Swimming to the Other Side

There's a song we sing at camp called "Swimming to the Other Side" by Pat Humphries. The kids love it, and so do the parents. We sang it the other day, and it reminds me of all the years I have spent in this place, and all the things it means to me.

We are living neath the great big dipper

We are washed by the very same rain

We are swimming in the stream together

Some in power and some in pain

We can worship this ground we walk on

Cherishing the beings that we live beside

Loving spirits will live forever

We're all swimming to the other side.

Read the rest of the lyrics here, and get inspired!

Being around great people and looking forward to working with kids starting monday... it gives me a little hope for this crazy world we live in.

To Vermont We Go!

My trunk is packed, just as it has been pretty much every year since I was 9.

Off to Vermont tomorrow, Farm and Wilderness on Friday, to get camp all set up for the kiddos to arrive. I'm excited to see old friends; friends I've known for years and years and who keep me going back to a pretty amazing place.

Limited internet, little to no phone all summer.

Snail mail.

Bliss!

My goat family

This is my goat family.

Now they can come with me wherever I go!

Boston

We went to Boston Sunday for my sister's birthday. Fun times were had by all!

We went out to brunch,

visited a farm

and Walden Pond,

and ate lots and lots of cake!

Being artsy-fartsy

Having fun with watercolors and colored pencils

Birthday card for my sister's 26th!!!

Trip down memory lane

Today I went to my high school's graduation. It felt somewhat surreal, knowing how much has happened between that day a year ago when I graduated and today watching a whole new batch of people leaving. What a time to be graduating high school, college, grad school! So much wrong with the world, so much right with it as well. So much we can all do, and will do, whether or not it is intentional. We all leave a mark on the world, and I think this group of 33 graduates will each leave a darn good one.

I saw old friends, teachers, coaches, mentors- and most of them fit in 2 or 3 of those categories, considering the way my high school is and was. Everyone involved in everything. It made me a tad nostalgic. I would not want to be back there by any means- I have moved on from high school, as everyone should- but it made me remember all the good things, and it was great to see people who mean a lot to me.

The class speaker was fantastic (who speaks is determined by the graduating class, not by GPA or any of that nonsense), and gave a sense of ease to the rainy day and rather glum spell the world seems to have found itself in.

Good people, good to be home. It's nice to call several places home, then it's ALWAYS good to be home!

Wendell Berry, again. (Shocking, I know!)

I was skimming Life is a Miracle by Wendell Berry, which I got out of the library the other day and found this little passage which I think is some good food for thought:

"Good artists are people who can stick things together so that they stay stuck. They know how to gather things into formal arrangements that are intelligible, memorable, and lasting. Good forms confer health upon the things that they gather together. Farms, families, and communities are forms of art just as are poems, paintings, and symphonies. None of these things would exist if we did not make them. We can make them either well or poorly; this choice is another thing that we make."

The wood chipper

Yesterday my dad and I rented a wood chipper for a few hours...

The giant pile of brush we pulled out of the woods.

I was ready, with volleyball muscles and protective headgear!

Dad feeding the chipper.

We cleared out a bunch of dead junk from the woods, and used the chips to re-do some old paths in our lower woods area. Pretty fun time, quite the adventure!

Home!

FINALLY IT'S SUMMER!

I am home at last, home at last.

Yesterday I went to the Hickories with two good friends and picked strawberries, and today I walked to the center of town and got some books at the library and Books on the Common. I bought The Food of a Younger Land by Mark Kurlansky, who is a terrific author. Then I went to the park and read under a nice tree next to the flower garden. It was super nice!

Lovely day outside,

good to see old friends!