to having drum circles, to brewing beer, to baking bread to backpacking to going to Denali to canoing etc, etc, etc. I do miss Missoula already though. There are three Missoulians stationed up here and several who have graduated from the U of M or who are linked to Missoula in one way or another.

I will try to be more consistent in my posts here, so check back and comment often.

Tada Ima.

I am now home after another epic five weeks in Japan. Among MANY things, my visit included another pilgrimage to Hiroshima. Last year, I went to both Hiroshima and Nagasaki and while in Nagasaki wrote this poem in response to my feelings. I had intended to the leave the poem folded in a paper crane at the epicenter in Horishima last year but I didn't have enough time. I intended to leave it this year come hell or high water but I forgot the crane at Taylor's apartement in Kokura and had no written record of it with me. So I'll post it here in hopes that the ether will receive it instead.

PEACES OF NAGASAKI

We are bombing the whole

world to pieces. We have

forgotten the hours of August

so warm, so scorching hot,

that shadows burned so fiercely

that they clung to the walls

even as the sun fell down.
Memories have slipped away

with the cobwebs of time

and the blasted scars have faded

into steel graves. New generations

push forth, squeaky clean.

Remind them of war.

Remind them of fog, gloom and hate.

Remind them of sunless days

shadowed with mushroom

clouds, of the fragile crust

of life and the tune of animosity.

For who can appreciate the beauty

of peace without knowing

the ugliness of war.

Gray Mornings

I fell for it once and I
said I will never do that again.
I have an idea of what the results
should be. I have an idea of what
should be produced.

But there is a problem with
the methodology. There is a
disconnect between what should
and what will happen.

Been there, done that.
It did not work so why
bother? I am so emotional
I think I am going to bust
a vein. I am trying to navigate
through that.

So I have gone back to the
drawing board. I am trying
to figure it out. I am looking
at how to live life right. There
are books to read, advice
from parents. The level
of articulation on this topic
is immense.

I have gained a more personalized
understanding of the problem,
therefore I will find a solution.

This is a poem I wrote entirely from excerpts from a lecture given in my anthropology class. Even though he was blabbing on and I wasn't following his thought process, I felt like writing down his words, because, strangely, they are very applicable in many different ways. Julie-maybe you will appreciate this poem the most!!!

I am here. What is here? Right now it is the library on the U of M campus in Missoula, Montana. Where was I before? Oh, various buildings on the campus and before that, Gardiner Montana for a Bluegrass Festival and before that, Seattle Washington for a friends wedding and before that, Necklace Valley in the Alpine Lakes Wilderness in Washington for work, and before that, the Gearhart Wilderness in the Fremont National Forest in Oregon and before that, The Diamond Peaks Wilderness in Oregon and before that, the Wenachee National Forest in Washington and before that, the Little Pend Oreille Wildlife Refuge in Washington and before that, the Alpine Lakes Wilderness in Washington and before that, the Malheur National Forest in Oregon and before that the Willamette National Forest in Oregon and before that Eugene, Oregon for Northwest Youth Corps staff training and before that Missoula, Montana, finishing up another semester of school and before that....well I've lost track so why should you keep track?

*******

Dear friends,

How are you?

I hope that it is well.

If you are interested in donated to the school that I volunteered with in Ghana, read on.

I hope that you all remember my dear friends at Tuskegee International School (TIS) in Ghana. For those of you who don't, TIS was one of the places that I volunteered while I was living in Ghana. The headmaster and mistress, Gloria and Charles treated me as their own, cooked meals for me, bought me gifts and allowed me to teach at their school. Their love and compassion had a huge affect on my time in Ghana.

The school is in the midst of a developing area. All of the houses in the area belong to expatriates or people of relatively more than the average income. However, few, if any of the houses are complete because the owners work on completion as they get enough funds. In the meantime, they allow a family or two to squat in their incomplete houses, kind of permanent house sitters. Therefore, all the kids that attend this school are incredibly poor. Many of them are on "scholarship" which means that Gloria and Charles allow them to go to school without paying their school fees. In addition to paying school fees, these children and their families must buy uniforms, books, pencils and lunch. As a result, many kids do not have notebooks for their homework, do not eat lunch or get beaten for not wearing a uniform.

Charles and Gloria are in the midst of building, in that same slow process, classrooms for fourth, fifth and sixth graders. Charles and Gloria dream of building a volunteer house on the property adjacent to the school. They hope that volunteers will come, pay to stay in the house and for meals, teach at the school and explore Ghana. They intend to use the volunteer fees to buy books, pay their teachers better, provide free meals and give more scholarships.

Last year, thanks to many generous donations, I was able to send them almost $500 dollars. I have attached pictures of the construction project. It is an incredible feeling to look at those pictures and see a building where, when I was working there, there was nothing.

I wholeheartedly believe in what they are trying to do and want to help them organize a volunteer program once they have the quarters built. In the meantime, I would like to ask that, if you have any extra funds this Christmas or are looking for a worthy cause to donate to, that you give to Tuskegee International School in Frafraha, Ghana. Moreover, if you would like to make a donation in anyone's name, I will be happy to send pictures or more information to you. Simply:

1. Make out a check to Rachel Kaufman with Ghana or Tuskegee International School in the memo on the check and send it to

Rachel Kaufman

2252 Westfield Court

Missoula, Montana 59801

In February (I am going to Japan for most of Dec. and Jan.), I will wire donations Charles and Gloria.

Five dollars will pay for a child's meal for a month

Ten dollars will pay for a uniform

Twenty dollars will pay for a semester or trimester of school

Charles and Gloria will use the money at their own discretion and funds may go towards anything I mentioned above. I fully trust Charles and Gloria to put donations towards legitimate projects.

I have copied some of the correspondence emails that I had with Charles last year. They include an interesting laundry list what they did with last year's donations and many thank yous and expressions of gratitude. They are very interesting and may impassion you to their cause!!!

HI RACHEL,

YES, I WENT IN FOR THE MONEY LAST THURSDAY AND WANTED TO DO THE PURCHASES OF THE MATERIALS SO THAT I COULD SEND U THE INFO BUT WE HAD LIGHTS OFF IN TOWN FOR TWO DAYS.THE TOTAL AMOUNT WAS 4,284,500 CEDIS I HAD FROM WESTERN UNION THE TRUST BANK, MADINA. I HAVE THE SCHOOL ACCOUNTS THERE.THE FOLLOWING ITEMS WERE BOUGHT AND WORKED WITH ON SATURDAY 4/2/2006:1.

35 BAGS CEMENT : 1,890,000 CEDIS2.

1 TRIP OF SAND : 800,0002.

1 TRIP OF STONE: 650,000 CEDIS

3. BLOCKS -300- 1,350,000 CEDIS

WORKMANSHIP : 600,000 CEDIS

FOR A MASON AND A LABORER FOR 2 DAYS.

TOTAL: 5,290,000 CEDIS

WE GIVE U AND THE DONORS THANK U ONCE AGAIN.

THE FLOORING OF CLASSES 4 TO 6 WAS DONE ON SATURDAY AND WE SHALL GET U SOME PICTURES. WE HOPE GOD WOULD BLESS U AND YOUR PARENTS AND FRIENDS WHO MADE IT POSSIBLE. IF WE COULD GET SUCH HELP EVERY MONTH FOR ABOUT 12 MONTHS, WE COULD FINISH OUR IMPORTANT PROJECTS TO MAKE IT COMFORTABLE FOR THE KIDS. THANKSI SHALL CONTACT U SOONDO NOT FORGET ABOUT THE VOLUNTEER PROJECT.

YOURS CHARLES

(TUSKEGEE, GHANA)

On 2/19/06, charles yarfoh wrote:

HI RACHEL,

HOPE U HAVE HAD MY LAST LETTER ON THE RECEIVAL OF THE MONEY.

WE HAVE DONE THE FLOOR OF CLASSES 4 TO 6, AND AS AT YESTERDAY WE RAISED SOMEFEW BLOCKS AROUND CLASSES 1,2 AND 3 TO TRY AND REDUCE THE WIND AND RAIN INTO THE CLASSROOMS. WE ARE GRATEFUL FOR YOUR HELP AND HOPE THESE PICTURE WILL GIVE A FAIR IDEAAS TO HOW IT WENT.

HI RACHEL,

I JUST HAD UR LETTER YESTERDAY. THANKS FOR EVERYTHING AND UR CONCERN, TIME AND CONTRIBUTIONS FOR US. I HAD UR BEAUTIFUL STICKERS YESTERDAY, A DAY AFTER WE HAD VACATED FOR THE EASTER HOLIDAYS.U ARE THE ONLY VOLUNTEER TO HAVE ACTUALLY THOUGHT OF US AFTER LEAVING. NONE HAVE CONTRIBUTED TO US THE WAY U DID AND WE ARE GRATEFUL.VERY FEW PUPILS PAY FEES TO HELP PAY TEACHER SALARIES SINCE THE SCHOOL CARES FOR A GOOD NUMBER OF THEM AND ATTRACT NOTHING FROM NO WHERE. THE MONEY U SENT US REALLY SENT SOME OF OUR STRUCTURES FORWARD AND WE ARE GRATEFUL. THEY SAY "ROME WAS BUILT OVER A LONG PERIOD OF TIME" SO I TAKE CONSOLATION FROM THAT. PLEASE, TRY AND GET PEN FRIENDS FOR MY KIDS, THE LAST LETTERS THEY WROTE WERE POSTED BY MR. NKANSAH AND SINCE THEN THEY NEVER HAD THE REPLIES TO THEM.

COULD U MAKE SOME CONTACTS WITH A FEW OFFICES TO SEE IF U COULD CHANCE ON A FEW SECOND HAND LAPTOPS FOR US, SOME FEW FRIENDS WHO OFTEN COME DOWN SAY THEY GET THE LAPTOPS BY MOVING FROM OFFICE TO OFFICE OR WRITE TO THEM AND THEY ARE NOTIFIED WHEN REPLACEMENTS ARE DONE BY THE COMPANY.

THANKS FOR ALL THE TROUBLES AND TO UR PARENTS AND RELIABLE FRIENDS AND FOES ALIKE. I WILL KEEP U UPDATED ALWAYS.

ME DA SI, AKPE.

THANKS, CHEERIO & SHALOM

CHARLES

I'm going to Japan!!!!!
Count the days: I'm leaving the US of A Dec. 15 and returning Jan. 21!!!!!

Snow Lake

I woke up at sunset, having slept
through the bristling hot day
and looked out over the frigid
lake afire with the setting sun.
So strong were the waves of color
in the sky that they splashed
into the water and so clear
were the mountains that I
could not tell solid from reflection,
dream from reality.

Tag

I tried to catch a rainbow today.
It slipped through my hands
and disappeared into the hills.
I tried to catch the sun today,
but I ran and ran and ran
out of breath. I tried to catch
you today, but found you
running right beside me.

Things that are broken:
My computer: the mouse clicker doesn't work and sometimes it doesn't recognize disks and it wont go to "my computer."
My car: the automatic transmission warning light comes on sporadically
My Mp3 player: who knows...I guess I shouldn't have taken it hiking with me...
My bike light: maybe it's out of batteries.
My watch: The velcro wrist band is all worn out.
My water bladder
My hiking boots: They are not in dire striates but they leak in holy places.
My bike: their is a large hole in the tire, not the tube, the tire. Actually, I fixed that.
My camera: the memory card always wants to format and my computer will not read it. Actually, I may have solved that problem as well.

Things that are not broken:
My dehydrator
My phone
My bones
My camping gear
My favorite pants

yap, I think that's it.

Spring Thaw

Like the highly anticipated
spring rain you
washed over me.
Cool water in a sheath
of brisk breathy air.

Oh what a winter it was,
frosted with lonely nights,
sleepy hours. I was pitted
and hollow, an empty shell
swelling around an ice core.

I saw through the glass
to your eye and like
an icicle in May,
I melted, a jagged point
dulling into a pool of silver.

You swooped in like
a summer storm and I uncurled
my wings, slowly sharing
those feelings petrified
in winter’s wayward wind.

Now July has settled
in like a stagnant stone
and summer’s thawing
warmth has so quickly
retracted into wilting heat.

Crystal Litmus

I carried you here
for years untold, a banished
flame, a bud of crystal
litmus curled beneath
a bundle of paper cranes.

I held you close for fear
of flying. I held you
close and squeezed
with boa constrictor
might. How tight a torrid
tangle did emerge
and how it did bind
me like a noose of steel.

And in that rush of rain
and sleet, I lost my hold
on you, on my ground,
my golden chrysalis.

But my gasping, grasping
hand did find you riding
atop the foaming brine
and my water logged
lunges did breath easy
once again. All for
the love we shared.

Live With Intention
Walk to the edge
listen hard. Laugh
Practice wellness. Play
with abandon. Continue to
learn. Appreciate your
friends. Choose with
no regret.
Do what you love.
Live as if
this is all there is.
Mary Anne Radmaches

You know that feeling...that feeling like you are stuck in between times. That's what I feel right now. I'm stuck in between starting and ending, the earth and the sky, Montana and Washington and finally, I'm stuck in between people.

I finally found my place in Montana...I found of group of kids where I can be more like myself than I've ever felt. They were high energy, both in actions and karma. And now we have parted ways...we have scattered to the four corners of the world, literally. I'm missing them, I'm missing their support and their love and their hugs and their laughs. But I'm back in Washington with old friends, comfortable friends and I'm feeling comfortable and I'm feeling a misconnection. There must be some quote out there for what I'm feeling. Something like old friendships never die, they just fade away. They did just fade away...

I went to SU graduation yesterday. It was one of the most emotional things I've done in awhile and I wore mascara to boot. It figures I would wear makeup the one day I'm going to cry my eyes out. But watching my peer group walk across the stage and collect there diploma, toss their hats into the air and hug each other with giant grins made me think about my life's what ifs and should haves, could haves, might haves. I could have been walking across that stage in the middle of Qwest field, "Rachel Kaufman, Magna Cumme Laude" and worn my Honors Program Cords. I would have been number 16 on the list of students who completed the Honors Program at SU. I could have been up there too. I know that I took the right path when I chose not to return to SU. I know my life has been rich and full and right, but the what ifs are emotional to entertain.

More over, all those people walking across the stage, I knew so many of them. They were good friends, but not anymore. Where did that go? Are the bonds I make so easy to break? It seems so... I feel like I am facing so many close relationships that have gone cold. That doesn't mean that they were worthless at the time, no not at all. It just means that I'm no good at beneath the surface or second times or long distance or substance.

I wish I could say everything I need to say here. I wish I could always say everything I need to say.

Last Song
by Jason Webley

One day,
The snow began to fall,
And slowly, inch by inch,
Covered up the earth.
'Til finally,
The top of the tallest building,
Was lost beneath a powdered sea,
As quiet as a shadow's grave.

And we say that the world isn't dying.
And we pray that the world isn't dying.
And just maybe the world isn't dying.
Maybe she's heavy with child.

One night,
A woman took my hand.
I left my home and followed her
Into an icy field.
When I wanted to go back,
I'd lost the way.
So she beckoned me to lie beneath
The stone that always bore my name.

One morning,
We woke up in an alley.
To the smell of urine, alcohol,
Trash and gasoline,
With a dim sense of a notion
We'd held something in our hands,
That was bigger than us or God,
And we can never touch again.

I've been looking at the symptoms for a while,
Maybe she's heavy with child.

Stella

Listen, soft, I caught a falling star yesterday.
It was on its way to the western shore, on its way, on its way.
I caught it as it plummeted by,
meandering down through the growling sky.
Our hearts pulsed together while cradled in my hand it did lie.
And should we ever need a breath from another time,
soft, all we need do is remember this rhyme.

I just noticed the funniest thing. This is my two year blogging anniversary. Check out my first ever post here. Happy anniversary to me.


Oh yes... and in completely unrelated news, these are my friends.

I am alive!!!
I want to pour like orange juice out of a pitcher. Then I want to take big gulps of myself from a chilled glass and sit down on the grass in the warm sun to thaw. Winter is a long time to freeze.
You know, the other day, while the sun was burning on my back, and my bare toes curled in the dry grass, I felt my spirit lift a little. It is struggling free folks and the Spring thunderstorms and the gusts of wind peppered with lightening are gonna shake it free.
Do you remember standing in a field with your arms spread out, reaching to the horizons with your fingers, lightly brushing them and feeling the ridges and humps. Then the wind gusted up from behind and you could lean back into it without holding on?
When I was little, maybe four or five, I flew...not in an airplane or on an eagle's back... I actually lifted off the ground right where my driveway met Quail Road. No one was around and the air was dead quiet. I was wearing a purple satin prom dress that was way too big and a crown of fake flowers.
I hope I am never too old to remember.

Those, I didn't eat, but some people did.

This is my buddy Siren and I in Costa Rica

I have been fairly absent lately. Absent from this blog, absent from my friends, absent-minded. I don't know why and I don't really want to expound right now. So, instead of being deep and philosophical about why I am the way I am etc., I'm going to tell you some shallow yet interesting things about my life.

I am currently and have been planning for the past three weeks to be an environmental science major with a minor in not for profit business and international development.

This semester, I am taking chemistry, geography, statistics and economics. In a one hundred percent change of pace, I don't have any papers to write this semester! I'm glowing.

I picked up the guitar again. I hope this lasts.

Summer looks like trail work again! I was going to try to fight fire but I think I'm too week to qualify. I can't do a pull up or a boy push up, how embarrassing. But I can beat certain boys at arm wrestling!

I sent about 500 dollars to Tuskegee International School in Ghana. They used the money to buy building supplies for their school. Thank you to everyone who donated!!! If you have any ideas about fundraising let me know.

I love music but most of all I love the Rolling Stones! Their new album A Bigger Bang is great. I also recently picked up Exile on Mainstreet. It makes me cry because it sounds so incredibly twangy. But here's the coolest; Stripped! It's a 1995 release of live recordings from their tour. It spans their whole career and has a lot of b-side tracks. Not to mention, the second track is Like a Rolling Stone.

Also, if you haven't heard Manu Chao or Cat Empire, check them out. Manu Chao is the ultimate world music musician. His lyrics are in English, French, Spanish, Portuguese and he is so non sequential. Cat Empire is from Australia and funky. I think they sound a lot like Dispatch. I also can't get enough Good Charlotte, Badly Drawn Boy or Belle and Sebastian. And the really exciting news is that Franz Ferdinand and Peter Tosh are on their way!

In other news, I am looking forward to Jazz Fest, Spring Break backpacking in a Utah national park and Bloomsday. Also on the platter, a possible trip to Vegas with my dad and a possible trip to Mexico from May to June.

Here's an excerpt from a book I'm reading: "Doctors sometimes draw maps of other parts of you, and your own map can become intensely interesting, but catch them trying to draw a map of a child's mind, which is not only confused, but keeps going round all the time. There are zigzag lines on it, just like your temperature on a card, and these are probably roads in the island; for the Neverland is always more or less and island, with astonishing splashes of colour here and there, and coral reefs and reakish-looking craft in the offing, and savages and lonely lairs, and gnomes who are mostly tailors, and caves through which a river runs, and princes with six elder brother, and a hut fast going to decay, and one very small old lady with a hooked nose. It would be an easy map if that were all; but thee is also first day at school, religion, fathers, the round pond, needlework, murders, hangings, verbs that take the dative, chocolate pudding day, getting into braces, say ninety-nine, three pence for pulling out your tooth yourself and so on; and either these are part of the island or they are another map showing through, and it is all rather confusing, especially as nothing will stand still."

So...that's that. I'm going to go wrastle up so pigs and give them all a shampoo and a shave and I'm going to try to stop running away from my fears one baby step at a time.

What an amazing winter break this has been!
I am really excited about all the things I have done and seen. I have packed a lot into just four weeks.
I guess the most recent things are going back to Fortuna and Volcan Arenal to visit a friend that I met the first time I was there. We had a really good time. We visited a swimming hole with a rope swing and two beautiful waterfalls and made spaghetti for some locals.
I also went to the Nicoya Peninsula and lounged on the beaches of Montezuma and Mal Piez for about 5 days. I met a wonderful girl on the ferry over. We became fast friends and traveled together for the past 5 days. She was a breath of fresh air after all the numerous guy companions I have been traveling with. Strangely enough, she disapeared this morning, luggage and all. So I went to San Jose as planned. I hope she is ok.
Now I am in San Jose, soaking up the big city culture after the ultra chill of the hippie surfer atmosphere of the peninsula. This city is crazy but fun.
I am looking forward to one last outing tomorrow to Volcan Poas.

Ola! I find myself in Panama! Craxy Huh? Other crazy things: Stayed for two days with a Tico family in a small palm nut harvesting town. We swam in the river with Crocidillios and jumped from high tree branches Road on the weel covering of a tractor for several miles to investigate flood damage Tried tongue (I´ll let your imagination wander) Hitch hiking in the back of a pick up truck road in the cab of a semi taught Ticos how to foot bag Watched Lord of the Rings in Spanish Somehow carried on a two hour long conversation in Spanish Took almost a hundred pictures of the Tico family I stayed with! I´ll see the canal tomorrow!!! Adios Amigos

It's a beautiful day in Costa Rica. In fact, all of the days have been beautiful. The light rain showers in the afternoon are very refreshing. The town of Fortuna is beneath Volcan Arenal and at night you can see the lava glowing red! We went on a boat ride and saw many exotic animals. We also went to a wonderful hotsprings and soaked for hours and hours under the starry sky. The locals set off fire works last night for Christmas Eve. It was quite the show. Today we are off to the cloud and rain forests of Monte Verde.
Merry Xmas all!!

Hello my darlings!
I am speaking to you from the ever wonderful, the ever green Costa Rica!
After a lot of unwanted and uncalled for delays we finally pulled into town today at 2:30 pm. That's right, over 24 hours worth of travel.
But Costa Rica is warm, beautiful, green and completely different from anything I've ever experienced before. The aunt, the mom and I went for a walk along the road (busy as hell and no sidewalks) to a little restaurant were we ordered up some bebers (drinks) and some chow. A wonderful mix was on the radio and we had a varied assortment of dishes including little tortillas with a relish tray and a whole roasted garlic, enchilada, stuffed chilis and heart of palm salad. MMMmmm. The people here a really nice. I can't say that I have seen a lot of the real culture, mainly just a busy road but I have high hopes for the next month. Tomorrow, we head to the grand Volcana Arenal, which is still lively as all get out and soak in the hot springs there abouts, go on a night tour looking for animals and generally bask in the "bad" feeling one gets from hanging out within death's grip right under an active volcano.
Adios!

Dodowa Road

Lapping dogs with lamenting dirges
called to me from sunburned Savannah
hills. Thirsty dogs, dry as sand and wind-
streaked tongues, with paws cracked
in Hamartan heat, pad up and down
the blood red road. Back and forth
they oscillate, circle round and round,
dead dogs. They haunt the side of the road,
rotting like war, rotting like rinds
of salted roast. Day after day, electricity,
cascading neurons, vanish with five
o'clock sunset. Hair and eyebrows gone
like a two year old's birthday cake.
Muscle and skin, toenails and eyeballs
are devoured like a fine book at one a.m.
Nerves and muscle, cartilage and soft
organs are pulled from cavities like precious
jewels and day after day, the road reaches
long to the north, and south to the sea.
The entire walk, rotting dogs decay
to dusty bones and dripping dreams.

Reflex

It all began on a rocking horse.
The story of my life, a talking horse,
started slow, like a second date,
a secret wish served on broken
plate, a golden coin, flattened
on railroad steel. I twitched
and conceived a critique
of consciousness. A cactus of truth
pierced my skin, drooled out
a foreign friend. Transposed
in a perspiring melange,
we painted a tapestry
of terracotta pearls and timid
paper and plastic,
expanding like a wicked
little shadow, inebriating
me like a salty sailor.
The curve of a smile puckers
in carefully colored calendars.
Teeth on Tuesdays, grins
on Mondays and chortles
on Fridays.
Week after week a sad
love song whispers
on my shoulder like an evil
demon, urging me to your
cracked egg shell smiles
and flakey pastry prose.
We both know that making
the sun rise is like muting
a silent monkey.
It has already happened.

Ripping Off a Whiny Song

A three pronged hat and a tin roof
sunday ice cream strolling
in Central Park, a chapeau
and a fatty dairy product,
it's true, but what were
the chances, of them strolling
in Central Park.

Come to me in a satin scarf
and robes of milky cream.
Come to me and listen
to my ditherings, my digressions,
commas, quotes and quid pro quos.
Six thousand words I have scribbled
with a million, trillion, gazillion
to follow. Hanging clauses,
compound sentences without
a pound, raw, unfinished.

If you came to me
in the hollow honeydew
haze, you would scare away
the spider webs of Easter egg
shadows and render me
a loquacious fool with your
enchanting cantations.

One for puppies and two
for pain. Another for love
and three for flying angels
raining fairy dust and subjunctives.
I am counting crayons,
each one a different color.

the leaves have fell off all the trees and despite the fact that i can see through the naked branches, i still can't see the stars for the fog. it the kind of fog that creeps up on you around corners and taps your left shoulder and quickly moves to your right side when you turn your head. outside is a death trap and i can't get used to the cold. i want to love it, to embrace it, to cuddle in front of a fire or walk briskly down the trail, feeling the coolness on my cheeks but knowing that i am warm. have you ever looked closely at hoar frost? it clings to pine needles like nylons in humid southern afternoons. it clings but it also pulls away like a thousand jagged saw tooths or a layer of sharks teeth. i've never seen anything so polar, clinging and pulling. it's like me in a way. stretching with all its might, pulled by some unseen force towards the mysterious future yet grounded, rooted to the tree afraid to take the first bite that will eventually devour the elephant. if i can't see things through to a successful ending, i terminate them before they begin and in the spring, i melt with the warm sun and trickle into the thawing ground. some wise wit once said, nothing ventured, nothing gained. well, my angels, he was right.

{From a documentary called Africa: A Triple Heritage}
The whole universe has been created in the image of god. In fact, the universe and the creative process are a kind of autobiography of god; god telling his story chapter by chapter, tree by tree star by star stream by stream. All of the different elements in nature can be expressions of god. The sun rise can be god’s smile, the draught, the wrath of the ancestors and thunder and lightening could sometimes be a divine orgasm.

If you believe in this
then the following is of no
consequence but if you
think that it is nothing
more than grey swirls
in the bathtub
then it is only a ring
'round the rim to me.
I repeat it over
and over, believe
with all my energy
and I can tell you
twice if not thrice
that there is no
difference between
you and me whether
they think so or not.
You have never
uttered a word
about it before so I
do not think it
matters anymore.
Tomorrow was the same
as yesterday and today
is coming faster then
I want to say. Let
them all wash away.
Now, weeks are like
petals on a flower.
I will not concern
myself with hours.
They cannot be there
and be here with me
so I leave them to
regimented minutes.
Because I believe
it is true. If you
do not...
simply be,
so that we can
be together.

The World According to Dan Dustin:

I am the the old original iron-jawed, brass-mounted, copper-bellied corpse-maker from the wilds of Arkansas! Look at me! I am the man they call Sudden Death and General Desolation! Sired by a hurricane, dam'd by an earthquake, half-brother to the cholera, nearly related to the smallpox on the mother's side! Look at me! I take nineteen alligators and a bar'l of whiskey for breakfast when I'm in robust health, and a bushel of rattlesnakes and a dead body when I'm ailing. I split the everlasting rocks with my glance and I squelch the thunder when I speak! Stand back and give me room according to m y strength! Blood's my natural drink, and the wails of the dying is music to my ear. Cast your eye on me, gentle-men, and lay low and hold your breath, for I'm 'bout to turn myself loose!

The Rolling Stones rocked. And be assured that I told you all about them and then promptly lost it all in an unexpected computer freeze. I'm just not really interested in rewriting the masterpiece so I'm going to give you some highlights from other peoples' masterpieces...

"Pasted on my open window, I see the sky above me, raw."
"I'm hoping to find a plug for my heart's leak."
"We are nothing but common souls, crying common tears."
"The paintings on the wall were filled with my blood."
"As a child, I thought we were all going to become famous."
"I've broken my laws too many times. Do it. Shoot me. I'm beginning to find my music."
"A leaf brushed my face on its way to disintegrating."

Out of context, they crinkle a little bit, a little less potent.
I danced in the oval last night under the half moon. I was alone, again.

Hey ol' buddies ol' pals.
I'm on my way to Seattle this coming weekend, Friday -Monday. Why? You ask. Because Sarah's darling dad found two tickets to the ROLLING STONES and he's giving them to us. So if you're a Seattlite, let's meet up, that is when I'm not rocking with Mic and Keith and Bill and Charlie!!! You know you can't always get what you want, but I did this time!
Thank you RICHARD!

Jules is in Ghana for a semester at Legon University. She has sent numerous emails about her time there and they echo so many of my experiences! She has been to so many places that I also went to. It is so cool to think that my footsteps fell on top of Sarah's and then hers on mine. Three friends have ventured to this place on three separate occasions and it is nothing but infinite and who knows who will follow? I am toying with going back for school. It think Jules has the right idea. She is taking classes which include Twi, indigenous religions, Ghanaian history and drum and dance. And what is even cooler is the fact that Jules is visiting Orphanage Africa. When she writes about the kids and the women that work there I just want to burst. I am overwhelmed with jealousy and excitement. Africa was such a nothing. I never thought of it. I never cared and now it is so huge. The African studies class that I am taking plus Jules' emails are reminding me everyday that I have only done half the work for my time in Africa. I want to set up something permanent. Saralita and I have tossed around ideas for Engineers Without Borders and I have been trying to think of something meaningful that I could coordinate with the school. But my thoughts need to be turned into action.

Do you want to meet my red HOT crew, the North Bend Berserkers?












Chris, Kyle, Maloney, MJ, Ryan and Rachel


Do you want to see what we do?

Bake apple crisp cakes...

and clear logs off the trail ...



Scale high rock faces....






carry heavy tools...

transplant ferns...

throw rocks...

and light ourselves on fire...

It is a measurless hour,
quiet, like a stream at twilight
is quiet, murmering its own sound,
murmering its watery prose.

The yellow light is ripe
on my face, spilling
over my lap, dripping down
to my toes.

It is the kind of light meant
for empty stores
and halloween nights.

If it were not for the people
permeating the darkness,
I would be a ghost.

I have never wanted to be
so much at once. A rip
tide pulls me back
to a feeling I forgot.

It is the midnight hour,
the stillness,
the frictionless love,
that pulls me like a cord
down into this deep caldron.

When there is nothing
in the noises of night
but isolation.

When there is nothing
in my heart but a need
to be, I think the noisless
night is breathing a song.

I try not to listen
but it is not there.

I DIDN'T REALIZE THE SKY WAS THIS SHALLOW

Has life been happening? I feel so tired I could sink through the cement foundation like honey in hot water. We all know summer is over. It happened last Friday and even though the temperatures may reach 72 degrees and the sun shines with all its might, there is snow on Lolo Peak and there are dead orange and red leaves in our yard. It smells different out there; summer is broken. Sleeping with out a sleeping bag, shot down dead, alpine lake swimming, murdered in its sleep, napping in the burning hot sun, stabbed straight through. Fall rises out of summer fire. No more burning dreams. I'm not anywhere new except beneath my house surrounded by cement feeling like Fortunato, all bricked in with irony. There are three ways off a merry go round. I don't think that I'm going to let it slow down, I'm going to burn it down. It isn't Fall in Seattle...

"Recreate your heart hour after hour for the tired hearts go blind"
(from the Hadith)

the spring break of our freshman year, sarah patrick and i flew to new orleans. it was the same day the war began. i cant find my journal from that time to refresh my memory about the people and places. but i dont need to. i remember that we almost stayed. a lot of people do. half the kids in the hostel originally had a plan ticket home. we took the ferry across the mississippi dozens of times, played sharks and pirates with the local kids, tapped our feet to strumming guitar and grating washboards. this poem was for sarah now its for memories, music, travel, the kids at algiers point, the piano player, the lovely people at india house and the partiers and the circle bar and all the people who lived in new orleans.

The Big Easy

The war is starting and sticky air breaths on our faces,
arms and stomach. Snaking brown river laps our feet,
curling over each toe like sifted powdered sugar
and every breath we take fills our lungs with hot pungent
Cajun spice. We blithely chase our fears with sips of mango
and spilt plastic cups of New Orleans’ cheapest brew.

Night falls slowly in a lazy southern city and street bands
play for old men, young girls, witch doctors, palm readers,
accountants, homeless and wonder lust teenagers alike. Dance
in the moonlight, swing our arms like monkeys and skip
around, through and under while jazz strums and girls yelp
and raucous laughter spills under the moon’s streaming beams.

Catch the rainbow beads dripping from the torrid sky,
wring the strands from our hair and watch the dripping
puddles form on the cool, cement floor while piano players
tap out an easy pace and children scramble like sharks over
yellow and red and blue metal. We call it life and let it slip
away into peyote smoke. We call it home and never leave.

So...Yesterday, the 27 of August was my 21st birthday. But the good birthday vibes seemed to have soaked into the entire week. My last trip with the NBTC was amazing. We hiked into the most beautiful glaciated valley I have ever seen. The jagged mountains were laced with snow and glacier remnants. The river was clear, so clear I could not see it. The only evidence that it really existed was the steady rumble of water flowing. The work was fun and challenging but not killer. We secured a floating bridge and did drainage work. On evening MJ and I took off up the steep side of mountain, scaling talus slopes and gaining ridge after endless ridge to finally arrive at the most beautifully juxtaposed barren high alpine lake. We could see for miles and miles including my old Skykomish playing grounds. We hiked home in the dark and the night was so cold and clear you could taste it. In the morning, we had back country baked apple crumble cake with a single candle in it to celebrate my birthday and Rob's anniversary. We worked half the day and took the rest off to play in the mountains. I feel like I could dangle them from a string and bat them about like a cat does with a mouse. We went straight up. I had to schmear. I had to pull myself up with whatever I could grab and when we finally emerged on a talus slope we were below jutting granite cliffs and below was a glacial valley full of morains and rounded boulders and cobbles. The valley looked like a waste land and I stayed there while my boys hiked even farther upward and onward. That evening we played the most incredible game of pinochle and Kyle and I won by the skin of our teeth. It was a roller coaster game with us in the lead and then trailing by a devastating number and then sprinting towards the finish line and barely pushing our chest through the red tape before Chris and MJ. The drive from the trail head takes around 1 and half hours and we rocked to the Killers and George Clinton and I could not have been in a better mood. On Saturday, my birthday, I was assailed with happy birthday wishes from my bunkmates. Willow and I went to the NB farmer's market. I took off for Seattle to meet up with my aunt and uncle who fed me lunch and a lemon drop, which made me dangerously loopy. Then I met up with wonderful friends, Sarah Patrick, Chris, Aaron and Dan. I love my friends, I do. We hung out at Pike Place and Discovery Park. When I walked into the bunkhouse in NB, my entire crew plus some were sitting around the table with 21 small shot bottles full of a variety of drinks. Baileys, Kahluha, Absolute Peach, Jack Daniels, Southern Comfort etc...21 different kinds. We stuffed some in our pockets and purses and headed to the Mount Si tavern to have beers and play horse shoes. A band was playing all the country rock classics like Sweet Home Alabama. The band got word it was my birthday and had me come up on the stage. We all sang happy birthday and then they gave me their pitcher of beer to chug. I didn't though. Not good at that kind of thing. We moved on to the NB bar and grill and I had a birthday cake. Which is some kind of mixed shot that you guzzle and then chase with lemon. It didn't taste good but it smelled just like cake batter. I was very reluctant to drink it. Our last stop was the Pour House, a common hang out for my boys. We had beers and arm wrestled. I didn't win once but what can I expect? The music was spiced with Imagine by John Lennon. I can't help but wonder about that song. It has been played at every keystone point in my life. Paris, Ghana, Birthdays, last days, sad days...I started to get very sleepy around 1:30 so the mile or so walk home was a bit of a challenge. I could walk a straight line, no problem. It was staying awake that was difficult. And as we all looped our way home, laughing and reminiscing, the crescent moon rose over Mount Si. It was all so very ethereal and I felt strangely transcendent (probably just drunk). What a wonderful ending to my season.

it is finished...

the sleepless nights have returned and i once again find myself in a time of transition. for the first time, i am able to identify the changes in my attitude and energy that come with certian types of stressful situations. the real me has been exposed and i'm not sure i like it. i am finally recognizing how self-conscious and critical i am. my physical and mental inferiority on the trail crew has really given me a lot to think about as have recent interactions with my peers. i am passive in certain circumstances and assertive and in control in others. i like that fact that i can interact with a lot of different people but not that i can't be the same person for all of them.

and that was all leading up to this announcement...drumroll please...i will be turning 21 on saturday! no that wasn't the real announcement. i finally decided to move back to missoula and embrace all of the wonderful opportunities that the u of m has to offer. i'll be home sunday.

I have the most bizarre dilemma and it is one that I am most ashamed to admit. Over the course of the past couple of months, I have been trying (but not very hard) to decide whether to attend school at the University of Montana or Seattle Central Community College. Now deadlines are approaching and the shit is about to hit the fan. My dilemma sounds fairly black or white, easy to decide right? WRONG. I have a whole host of factors, pros, cons, desires and fears attached to each school. To summarize, and believe me, this onion is chalk full of layers:

UM has home, family, comfort, personal space, is in state, long term possibilities, friends, personal refocusing possibilities such as getting back into yoga, exercise, guitar, planning Nepal, getting some Ghana projects started and NOLs.

But it also starts earlier, I'm not registered and have a lot of hoops to jump through to become registered.

SCCC has a later starting date(so I could work for the forest service longer and go out on fires) and shorter quarter length, friends, new living arrangements, excitement of a big city where I am no longer a minor, a really cool 18 credit collective learning on Southeast Asia, possibility to work at Great Harvest again, I have already registered and paid and Ghana project options.

But it costs more, would be a lot of intense courses that don't offer much in the way of a career, a dead end, more stress and personal compromise, harder to work on planning Nepal and not home.

Two days ago, I was planning on SCCC but yesterday and this morning I was dead set on going to the UM. Right now, I'm staying in Seattle and just finished paying my tuition at SCCC. I'm playing both sides of the field here folks and I just can't make up my mind. I'm sure everyone is feeling so sorry for the poor little girl who has options and opportunities and the financial capabilities to screw around like this but just for laughs and sympathy and shear curiosity, where do you, dear reader, think I should go and why?

I'm too lazy to write coherently so I'm going to streamline.

Summer So Far
a beginning and an end, school morphed into the woods
an evergreen dish loaded with boys and tools and fireschool
hotspring secrets, bubbling water spilling with a pumpkin breeze
fireworks with family, the queen called for her lemonade
we stirred the lake with long sticks,
magiked fish sizzling in sauce
mud covered, wet and tired, building bridges to Eden
mosquito bites covered in chocolate pudding
bikers and chicks, studs and choppers
blues in the middle of Washington.
others and feet,
music and beats,
German lessons, pensions and religion
leave without pay to I can heal.
long open roads and quiet empty woods,
nights at rest stops and coffee spots,
Safeways and thriftsways
Spicing friends with curry and naan
rooftop performances, the curtain opened
with chocolate and spells.
Undefeated pinochle champ and unsullied swimmer
Biking to the sea and salty tears, letting go
Peppered with salsa and BBQs, I wore a toga
and crowned myself with ivy.

Dim red light permeates the room and smoke floats in a striation about six feet off the ground. A bean bag is positioned under a large green umbrella tree. The tree has ornaments hanging off of it. They are fairly indistinguishable but the set dresser should use ultimate care when choosing them. They are perhaps the most important and integral element. Voice from the darkness begins and then character in a rather brackish colored bunny suit strolls in. The irony of the bunny discussing the qualities of people should not be forgotten. The actor should be directed to emphasize the importance of tragedy in relation to the genocide occurring on our highways as cars drive through bug hatches. The actor should also keep a picture of a durian in the back of his mind, because the audience will subconsciously be reacting to this. It is most important.

People are fascinating. The past month has been packed and the general theme has been experiencing people both physically, mentally, verbally, from a distance and right up close. Amazing business...This field work. Some people are horribly dull to look at and maybe at first conversation but give them some effort and their life slowly unfolds as an amazing tapestry of deeds and dreams. Others are wild, they put everything out on the dance floor. Both personality and body type are displayed and your imagination only gets to fill in their past. The present is all they care about. But even here, these people have a story, amazing stories, inspiring stories. Sometimes it's hard to really listen to other people but its better than reading a book though a bit more exhausting. I highly encourage random conversations and bouts of selfless conversation. Fascinating stuff, Burns, fascinating stuff. Yes...hmm...(takes a large drag on a vanilla tobacco filled pipe)

Lights fade as curtain closes.
The End

That was a fopping kickass play, by the way!!!

Emerging blubber and flubber, six feet and drowning in mass media. Dreams of silicon marmalade but I have Aphrodite and Cleopatra, strong ancient beauties, lingering in these veins.
-Joellen Buccat

It has been a long time coming. Funny how my muse comes and goes like a carnival or a rainstorm. It's bright and flashy, a party for awhile and then my mind is a veritable desert and I have fragments that pop around like a ping pong ball. My emotions were on hold but now that I'm out in the woods my freedom to think is also my freedom to dwell. Getting to know people always makes me wonder who I really am...I think I constructed myself out things that I thought were admirable and artsy and pensive and intuitive and beautiful. But I think I misinterpreted those things somewhere along the line which is okay because now I'm just that weird girl that wanders with the wind. I can deal with that, it's artsy... so that isn't what this poem is about. I am a big fat hypocrite. Writing this poem is the very act of contradiction to my poetic resolution. And I don't think the title of my poem is at all appropriate and I need to dwell on it a bit more so it is absent.

Silver clouds are far
behind that icy stare
and love is a stupid
thing all wrapped in jealous
gauze. A hopeless wish,
a rainbow fish flashing
beneath the foam,
too big for the line,
too vibrant for death to dull.
I waited on the horizon
for a gale to hurl me
off the edge of the earth,
space goggles on
and adrenalin high.
The plunge was near
and oxygen zero but I
could breath and I knew
the abyss was an idea
you made. It was a depth
masked by the stars
in my eyes but I saw
the moon last night,
emerge from the haze
and nothing but my laugh
on the wind will tell you
that I have gone cold
and rigid on the rim.

no words, just music...

What Happens When The Heart Just Stops
The Frames

So what happens when the heart just stops
Stops caring for anyone
The hollow in your chest dries up
And you stop believing

So what happens when the heart gives up
But the body goes on living
The blood crawls to a slow and stops
And flows away
Well we got no-one to meet
No love we would beseech

We only have ourselves to blame for everything
There was no answer in the dust
And I'm missing you so much
And now you're sleeping
And I'm leaving
Empty-handed waiting
Time it will subside and we'll agree
It was a given

Well there was no standard we could set
And the world it does regret
To have to leave you in this state of bereavement
You see I'm feeling everything
Nothing gets by

There is a hollow in my chest
The time I won't forget
There is no comfort in the eyes
They put us always to the test I can't prepare myself for that
But I work it out in time

There is a love that flows between us
Ever-changing everyday I worked myself up to a crawl
But I'm not fearing it at all
I have no reason left to stay

And that's why I'm leaving
And there was no answer in the dust
And the one I feared to trust
There is a lie that drags me
Beating and pulling into disappointment

You might think that my life, or at least my outlook on life, is pretty bleak. However, things are not always what they seem (like Aladdin, the diamond in the rough). I thought I would share a diamond, not to make us all feel better about myself but because it is so funny. Names, dates, locations and actual events have been altered to protect all involved, including myself.

Fact 1: My friend, who shall forthwith be known as Anna studies early in the morning in a public quiet place that shall be known as the X Spot. Generally, she studies until her friend, commonly known as Friday arrives. They procede to chat and then she goes to class.

Fact 2: Friday lives in what shall be called Boulder Snout, about 30 miles out of Seattle. This just happens to be the very same village that I will be based out of this summer on my trail crew. Anna and I thought it would be cool for me to meet Friday and bond over our similar summer digs.

So here's what happened: I was at the X Spot at 7 am but Anna apparantly has no self control when she sleeps and turns off her alarm without actually waking up so she was a no show. I worked on my paper while casually wondering if any of the boys around were Friday. I had no idea what he looked like. After a while, I started squirming around on my chair and at one point I was squating and then stood up on the chair to reposition and when I tried to sit back down in a sort of half pigion pose, the chair tipped and slid backwards. I flailed my arms in an attempt to save my fall and the momentum twisted me into a rather sideways position. I crashed to the floor and lay there like a stunned beached whale for a moment. The whole ordeal made a huge racket in the solomn silence and I made matters much worse by laughing histarically. I was horizontally spread on the ground with a toppled chair under me and scattered papers fluttering about and I certainly was not alone in my laughter.

The next morning, Anna actually got up and we managed to convene at the X Spot. Friday came right on schedual, introductions were made and we bonded a bit over our mutual residence. But time was such that I had to leave and I made a quick exit, leaving Anna and Friday to their conversation.

Two days later, Anna mentioned that Friday had recognized me because he had seen me tumble of my chair the day before. He found it odd that he should see me participating in mildly unsuccessful acrobatics one day and then meet me the next, having never known or seen me before. But it is even funnier because as I reflect on the people present, he certainly had been right there in front of me, he just hadn't fit the Friday description. He even asked if I was ok and gave me a somewhat sympathetic smile. So it boils down to my incredible ability to make a fool out of myself and laugh over it and my horrible feature recognition and I am laughing as I type this. What fun...
I guess you had to have been there...

Well, here I am.

I have been sitting in front of my computer constantly for the past week and now that I only have two reflection-type papers hanging over my head and have successfully handed in two grade defining papers, I find myself sitting (or rather hunched on the floor in an awkward zen pose that is not only making my left foot fall asleep but is making the waistline of my pants cut into my stomach significantly) in front of my computer wondering what to do now. The thought of any physical activity is way too much to even bare. My exhaustion seems to be an all-encompassing one that manifests in my lack of enthusiasm to even go for the simplest walk or make a simple bowl of soup. I have not been very healthy lately, but I'm not really complaining. I cannot complain about something that I do intentionally. I am very poor at balancing work, school, friends and myself. Instead of holding even one up and forsaking the others, I let them all drop. I am like a giant snail with a rotten foot and I am stinking up my own shell with my puss. I am most unhappy about how I have been treating (or not treating friends) and how I have been bolled over by the American way of life with out so much as a backward glance at Africa.

But today I am thankful for my family and friends who have taken so much of their time and themselves to buoy me up these past few weeks. I am thankful for my lap top (monsieur ecriver) and Microsoft word. I am thankful for the wonderful hugs that have been sent my way and I am thankful that other people pay attention when I am driving. I am thankful for music and jam sessions and the wonderful emotions that flow over me and I am thankful for strangers who invite me in and I am thankful for sunny days when my mind is in shadows.

I wish it was raining. I realized just this second that I have been listening to an unprecedented amount of music that mentions the rain lately. Coincidence...?

10000 Maniacs
If I were you,
defiant you, alone
upon a troubled way.

I would send my
heart to you to
save it for a rainy day...

The Killers
We took a walk that night,
but it wasn't the same
We had a fight on the
promenade out in the rain

Maroon Five
I don't mind spending
every night out on the
corner in the pouring rain.

Nora Jones
And I want to wake
up with the rain
falling on a tin roof.

Wallflowers
I'm bringing down my suitcase now
I'm shining up my good shoes brown
cause no-one knows my name
Now, no-one knows my name
So look out into the morning rain
cause I'm on the mourning train

It's raining men, halejula
no just kidding... I don't even know who sings it!

According to Mohammed, Anthropology Professor extraordinaire:
When we say I romantically love you, we mean a host of things including, but not limited to, I care about you, I will be loyal to you, I will protect you, I like who you are, I can rely on you and you can rely on me, I admire you, you inspire me, you make me feel good...etc.

But we also mean, I like being physically intimate with you. I like kissing you and having sex with only you. Physical intimacy is a defining factor because in its absence, we could be describing how we feel about our best friends. When physical intimacy is a factor, jealousy is a factor. We are jealous because, according to Freud, humans lapse into mental psychosis. Romantic love makes rational human beings irrational.

All of us twitterpated, romantic fools are on the pathway to mental psychosis where a good majority of us have already gone. Mohammed and Freud aren't saying anything new here. We already knew that love drives us crazy. But I think that being sane and out of love is much worse.
Crazy? I was crazy once...

Not Talking

Storms brewing on the western shore
with clouds of doom, precognoscente
of a fatal electric strike. Thunder echoes
in between glassy towers streaming
with sleeting peril. Tears of rain, tearing
like a knife.

Storms brooding like an old maid
rocking, rocking...
darker, darker
threatening to read my mind
threatening to take me down

Storms of screeching birds, plummeting
wings on an ashy wind. Smelling of intense
fear like a musty, threadbare tree,
a slinking cat with wide, yellow eyes, tail
tucked in howling fear.

Storms ripping chemical rain and steely ice.
hotter and colder
There is a life cracked open and bleeding,
sweeping down the metallic streets
with green downpour. Charcoal dreams
are muddied dust in a quivering sky.

I don't know what to do!

Do you ever feel like you are going to burst? Maybe that is not the word for it. Essentially, I mean, do you ever feel so overwhelmed by all the problems and issues, big and small, that need your attention, immediate attention, that you can't imagine being able to attend one of them much less all or any of them? So you retract. You don't do anything and waste away your life, slothing through the motions. You live your life, but you don't live it for anything or anyone. That's how I feel. The world is dying and I can't do anything about it. This beautiful world, this amazing sphere of people, music, dancing, oceans, houses, forests, freeways, markets, beads, books, flowers, universities, espresso drinks, pierced ears, marriage, color, saltines in little plastic packs, airplanes, tro-tros, terraced farming, commercialism, pollution, snails, rice paddies, sun set beaches and marmalade analogies. This world is dying. There are 6.4 billion people in the world. One recycled aluminum can will power a television for three hours. Flying from Seattle to New York will completely nullify an entire years worth of recycling. The coral reefs and glaciers in Glacier National Park will be gone during my lifetime. In 20 years, the world population will more than double. Our road less wildernesses are no longer going to be protected but harvested instead. The Mexican wolves have all but become extinct. The last wild Mexican wolf, named Lobo, was lured into a trap by his mate's carcass. His captures tethered him in a field and humiliated and tortured him. In the morning, they found the leader of the pack stone cold and dead. For years he had out-witted them, avoiding their poison and steel traps. And in one fell swoop, they killed him; they broke his heart and his spirit.I am a white, blond, green-eyed female. Therefore, I have an accumulated advantage. I will be more likely to get a job, buy an apartment, make a better deal on a car and hail a taxi than any other non-white person. I will not be as likely to be sentenced five more years for a crime or pulled over for speeding. I know all these things. I know that there is inequity and injustice and poverty and pollution etc. The picture is bleak. As individuals we are good but we manifest a society full of discriminating bigots who consume 65 gallons of water a day and over 1/3 of the world’s resources. I feel like crying and I left out so much that I do not know. I am going to get it out right now. I am a polluter, I drive a car and throw away trash and sometimes get bags at the grocery store. I use paper cups and too much toilet paper. I buy things that were not made locally. I am not a conscious consumer and I would rather keep my shower water on while washing. I have expensive, unnecessary things and I think my world is coming to an end when I have to pay 9 dollars to see a movie. At least I have nine dollars to spend on a movie. I am a huge part of the problem. I am sorry but just being aware is not going to make any difference at all. Look at me, I am aware and I still drive my car to work and I still buy Tevas from China and I still blow hot air out of my mouth while sitting on my butt, probably conuming more than my share of petroleum products.

I just have a lot of fragments today. I am fragmenting, I think...

The Sarah's and I, once again, kicked butt in Bloomsday. We did almost everything exactly the same as last year on May 3, including frisbee, dinner in Coeur D'Alene and crashing at Gramma Joyce's house. However, we were down one woman. Our dear darling Rena forsaked us for her ever-so-important work. And instead of running the race at the same pace we all beat our times from last year. I finished the sucker in 1:15 on the nose, making that my second fastest of my four races. We also had the pleasure of meeting up with our neighbor, Hilary. Saralita left her CDs in my car and I discovered that she has been hording an old friend. We have been catching up. This is what we've been discussing.

Have You Seen Me Lately
Counting Crows

Get away from me
this isn't gonna be easy
but I don't need you
believe me
you got a piece of me
but it's just a little piece of me
and I don't need anyone
and these days I feel
like I'm fading away
like sometimes when
I hear myself on the radio
Have you seen me lately?
I was out on the radio
starting to change
somewhere out in America
it's starting to rain
could you tell me the
things you remember about me
and have you seen me lately?
I remember me
and all the little things
that make up a memory
like she said she loved
to watch me sleep
like she said,
"it's the breathing
it's the breathing in and out and in
and..."Have you seen me lately?

Probably not... I've been too busy rolling my sticks of gum up in little spirals and then biting off each end so that the cylinder forms a square. I've been too busy using/consuming an average of 65 gallons of water a day. I held hands with someone during a casual conversation. It reminded me of Ghana. I've forgotten a lot. I have it all written down somewhere and when I'm not fading away, I will remember. Someone told me today that this might be the last day that we have together...