Last week, Mara, our next door neighbor, wound up with a guest on her hands: a puppy whose foster home hadn’t quite worked out. Mara runs a dog rescue, Redwood Pals, so this is not as unusual for her as it might be for most of us. She quickly found a potential adopter and arranged a meet-and-greet for the next day, but first she asked if Sophie might like a puppy play date.

Sophie is extremely adorable and also extremely high-energy, so the answer was absolutely, yes. I’m in favor of everything that gives her a chance to tire herself out. The puppy, then named Tulip and now called Bear, came over and they played together happily. Much rough-and-tumble, much rampaging through the garden, much chewing on one another’s ears and legs. Much fun!

They’re very different dogs: Sophie is the elder, by about a month, but already smaller. Random people on the street have identified her immediately as a border collie, but she’s probably a mix with some Australian shepherd in her, too. Bear’s mom is known to be a German shepherd and she’s got that texture in her coat, but she’s got Labrador retriever feet, ears, and instincts. (Water, yes! Balls, hers!) Both of them, though, are primarily black with white on their feet and the tips of their tails. Sophie’s also got a white collar and some white markings on her face, and Bear has a white chin and some white on her chest. Each alone is cute and together they cross into cuteness overload.

Anyway, the meeting the next day was in the evening, so I texted Mara in the morning and invited Tulip over for another play date. Mara was working, so Tulip came over and stayed for much of the day — including Suzanne’s lunch break and also her late afternoon arrival from work, which is highly relevant. Then Mara came and picked her up to take her to the potential adopter, so we waved good-bye.

The adoption meeting went well, the adopter was enthusiastic and so Bear was scheduled to go to her forever-home the next night, Friday. That gave us another play-date day first, so Bear again came over and spent the day in the backyard with Sophie and me. And Suzanne when she came home for lunch and in the afternoon.

When Mara arrived to pick Bear up, however, she hadn’t heard from the adopter. She seemed puzzled, but also resigned to the hassles of coordinating schedules with adopters. She took Bear home and I said something to Suzanne about how much we’d miss her. She and Sophie just had such good energy together.

I think I also said something to Suzanne about how Bear’s energy was the perfect fit for her — a little goofy, enthusiastic, but also really mellow. Sophie is sweet, but she has drive and persistence and Bear has tolerance and playfulness. Which is not to say that they’re not both playful, but their personalities are different. Some of that might be because Bear is younger, of course, but Sophie feels like the kind of dog that needs an obstacle course and Bear feels like the kind of dog who will chase a ball for as long as you’re willing to throw it.

Saturday morning rolls around and the adopter is still a no-show, so Bear came over for another play date. At 8:39 that morning, I texted Suzanne, “Tulip would be saying, ‘Oh, God, you again?’ if she had words.”

To which Suzanne responded, “She’s back?” And eventually, “Is that woman going to take Tulip?”

I responded, “She was a no-show. Mara was going to try to get in touch with her.”

Suzanne answered, “I texted Mara. I think I have a new dog.” This warranted many exclamation points on my part, but didn’t get them, probably because I was busy playing with dogs. 🙂 But by that night, Tulip was Bear, with a collar and a tag and a crate in the kitchen.

And now you know why I haven’t posted for a while. If caring for one puppy is a lot like an easier version of having a newborn, complete with middle of the night wake-ups, caring for two is a little like running a preschool. We’re working on getting on a schedule & establishing some rules — no rough play in the tiny house! Nap time is quiet time. No chasing cats, leave Riley alone when he says no, don’t dig in the potato bed.

But I couldn’t possibly think of a nicer way to spend my August. The only thing better than one puppy is two puppies!

I was nervous as the plane descended into California. Not because of the wildfires or the fog or the tiny airport, but because of the puppy. After a month of life at the Mighty Small Farm, would she have decided that Suzanne was her person? Or that she belonged with the pack in the big house, cuddling next to Riley and playing chase with Olivia Murderpaws? Would she like me?

And… would I like her? It’s hard not to like a puppy, of course — you’d have to have a heart made of ice or maybe no heart at all. But I did sort of wonder whether maybe Zelda had taken my heart with her when she left.

Fortunately, if she did, she brought it back with her when she returned. Because yes, after telling me to look for her, and letting me know she was on her way (via a half-awake dream in February), I have faith that the universe has let her come back to me. And yes, I know this sounds unlikely and ridiculous. To a mainstream Protestant, reincarnation is enough of a stretch without animals being reincarnated. But I have evidence! (Sort of?)

(Right here there should be a really cute photo. But I am struggling with my computer & can’t make it work. Sigh. So look at the sidebar for the pictures I’ve posted on Instagram from my phone, and if you’re getting this via email, you’re just going to trust me — she’s cute. Very cute!)

Sophie met me for the first time in the car at the airport, and greeted me with the hero’s welcome, full body tail wag and mad kisses, then fell asleep on the way home, just the way Zelda always did. She took Zelda’s ratty old squirrel with every evidence of delight and possessiveness, and played with it multiple times without ripping into it. After Suzanne confidently said, “She doesn’t understand fetch yet,” she returned the ball to me about ten times in a row, just like Z. (She then immediately forgot that skill and has not repeated it since. Not a single time!) Later she went to sleep while lying in the patch of dirt that Zelda preferred, which is a spot where none of the other animals choose to sleep, but where Z napped regularly. She’s also expressed a preference for drinking water in motion, via a fountain in the back yard, just the way Zelda used to (although Z used to knock on the water spout and ask for the water to be turned on, which is not a skill Sophie has yet demonstrated.) And when she took offense at a dog walking by the yard, Suzanne commented that she is very random in her objections — most dogs are friends, but a few are not. The dog she objected to was solid black and Zelda had a lifelong, seemingly irrational, dislike of black Labs.

Is this compelling evidence? Maybe? I suppose it depends on what you want to believe.

But soon after we got back from the airport, and before five out of the six above things happened, I carried two stones that I’d picked up on my adventures out to the pile of rocks that mark the place where we buried Zelda’s ashes. I sat down on the piece of driftwood next to the pile, my stones in hand, and started talking to Z. I wanted to tell her what the stones were and why they were special, but I was feeling… well, bereaved. Meeting my new puppy felt far more bittersweet than I’d anticipated, because I couldn’t help remembering my old puppy and missing her immensely.

Out of nowhere, Sophie burst through the flowers, hurled herself at me — and bit my nose! I yelped and she immediately switched to the hero’s welcome, tail wagging furiously, lots of kisses, and I had to laugh. I still put my rocks on Zelda’s marker, I still told Z that I loved her and missed her and always would… but I was already half-convinced that her spirit was back, minus the memories of her previous life, but with all the sweetness and strong opinions. Interestingly enough, I don’t think I’ve gotten the hero’s welcome a single time since then. But I guess I haven’t left her alone much.

One area in which Sophie is notably different than Z is that she’s interested in eating all the things. Lettuce, sure. Peach, why not? Random plant life, leaves, bark, cat poop, absolutely, it all tastes delicious! This, of course, is in complete contrast to Zelda who had to be coaxed to eat anything, even steak or rotisserie chicken, in the last years of her life. But maybe if you get reincarnated into a body with healthy teeth and no evil tick-borne chronic illnesses, food is more exciting.

It’s also possible that she chose to come back in a slightly bigger body in order to have a slightly bigger brain. If Z was a rocket scientist for a dog, Sophie might be a theoretical physicist. I would credit the magnificence of Suzanne’s training, except that Suzanne had specifically not started leash training yet, so I started that on Monday. It took about five minutes. Not that Sophie’s perfect while walking — she’s extremely excited and bouncy and needs to sniff all the things on both sides of the sidewalk and simultaneously go as fast as possible! — but she understands what the leash is, lets me put it on, doesn’t try to chew it or attack it, and is enthusiastic the moment I bring it out.

She also recognizes her name, mostly comes when called or signaled, sits when told to, is starting to understand down, stops at street crossings, looks at my eyes, and just in general is a spectacular fifteen-week-old puppy. Incidentally, she has not peed or pooped inside the tiny house once. That’s a little bit to my credit: I’m the one waking up every four or five hours to let her out. But last night she woke me up with a paw on my face and told me it was time, which is honestly pretty dang impressive for a baby. I suspect that there will be accidents in our future — perfection is unrealistic for both of us. But Bartleby was full-grown and still thought it was okay to pee anywhere he believed you wouldn’t see him, so Sophie’s definitely ahead of the curve. (Of course, B’s original owners were… not the best.)

One more Sophie story! For now, anyway, since my guess is I’ll be writing a lot more of them over the next months.

Yesterday we took our first real walk, 2/3 of a mile according to my step counter. Along the way, we passed a sewer grate and Sophie wanted to take a look.

Our conversation went like this:

Sophie: I must investigate this drain.
Me: No, your paws might get stuck in the grate. Come away from there, please.
Sophie: No, really, this drain is very interesting, I need a closer look.
Me: Your feet are too small, honey, you won’t like it if you step in the holes.
Sophie: You don’t understand, this drain is absolutely fascinating, it will be worth it.
Me: Well, we learn from our mistakes so let’s investigate the drain.
Sophie: Oh, yes, it is VERY interesting. You should really take a look.
Me (taking a look): OMG, HOLY — WTF?!!

There was a raccoon in the drain, looking up at us and hissing. We were literally maybe two feet above it. Totally freaked me out, despite the big metal grate between us and it. So she was correct, it WAS very interesting. She did not step in any of the holes, either. Theoretical physicist, to be sure.

It’s been a weird month.

Not a bad month. Indeed, in a lot of ways, a really good month. I got to enjoy hanging out with the Best Brother Ever, both on our incredibly long and tedious drive to Florida and at the Airbnb he rented. I also got to spend quality time with my dad and stepmom while also being useful, which is always gratifying. Helping family is not transactional, but I like being able to give back to people who have given so much to me. Plus I saw so many Florida friends that I hadn’t seen since pre-pandemic. Lunch/dinner/fun & games in person are so much better than over text!

Still, it was a weird month. Everyone has pandemic stories, some of which felt pretty bleak. Sitting in the hospital with my dad was inevitably reminiscent of the last time I spent hours in the hospital, ten years ago with my mom. And I can’t, of course, be in Florida without thinking of my son. I have many more good memories of him than bad, but the bad ones hurt.

I also sold Serenity. It went reasonably smoothly: I never did advertise her on RVTrader, but I posted the fact of her sale to the Facebook Travato Owners and Wannabes group, and a single woman (with dog!) in Tampa reached out.

I took care of getting new batteries first, and also wound up reducing the price to cover the propane repair because it would have taken another month to get the part to fix it, as well as taking $$ off for a couple other minor problems. (The awning never worked & the electric step stopped working on the way to Florida). I was still satisfied and the buyer was satisfied, too, which is the best way for transactions like that to go.

It was still oddly hard. An incredibly kind friend, Frisbee, drove to Tampa to pick me up and bring me back to central Florida. When I’d buckled my seatbelt, he said, casually, in the way one does, “So how are you doing?”

I replied, “I think maybe I need to cry.”

Being a peak thoughtful human being, he immediately apologized for not having brought tissues, so I laughed instead. We started talking and I never did cry — the moment passed — but the feeling remained.

It’s not that I feel like selling the van was the wrong choice. I am completely delighted by the thought of not driving anywhere for a very long time. Today I’ll drive an hour so to get back to Mount Dora (borrowing a friend’s car) and tomorrow I’ll do the same in reverse, and that’ll be the last time I drive for probably weeks, maybe months. I love that thought. Love, love, love it. But still… a great adventure has come to an end and a time in my life is over and that means… well, some blend of nostalgia and mourning, I guess. It’s bittersweet, in the truest sense of the word.

But yesterday, I went to the Epcot Food & Wine Festival with C and Frisbee. We had a perfect day. The weather was remarkably tolerable for August in Florida, the lines were short, the food was great, and the company was outstanding. It was a day of Disney magic, filled with moments like getting the best possible seat on the Soaring ride and still making it out in time for the fireworks.

Along the way, we were eating griddled cheese with honey and pistachios in Greece, and for some reason I remembered the video I made eleven years ago, of a family trip to the Food & Wine Festival. I showed it to C & F while we were perched at a table overlooking the water, Epcot’s giant golf ball in the background. When I made that video, I had no idea what the next ten years would bring — none of the bad, of which there was plenty, but also none of the great, wonderful, amazing, and fun. It was a potent reminder that ten years from now, today will be just a distant memory. Even without Serenity, I expect that there will be plenty of good adventures before I get there.

I arrived in Allentown almost a month ago. The trip was my sixth solo cross-country drive, and I’d concluded along the way that I really didn’t ever want to do it again. Cross-country, maybe, but not solo. It wasn’t an unexpected thought. I’d been realizing, pretty much since my V-day in early May (when my vaccinations reached full effectiveness), that I’d lost my enthusiasm for the road. Instead of V-day translating to, “Yay, freedom to head to new places!” it had felt like, “Yay, freedom to invite people over for dinner!”

I loved so many great things about living in Serenity and wandering the country — there were so many beautiful moments, so many sparks of joy and wonder — but I’d gotten really attached to my life in Arcata. Who was going to give the chickens treats with me gone? Who would provide a kitten-free zone for Gina, #notmycat? Who would cook interesting dinners for Suzanne? Crucially, I also didn’t want to spend my scarce dollars on campground reservations and van updates: given the choice between new batteries for Serenity (a typical necessary expenditure after five years) and an overhead fan for Serendipity or a grill, I really wanted that overhead fan.

I also wondered if maybe I was ready to give up writing. Not just give up on indie publishing, but give up on writing entirely: not only fiction, but also no more morning words, no more evening reflections, no more journals or blog posts. To investigate that question, I decided to stop writing entirely for a month, and see how I felt about it. Spoiler alert: the month isn’t quite over yet and I’m writing, so the answer is probably obvious. It was a good exercise, because I truly do have a love/hate relationship with the act of arranging words into meaning, but not doing it at all for a month was a lot like giving up caffeine. My life felt flatter.

Will giving up Serenity feel the same? I sure hope not, because I’ve been planning and wavering, and cleaning and organizing, and planning and wavering, ad infinitum, but this morning Suzanne said, “If you’re ready, let her bring that same joy to another person,” and it felt like a beam of sunshine on a cloudy day. Of course that’s the way to think about it. Of course!

So very soon I will post that Serenity is for sale on FB in the Winnebago Travato group and probably soon thereafter, I’ll put an ad on RVtrader.com. I’ve got an appointment scheduled for her at the RV dealer next week to get some things fixed (the propane and probably new batteries, maybe the awning that’s never worked), but someday after that, she’ll be bringing someone else the joy that she’s brought me. I hope, anyway! And if not, I’ll make one last cross-country run and take my time selling her in Arcata.

But I am in more of a hurry to get back to Arcata than I thought I would be, because another thing that happened during the last month was that Suzanne’s next door neighbor (who runs a dog rescue, Redwood Pals) sent me this picture.

To which I replied something like, “OMG, yes. But I won’t be home for a couple months and taking care of a puppy that long is a pretty big ask.”

It is a pretty big ask, especially when asked of someone with a full-time job, three cats, a dog, and baby chickens. But Suzanne is a pretty damn amazing friend. The puppy on the right is now named Sophie, and Suzanne is sending me regular pictures, as well as updates on her assimilation into the pack. (Olivia Murderpaws says “Yes, I will play with this creature, thank you,” Riley D says, “Why have you done this to me?”, Gina #notmycat says, “No!” and Momotaro has no opinion as long as his nap time is not interfered with.) Sophie’s already a lot bigger, and I definitely want to get home before she decides that Suzanne is her one and only person.

First things first, though — next on the agenda is a drive to Florida. The BBE and I leave PA on Friday & will get there on Saturday. I’m so looking forward to seeing the family and friends that I haven’t seen since pre-pandemic times. And so grateful for the vaccinations that make it safe.

(In other random news, last week I tripped over a combination of a step I didn’t notice and a dog gate I couldn’t then avoid and managed to mildly sprain my ankle and badly sprain my wrist. This disjointed post has taken me literal hours to write (and some ibuprofen) because typing one-handed is hard and I keep starting to use my right hand and then regretting it. So annoying!)

I woke up this morning to the sound of a crying baby. Actually, let me be more specific: I listened to a crying baby before falling asleep last night, I woke up in the middle of the night to the sound of a crying baby at least twice, and I woke up this morning — at a time my computer thinks was 4AM, but my phone thinks was 7AM — to the sound of a crying baby. I feel sorry for the baby and for my neighbors, but I feel sorrier for me.

I feel particularly sorry because I am staying at a hotel. Thursday night, spent at lovely little boondocking spot in Nebraska, was really damn hot. 85 degrees in the van at midnight and I don’t think it got much cooler until the wind picked up around 4AM and let me worry about tornadoes. (They weren’t supposed to be happening near me, only farther north, but when did that ever stop middle-of-the-night worrying?)

Friday’s drive was equally hot. A beautiful day, plenty of sunshine, but in the 90s, and the dashboard AC at fully cranked could barely keep up. I didn’t even want to stop at rest stops to take breaks, because it was so hot in the back of the van. Even the house battery was struggling, draining really fast although the only thing running was the refrigerator. I’m assuming that the fridge was drawing a lot of power because of the heat, but the reality is that the house batteries are five years old which means it’s probably time to replace them. Sigh.

I’ve actually spent a lot of my drive thinking about selling Serenity. It’s a notion that’s been slowly growing on me. I’d have to go back and look at texts to the BBE to remember when the idea first came up, but even before I left California, it was in the back of my mind. And I was going to write more about that, but I need to get on the road again today, not spend my day staring at my computer screen thinking, so back to my story for now. More on possible Serenity sale & its rationale later.

Eventually, after the hell that was Chicago-area traffic, I stopped for gas. I answered a text from the BBE honestly (the words “so so tired” were included), and he said, “Get a hotel room.” It was a lightning bolt moment. Yes!! In all my years of solo van traveling, I have never stopped for a hotel. But I was tired and hot, and hadn’t eaten a real meal or had a real shower in days. A hotel sounded fantastic. I googled for motels and made a quick reservation at what looked like the closest one, a Comfort Suites in South Bend, Indiana. It was another half an hour away along the toll interstate and somewhat to my annoyance, I passed several other motels before getting here. When I got to my room, that was forgotten, though, because I’ve never stayed in a hotel with a nicer bathtub. I felt grateful to the universe while I had my first bath in eons — since pre-pandemic, in fact!

I’m not quite sure what the universe might be trying to tell me, though. The bath was lovely and the bed was comfortable, but the crying baby made me wish I was in the van so I could pack up and drive away. Not that I would have been likely to do that in the middle of the night, because where would I have gone? But this morning while I was trying to figure out how to use the in-room coffee maker, I discovered that no one had cleaned it after its last use and the coffee filter in it had grown mold. Needless to say, that made me wish for the van even more. But I haven’t been making coffee all the way cross-country because the propane’s not working so… yeah. Maybe the universe is just reminding me that travel is always filled with stupid small challenges?

But it’s past 8 — if only 5:11AM according to my computer — so time for me to get on the road. I am 7 hours away from my aunt & uncle, so have invited myself to dinner. Now to get there!

If only it were possible to write a blog post while actually driving the van. I’d have all kinds of stories to tell; about the coyote I spotted in the Nevada mountains, about interesting rock formations in Utah, about regrets and memories and serendipitous songs, about plans for the future… hours and hours worth of thinking and observing, some of it interesting, most of it not.

But unfortunately, in the moments when I can actually sit down at the computer, I’m thoroughly uninspired and would rather be doing other things, like sleeping or researching my next stop or appreciating my current stop.

But the quick story goes like this: last week was all trying not to stress about whether I’d be ready in time, worrying about what might go wrong, ruminating about imagined future conversations, and mostly reading compulsively to avoid doing all of the above. On Monday, however, I finally headed off. I’d already done my research so I knew roughly where I was going to stop for the night, at the Humboldt water management area in Nevada.

When I got there, though, I zoomed right on by. I was making great time. It should have been obvious before I started that traveling without a dog would mean fewer stops and shorter stops, but that actually hadn’t occurred to me. Hey, traveling without a dog means fewer stops and shorter stops, surprise! Instead I stopped about an hour later at a WMA in Winnemuca. It was a nice place but surprisingly crowded for a Monday afternoon in early June, and I would up without a real site, mostly just parked on the edge of the road.

Because of that I got on the road very early on Tuesday morning, and again, pretty much zoomed along. My plan was to stop in Utah, and I’d picked a couple options, depending on timing and how my day was going. I passed the first one around noon, when it felt much too early to stop, and the second around 2, when it was way too hot to stop. Instead I wound up at the Flaming Gorge National Recreation Area in Wyoming.

It was a gorgeous place and Wednesday started out as a beautiful day. I took a nice walk down to the river, then seriously considered hanging out at the campsite until noon (check-out time). But the temperatures were rising and I hadn’t found a site with any shade, so I decided to get on my way.

My original plan had me getting to Saratoga, Wyoming on Wednesday evening, then spending Thursday as a slow driving/small adventure day, specifically visiting the hot springs in Saratoga, then going to Rocky Mountain National Park. The great time I’d made meant that I could make that the Wednesday plan, more or less, then spend Thursday maybe exploring Denver?

There was only one issue with that revised plan: the weather. Going to a hot spring when the temperatures were already in the 80s didn’t seem that appealing. Plus, the wind was picking up as I drove. The day was bright and sunny but I could feel the van getting pushed around and see the dust in the air. I stopped at a rest stop to see what was going on, and there were wind advisories — up to 40MPH — throughout Wyoming. Time to go to Colorado? Um, nope. Temperatures were going to be in the high 90s in Denver on Thursday! I ate my lunch, read a book, texted the BBE, thought for a while, and then texted him again and told him to cancel his plane ticket. I couldn’t see hanging out in hot windy places for two days waiting for him to arrive when I could just keep driving.

And then I kept driving. I wasn’t crazily ambitious — Google maps suggests that it was about a 350 mile day — but I made it across the Wyoming border and stopped at a lovely little campground in Nebraska. It’s a donation site (when you register, a sign suggests $5 – 10) and there aren’t any real amenities, as far as I can tell, but when I got here yesterday, lots of people were playing in the water. It’s very green and pretty, so I found myself a quiet water view site and settled down.

“Quiet” was not accurate, however. The reviews warned about the train noises and they weren’t kidding. The campground is right next to the train tracks and it is impressively loud when a train comes through. The sort of loud where it feels like you can actually feel the vibrations in the air as a physical sensation, not just a sound. When I settled in last night, I thought that if the weather was nice, I might stay a second day, but after listening to the trains all night, I know that would be pointless: there’s no point in taking a rest day at a place where you can’t rest. But I’ve got roughly 1500 miles to go by Monday, which is entirely feasible, if not much fun.

Today’s goal: to get all the way through Nebraska and make it into Iowa. And somewhere along the way to stop and get a salad. I’ve been eating my road trip food exclusively — beef jerky, dried mango, hard-boiled eggs, cheese and crackers, yogurt, granola and fruit — and I’m feeling really ready for some vegetables. I couldn’t quite bring myself to have a gas station salad yesterday, but maybe today I’m feeling that desperate. Or maybe today I’ll find someplace fun to eat. I guess I’ll find out when I stop writing and start driving.

Until yesterday, my plans for the summer of 2021 included lots of time sitting in the Mighty Small Farm’s garden, listening to chickens squabble and a cat complain; at least some time at local beaches being awed by the gorgeousness of nature; and a fair amount of time cooking interesting food from local farms and also thinking about cooking interesting food, which really is one of my favorite ways to spend my time these days. Oh, and I suppose at least some time spent struggling with all my writing projects (none of which are going anywhere fast.)

As of today, my plans involve a lot more driving. When I woke up this morning, I was not so sure that was a good thing, because the thought of long days of driving was… well, uninspiring. But the Best Brother Ever sent me a text, I called him in response, and four hours later, I have a plan which is feeling kinda delightful.

I’ll leave here on Monday, June 7th. (Hopefully with working propane in the van.) I’ll spend Monday night in Nevada, Tuesday night in Utah, and Wednesday night in Saratoga, Wyoming. On Thursday, I have a reservation to drive into Rocky Mountain National Park. Unfortunately, it’s late — the only slot available was 4PM – 6PM and there’s no camping in the park this year. But I’ll take some pictures, admire some scenery, and then find a place to stay somewhere near Denver.

Friday morning, I’ll pick up the Best Brother Ever at the Denver airport. He’ll drive with me through the weekend — most likely through Kansas, Missouri, Indiana, Ohio, a tiny sliver of West Virginia and into Pennsylvania. Maybe we’ll get to visit an aunt and uncle in western PA, but either way, we’ll try to make it to his house by Tuesday the 15th at the latest. Yeah, that’s about a week to go cross-country which is no one’s idea of a good time, but it’s going to be so much nicer with company for part of the drive.

Over the next couple of weeks, I will pick blueberries and appreciate the garden house and also do something fun with my niece. I’m not sure what that fun looks like — I suspect I’m not going to be feeling super enthusiastic about long drives — but I’d love to drag her with me on a short trip to the Massachusetts coastline to visit friends and relatives there. We’ve both been vaccinated, and it would be so nice to hug some people. (#1 on the list, Barbara!)

Regardless of how I spend the end of June, in first week of July I’ll join the BBE and his family for a week’s vacation in Vermont. Summer in Vermont, yay! I’m picturing lemonade and Adirondack chairs and wandering around cute small towns. I bet there will also be swimming and ice cream and cooking delicious meals.

On the 10th we’ll head back to Pennsylvania and on the 15th or 16th, the BBE and I will start driving south. Ideally we’ll reach Florida with a few days to spare before my dad has back surgery — time to hang out and catch up and have good conversations. There will, of course, be plenty of time for those conversations post his surgery, too — it’s optional back surgery, nothing that requires melodrama — but the recovery period’s not going to be much fun for him. But I will be glad to be there to walk the dog and run errands and drive places as needed. And visit Floridian friends, too, of course!

I don’t know how long I’ll stay in Florida. Living in a metal box in August in Florida is not going to be super comfortable. But right now I expect that I’ll be there through August and probably into September. Of course, plans can change. This week is proof of that. So I’m not going to stress about things I can’t predict. Sufficient unto the day, right? Meanwhile, I’m so much more looking forward to the next several weeks than I was yesterday. I am going to miss the Mighty Small Farm enormously but it’s going to be so nice to hug all the people that I haven’t seen since the Covid Times began.

Once upon a time, in what feels like a previous life, the publishing company I worked for published a book called, “No One Cares What You Had For Lunch.” It was a book of “inspirational ideas” for bloggers. (This was back in the dark ages, when people were enthusiastic about blogging, aka 2006.)

I was not involved in the decision to publish it, but I can remember thinking that 1) if you didn’t have any ideas for things to blog about, maybe that was a sign you shouldn’t be bothering to blog and 2) I cared what you had for lunch. I like reading about food. I definitely think it’s amusing that fifteen years later, food bloggers are among the few blogs still surviving and thriving in 2021. (Not that I’ve done any research to prove that — I’m purely basing it on the number of ads on recipe sites.)

Anyway, back in January, I put tracking my cooking on my list of goals for 2021 — not because I wanted to change the way I cook, but just to develop an awareness that would last longer than a few weeks. Like a lot of people, I tend to make things in waves: one month, I’m all about the quinoa bowls and the next month, I’ve moved on. In fact, after eating quinoa bowls almost daily while I lived in the van, I couldn’t tell you when the last time I had one was. It’s been a while, anyway.

So recording what I made seemed like a way of both remembering the one-off meals — like the kimchi soup that I think was not the same as the Hungarian mushroom soup? but can’t really remember six months later — and also encouraging myself to mix it up when I get in a rut.

Unfortunately, recording it in my morning words file, as I did for the first few months of the year, was pointless, because I never go back and look at those words. In fact, you’re not supposed to look at them, you’re supposed to write them and move on. The idea is to encourage creativity and brain-dumping, not to treat them like a journal. Even a journal wouldn’t be much use for recording food, though, because I might look at it ten years from now, but not often enough to be reminded of something I ate three months ago and meant to try again.

Enter Instagram. Is it ironic that after quitting all social media in February and updating all the bios in all my books so that they didn’t include social media links, I decided that a social media tool was the most efficient way to do something? Yeah, sort of. But it’s simple to use, easy to do from my phone, didn’t require any complicated set-up, stores the images in the cloud, lets me write captions and keep them connected with the image… it’s a much more straightforward way to track photos than creating a file in Scrivener or Pages or Vellum, or even trying to organize a folder of them in Photos.

Initially, I made a private account so that only a few people could see what I was posting. But when I decided to start blogging again, I couldn’t attach the private account to the blog widget that lets the pictures show up in the sidebar. Ensue much mental debate — about sharing vs over-sharing, perception vs reality, creation vs consumption, privacy vs presence, online ownership vs supporting billionaires… plus a hefty dollop of Feelings about letting people who have hurt me badly have any insight into my life.

In other words, ensue much over-thinking.

In the end, I decided not to care. Literally, just not to care about any of those things. Instagram is convenient and fulfills a need for a thing I want to do. And once I started posting food pictures, I also started posting cat and dog photos and scenery. In fact, so much so, that I decided my Instagram bio should read “fluffy friends, good food, freedom.” My personal tag line in action. 🙂

But if you’re on Instagram and I haven’t followed you yet (or vice versa), you can follow me at sjwynde and I will happily follow you back. Because I want to see your pictures, too, and if they’re all of food, that’s fine by me.

Suzanne had three days off in a row this weekend, so we went on our first post-vaccination road trip. It wasn’t ambitious. In fact, “road trip” might even be the wrong phrase. Getaway, maybe? Back in April, when we started talking about options, she had lots of great ideas, to which I kept saying, “Um, that’s gonna be a lot of driving.” Despite my year of barely moving, I’ve still lost my enthusiasm for road trips that are all about the roads. I like being at new places, but I’m not a fan of getting to them. Eventually, we decided to go to Brookings, which is just two hours north of Arcata. It could easily be a day trip if one felt so inclined, but for a two day camping trip, it might also be fun.

Spoiler alert: it was!

The trip didn’t begin on the greatest of notes for me, though. As I started the van, I automatically checked to make sure Zelda was settled, before remembering that she wasn’t with me. I shoved the thought away, which lasted for about five minutes, until I had to brake at a stop sign and glanced over to make sure she was okay. Surprise, she still wasn’t there. It was the first time I’ve traveled alone since she died and I missed her like l lost her yesterday. The loneliness of driving without her felt like the throb of a newly broken bone, pulsing with my heartbeat. Not much fun, really. If I’d been looking at a longer drive, I honestly think I might have turned around and gone back to Arcata. But I made it to Brookings & met up with Suzanne in the Fred Meyer parking lot where we considered our camping options.

We hadn’t made reservations ahead of time, because of uncertainty about the weather plus lack of available reservable spots (they’re mostly first come, first served out of season), but Suzanne knew of a nice campground about an hour away from Brookings. I didn’t actually want to drive anymore, though, and the weather wasn’t as unpleasant as the weather apps had made it sound, so first we checked Harris Beach State Park, to see if they had any available sites. They did, so for $20/night, we wound up in semi-adjacent tent sites in the D loop.

If I was giving the campground a star rating, it would probably have to be 4 stars, because my site backed onto 101 and the traffic noise was pretty much non-stop. On the other hand, it was highway traffic noise, so reasonably smooth, plus the site was beautiful — level, spacious, treed & private — and there were easy walks down to a gorgeous beach. For $20/night, a total bargain. So maybe 5 stars. Or, since this is my own star rating system, maybe a 4.7. No reason I can’t use decimals!

We spent Friday in Brookings: visiting the beach, a couple of thrift stores, and the Humane Society. The Humane Society was, perhaps, misplaced optimism. We walked in and there was a white puppy with a patch over its eye. I had a moment of breathless hope, but it wasn’t Zelda. Like, just not even remotely close to Zelda. I told myself for a few seconds that of course if Zelda has come back, she’s in a puppy body now and she won’t remember her previous training or her previous life. But that puppy was Not Zelda. White, sure, and with a patch like the one Zelda outgrew after her own puppyhood, but just… Not Zelda. Meanwhile, a guy at the desk was surrendering a sweet, skinny, old black dog, whose owner was in the hospital. I had to go outside to stop myself from bursting into tears. If the universe does let Z come back to me, how will I know? What if I don’t recognize her? What if I miss her? Meanwhile, of course, the shelters are filled with dogs that need someone like me, with time and compassion and a quiet safe space to be, and what if I should be helping one of them? It took me a whole bunch of deep breaths and a walk on the beach before I could remind myself that I’m trusting the universe on this one. It’s out of my control. My job is to just to let go, while keeping my eyes open. Waiting is hard, though.

Saturday was more beach, a terrific drive through national forest land, some wading in a river (I think the Rogue, but I’m not 100% sure), and plenty of sunshine. We ate lunch at Barnacle Bistro in Gold Beach — our real first restaurant meal since the pandemic! It was outside on their socially distanced patio, so still with some caution, but it was both delightful and really, really weird to be reading a menu. We then spent the afternoon playing games at the picnic table back at the campground, ate a snack style dinner, built a campfire and toasted Peeps. It was a supremely perfect camping day: excellent company, great weather, interesting food, good exploring time, fun in all sorts of ways!

I’d have a tough time picking my favorite moment of the trip, but one of the highlights was definitely playing Codenames: Duet. We were terrible at it! It’s a word game and… well, you know, words are kinda my thing. Kinda Suzanne’s thing, too. If you’d asked either of us ahead of time if we would be good at this game, we would have been smug in our expectation that it would be easy. But it’s not! You set up a board of 25 words, with a card that tells you which words (based on their positions) are contacts (good) and assassins (bad). You and your partner take turns giving clues and guessing words from the clues, but you have a limited number of turns (9) in which to find 15 contacts, so your clues have to apply to more than one word. But at the same time, you don’t want them to apply to the wrong words, because some of the words on the board instantly end the game. (They’re the assassins.) So, for example, I gave the clue “Bogart” and wanted Suzanne to guess “whistle” and “lips.” She did, because she rocks. Second example: she gave me the clue “Goo goo g’joo” and wanted me to guess “walrus” and “egg”. Alas, I am not up on my Beatles music and failed. But much laughter ensued and really, games that make you laugh are just the best.

Sunday was gray and chilly, but we took one last walk on the beach before heading home. I was thinking about my friend Michelle as I walked. Gray beaches always make me think of her, because she loved the beach in winter: all of the first beaches in my life (that I remember, anyway) were with her. She also collected beach glass. Earlier this winter, on an extremely bad day, on an extremely clean beach, I found a piece of brown glass, still jagged, and it felt like a hug from her.

Anyway, on this day, I was wondering what our relationship would be like if she’d lived, wondering whether she would have stayed someone who loved me for who I am instead of wishing me different. Not loving despite, but loving because. It felt like I got my answer when, in rapid succession (and on another extremely clean beach), I found a piece of broken green glass; a piece of pastel blue glass, shaped like a heart if you looked at it right; and a second piece of blue glass that appeared when I told myself I was being silly to think Michelle was talking to me. Suzanne was then somewhat worried when she saw the tears running down my face, but… well, it’s not often that the universe provides such magical trash.

I gave Suzanne an early birthday present on Saturday, mostly because I’d been working on it for a while and I really wanted to finish it, but I’d hit the point where I just couldn’t complete it without her help. Decisions needed to be made. Words needed to be guessed at. Mystifying blanks needed to be filled in!

I’d stolen her box of recipes — the ones she’s been collecting for literal decades — and turned them into a book. Doesn’t that sound simple? It sounded simple to me before I started: take the recipes, type them, generate book, ta-da! Fun birthday present, check.

I did not consider three challenges before I began: 1) reading other people’s handwriting; 2) twenty-year-old, well-loved recipes suffering from inevitable decay (water stains, fading, etc.); and 3) how often recipes that we write for ourselves lack details.

Exhibit A:

Exhibit B:

Actually, there were some other challenges, too. Like, should I include recipes that I’d call heritage recipes? Such as chicken-fried steak with cream gravy or bone-in ham with maple glaze? Foods that she’s somewhat unlikely to ever want to cook again? The answer to that one was a pretty easy yes. Maybe she won’t want to make chicken-fried steak again, but any recipe with the line, “Brown the flour — it won’t take but maybe a minute —” deserves its place in history.

What about duplicate recipes? Or rather, almost duplicate recipes. Two different lasagnas, so is one better than the other? Two different pumpkin pies, one titled “Now This Is Pumpkin Pie!” I’m guessing that one is preferable to the generic “Pumpkin Pie” recipe, but the ingredient list was, alas, illegible to me. I’m hoping Suzanne can decipher it, because obviously that’s the one to try. My personal favorite duplicate was Shanghai Chicken Wings, two versions, one labeled “Jason’s Variation.” Should I include both? (Answer: so far, yes, but when we make the Shanghai Chicken Wings, we’re going with Jason’s variation.)

Then there were the inevitable spelling errors and copying mistakes. Did I want to copy the recipes exactly as they were written on the cards or did I want to fix things that seemed like they might need fixing? The recipe for “Don Hoffman’s Mom’s Apple Pie” was copied from a sticky note, and the note was still on the back of the index card, so I knew the sugar had been omitted on the index card — was that intentional or accidental? Or “spagetti” used on recipes for spaghetti carbonara, spaghetti with meatballs, spaghetti alla puttanesca, and Little Joe’s spaghetti, so internally consistent, but being auto-corrected every single time I tried to type the word. Auto-corrected over and over again until I finally gave up and went with “spaghetti.” I think we’re going to fix that one before we send it to get printed, though. Spagetti might not be auto-corrects’ official spelling, but it is definitely Suzanne’s spelling, and this is Suzanne’s cookbook.

Then there were the revisions. One cookie recipe started out with a temp of 375. It was crossed out and 350 was written in next to it. That was then crossed out and 325 was written next to it. Obviously, 325 was the right temperature. But the changes were part of the story of the recipe. Did I want to include them? If so, how? Just a simple strike-through or with a note?

Before I started, I figured I’d format it like a cookbook — maybe two columns, with the ingredients on one side, the instructions on the other. Except that would have meant dramatically revising some recipes. Like this card, which just wasn’t going to work in that format:

TOMATO SAUCES

Warm Tomato Vinaigrette: 1 can crushed tomatoes heated in saucepan; whisk in 4 tbsp red wine vinegar and 1 tsp parsley, salt & pepper. Serve over hot pasta.

Mushrooms, brandy & cream sauce: Sauté chopped mushrooms with shallot or green onion; add 1/8 cup of brandy and flame! Add 1 cup cream, toss with pasta.

Mushroom wine sauce: sauté 1/4 cup minced onion, 1 clove garlic with mushrooms. Add 1/4 cup white wine and boil; add 1 cup crushed tomatoes; salt and pepper.

Sausage and mushroom sauce; sauté sausage, onion, garlic, and mushrooms; add 1 cup of white wine and reduce until almost dry. Add 2 cups of tomato sauce, salt and pepper.

Finally, there was the question of organization. When I started, I intended to put the recipes in the exact order in which they were placed in the gray box. Once I’d typed eighty recipes or so, though, I knew I couldn’t bring myself to do that. I’m guessing that at some point, the box spilled, and recipes got put back in only rough order. Even though it doesn’t make any difference at all in an ebook — being able to search is sorta the point, after all — the oatmeal cookie recipe just doesn’t belong between clam chowder and meatloaf.

Oh, and then one final question: were there dishes of mine that Suzanne might like to add to her collection? My okonomiyaki (GF cabbage pancakes) are a regular in the dinner rotation, as are jerk shrimp tacos and baked chicken thighs. Obviously, she doesn’t need to care about how to cook those things as long as I’m around, but eventually I’ll be traveling again. Okonomiyaki, in particular, is a perfect fast & easy, come-home-tired, throw-it-together-quick kinda meal, but the details — a sprinkle of sesame seeds, some green onion if you’ve got it — are easy to forget. I don’t tend to have recipes written down, because I mostly just wing it in the kitchen. Also the things I cook are usually constantly evolving as I think of ways to improve them. (I’m a kaizen kinda cook, I think, if such a thing exists). But if there was anything she wanted to be able to make for herself, I’d happily write them down for her, of course.

At any rate, her birthday present has now turned into work for her, which is not really the way birthday presents are supposed to go. But eventually all those questions will get resolved, I’ll polish it up, send it to be printed (probably via B&N’s personal printing option) and it will be really cool. In the meantime, putting it together and making a cover for it was excellent fun.

In other Mighty Small Farm news, Gina — who is #notmycat — caught a baby rat today. I’m torn between finding this good news — Go, Gina, go! — and bad news — ICK! But at least Suzanne managed to stop her from bringing it inside my tiny house. Small blessings, for which I am grateful.