tasty delights (LA, vol II, Aug 09)

While I peruse my extensive library of photos, I've discovered my affinity for up-close shots of food. I can think of a few times my camera lens got embarrassingly close to a sauce or ice cream product (mmm, hungry). Maybe it's because I believe subconsciously the more detail I capture, the more I'll remember the taste.

For example, the fresh fish/cilantro/zing of pepper fish taco, wrapped in a flour tortilla, devoured from a simple paper carton on the Pacific Coast Hwy in Malibu. I can still taste it. My best friend Liv took me there after a somewhat harrowing drive to her grandparents' condo, just up the PCH a bit (harrowing, you ask? Well, as we pulled into the secured gate, Liv asked for the keys for the condo... my only job was to hold the keys... said keys had fallen between seats... my heart stopped and I had visions of Liv tossing me out to be devoured by beach bums and sea animals and kids with plastic shovels. BUT we found them. Wow, heart palpitations come back just at the memory, but I digress). Obviously a near-fatal failure of responsibility drums up the hunger, so we decided to quit with the driving already and have a nice stroll down the PCH to the legendary biker restaurant, Neptune's Net. Our "nice stroll" turned out to be a balancing act between a ledge above the rocky hill to the beach and the line of cars/surf vans parked along the highway. Upon meeting some leathery middle aged men who drank from beer cans while lounging in their open surf van, beach stretched to the sky from below, I realized my reincarnation wish: come back as surfer dude with skin the texture of 40-year old tanned leather. Surf, drink, sit in sun, surf, maybe eat, talk to strangers, sit in sun, drink... what a life.

Upon entering the buzzing, sun-bleached biker haven, we grabbed a table near a hanging net with beach/Malibu-related memorabilia. Sweaty, sticky, and smelling of sea salt, we collapsed in the booth after ordering from boisterous, hair-dreaded employees. When the little paper plate of heaven appeared in front of me, it was all I could do to resist jumping in face-first.

June can't come soon enough!

firenze, vol. I (January 08)

Just another January day before class. On the professor's terrace with take-out sandwiches from the cafe down the street, a few of us relaxed in the sunlight we craved in the company of Florence's centerpiece, the Duomo. After days of soaked-through shoes, drenched umbrellas, and unfortunate humidity-ridden hair (ugh), the last week and a half finally brought relief to our little band of art historians.

I appreciate the sun a billion times more when I haven't seen it for awhile. Now that it's light until 7:30PM (!!!!!!!), I feel... bouncier. Or something. When rays of sun creep around buildings and smack you in the face, you can't help but to be re-energized.

wyoming horizontals (March 09; Aug 09; unknown 09)

Southern Wyoming, early spring, barren but somehow lively with snow.



Layers upon layers of foothills, mesas, mountains - the Bighorns in the summer.



Sometimes it is fun to try to see where exactly the sun sets, behind the hill over there.

I don't have much to say for now, but I do enjoy a view of all this open air.

visual cues (August 09)

Lucy relaxes for a second to take in the view from my bedroom window, and depending on the street's activities, lays there to quietly observe or loudly barks at what she sees below. The bed in my room at home is situated under one of two windows, allowing for ample light - and a prime view of Green Meadows Drive.

Sometimes I wonder how many cumulative hours I've spent staring out this window, with or without dog. The view hasn't changed much. Up the street a bit, a blue house; the slight shadow of Casper Mountain seems to stretch above it. A few years ago, the neighbors directly across the street renovated their (not pictured) house's exterior, a much-welcomed facelift. They have a spruce tree I thought I remembered as a few feet tall; only on a recent trip home did I notice it stretches tall and skinny, almost taller than the house itself. There is an alleyway between the garage and Garden Creek. I've watched deer, dogs, and unruly teens amble around in the gravel, often disappearing where the alley curves and disappears behind their house. In the summer, the trees and brush from the creek spill into the alley and make it so green, I think I'm in Minnesota.

Since this is my childhood home, even the most simple of visual cues rush to me. In the summer, I used to leave my window open all night, braving the dry cool to take in my favorite scent. The Russian olive trees next to my house and lining the creek have a scent completely unique to home - maybe I haven't looked hard enough, but I've never come across it here. It's sweet and tangy, and to some degree, I couldn't stop breathing it in, almost to a point of accidental hyperventilation. Sometimes in the summer, when I fought to try and sleep, simply resting my head on the windowsill and screen and watching for nothing was enough to lull me back to my pillow.

I probably took this picture last summer to show my dog in her constant state of hyper-awareness. And tonight, I'm happy to see it. Sometimes I miss home so much, the weight of the little things I remember kind of throws me off guard. On nights like this when I can't quite turn off my thoughts, I could use an open window and some fresh creek air to calm them.

late-winter survival guide (April 09)

You know those spring afternoons that balance just the right amount of warmth with the perfect sense of crispness? Those will get me through until May. Days like today -- with it's 40ish degree, sunlit weather -- remind me of the inevitable arrival of spring and summer.

Last year, I put a good amount of effort toward the discovery of new places in Minneapolis. The afternoon pictured, two good friends from college and I settled upon Crema Cafe and Sonny's Ice Cream in Minneapolis (34th and Lyndale, to be precise). I'm pretty sure it was a late April day, and the leaves weren't quite ready to come out, yet the weather was warm enough. The light is refreshing, cleansing, and totally unique to this time of year. We took this afternoon to enjoy a light lunch, marvel at the emerging buds, and share stories of our lives in the first year after college. Ellen, on the left, had just moved to Madison and we were all still adjusting to her noticeable absence.

Maybe this winter has been a little colder than usual, and maybe I've found enough of a warmth in my little town to keep me from venturing out so much. However, I am convinced my recently-adopted homebody ways will melt with the drifts outside. Spring and summer will take me to the city, because there are those little alleyways with a table and a coffee for friends, staged perfectly for us to meet halfway.

The beginning of March always seems hopeful, but it teases us: we've survived February (thank God), yet there are still enough cold days to balance with the sunny days. It isn't spring, but it is just enough to know the warm days are coming.

freedom-party-celebration (July 08)

The last real summer I had lasted for almost exactly two months. By "real," I mean: carefree days, stress-free job, late nights, maximum outdoor time, and a sense of freedom unchallenged by constraints of class and lab schedules. In early July, as soon as I received the phone call that offered me my (current) job, I knew my days in the sun (sure, pun intended) were over. And that was okay. It was time to move on. But for this reason, that summer remains two of my most idealized months in recent memory.

It isn't a pretty picture. By the standards of most living situations, mine teetered on squalor. The morning following graduation, I hauled everything accumulated during college to a basement room of a house occupied by a girl, Lindsay, and her lively group of semi-transient friends (by "transient," I mean I never knew who would be crashing on the upstairs couch in the morning). Lindsay and I only knew each other through a first-year French class and subsequent mingling at Froggy's for karaoke Thursdays. Good fortune had my side when I mentioned to her in passing, close to graduation, that I had nowhere to live but was working at the local coffeehouse for the summer. Quickly she offered me a room, to sublease until August. A friendship was born. Boom.

The morning I moved my things into the room, I sat on the two stacked mattresses and stared at the boxes around me, dumbfounded. This was going to be my first bedroom after college. It was messy already, and a little dirty as the previous occupant had to move out quickly, but it was the first space I'd occupied alone since my childhood home. I was dumbfounded not so much from the state of my new bedroom, but by the fact that I was now truly on my own.

When I started the 6am-noon daily full-time shift, it left afternoons for getting better acquainted with my new housemate (and co-barista), Lindsay. In stark contrast to my fungus-infested, flooded bedroom (seriously, I don't lie), Lindsay had the penthouse: a large room on the top of the house that stayed dry and fungus-free. The temperature difference alone was astounding for two bedrooms in the same house. Our kitchen, the meeting spot, served as our restaurant, our bar, our meeting place.

A few exhausting first days into the job, as I crashed on my bed after 6 hours on my feet, Lindsay barreled down and asked me if I "would be boring like this ALL SUMMER." Someone of her energy is hard to match, but I am proud of the way I kept up. In our little house, with the dirty carpet rug, black leather couch (that smelled of old booze from its former residence), Lindsay and I forged a family bond. In the little sunken backyard, we pitched a badminton net and lounged in our bathing suits on semi-broken chairs, listening to music and chatting over a beer or two. It is a scene, in my mind, that warms me with bliss.

Often after our days at home in the yard, we would shower, put on "real" clothes, and venture on down to town. Lindsay lived only a short walk from our favorite hangout, the Tavern, which made it all the easier to make the quick commute. Because it's impossible to simply enjoy a quiet drink with this girl, she taught me a few games to make it even MORE fun (as pictured above). What makes me happy about this picture is that here, we were celebrating her freedom: finishing a 10 day shift filling in as owner to the coffeehouse with mornings starting at 4am. For her "Freedom Party," Lindsay and I dressed up and played her favorite game on our stunning carpet. I lost dismally, and we headed to town.

She brought life to the mundane things, a true talent. Lindsay has limitless passion and intelligence for the world around her. After we moved out of our house, Lindsay took a stint in Peace Corps Madagascar, before her emergency evacuation last March. She lived in town (and with me for a month) until last August, when she landed herself quite a job and quickly moved to Madison. Simply put, I miss her all the time, as she made things joyful in her own unique way (like wine and an Audrey Hepburn movie on Sundays). Our reunions are just as sweet as our brief but sweet time as sister/housemates. Luckily, I see her tomorrow.