The Everybody

That moment where I darken the lights in the kitchen, coax up the music, shoot an integral friend a specific look through the crowd, and soon there are all my friends dancing. A moment of YES, and I'd rather be nowhere else in the world, there among my pots and pans with the table pushed aside. It was all spontaneous and downstairs the curtains buzzed from the bouncing. The man from Sweden, my new grad student, the architecture history woman of soul, the indefatigable pal of southeast Asia, all those dear ones with whom I was 14 once. All of these dancing together. And I brought out hats, the red bowler, the white bro hat, and they were rotating around as dance props.

I was throwing an Everybody Party.

I have amazing friends and I am beyond blessed for all of them. And all my amazing friends were saying throughout the night that my other amazing friends were amazing. "SEE, right!"

I love being at parties, being among the buzz and the energy, but even better I love doing at parties. Meaning: the hostessing, the mixing of drinks, introducing people ("Annie, this is Ben; he knew me when I had long hair and was way less fun"). I always had a reason to thread through the crowd, allegedly to refill drinks, but it meant mingling with intention and seeing to everybody.

I had made a menu, The Annie (ginger, cider, whisky), The Holly (nutmeg whisky clove), etc, etc, all these friends and their cocktail spirit animals. I left out a pen and invited others to add themselves. We all stood around drinking Hollies at first, people rather intimidated perhaps by the black pepper lemon vodka sassy Mariahs. No solo cups for us, I was proud to bring out Grandma June's gold rimmed glasses on a tray (the tray, in fact, was a flat from the greenhouse for plant starts, but whatever).

It was all sort of a big experiment, all these mixing of circles (from my work team, to the beautiful yoga goddess I met randomly who happens to have my birthday, to the famous Big Ben I went to college with), and all these bizarre yet hopefully delicious cocktail ingredients. Cardamom, ginger, rosemary, cider, lemon, nutmeg, clove, lemon verbena. I love mixing.

Now is not the time of a shared house where parties would be a burden, not the time of living out too far where nobody can walk over. I love my apartment. It's third-floor height and tree-house-ness, that its two blocks from anything, that it can become Hotel Mansard for visitors. I write this in the early morning light of post-party glow, both couches and papasan chair holding my sleeping friends.

Smelling a Time Capsule

The biggest feeling as I rolled my aunt's car through town, the withered rustbelt dead end town--happening to hold my alma mater Allegheny College-- with the lights of the chain restaurants and the empty streets of downtown was this: "I am so glad I don't live here." Which surprised me; I was expecting something like "weeee I feel College again!" or "how different it looks!" I wasnt expecting a sweep of relief.

I was back for "homecoming", though I attended no sports games and reunioned with few class mates, I was there to do my own thing... which was really no different from when I attended school there. I had not been back in 5 years.

Five years in one's twenties is a critical growth stage, producing more leaves, fruiting maybe for some, certainly strengthening of core stem. Going back was like opening a time capsule, preserved in its original state of Old Sandra. The Sandra who was SAaaaandra, with normal hair, and too much timidity to deal boldly with the world, anxiety over little things.

So I was back to visit with myself, the self who couldn't imagine a life after college. Somehow, being back again, I felt taller now. Or that everything was slightly smaller. How much difference can be made by travel, biking, jobs, broken hearts, stolen bikes, music...

I wheeled downtown the first night, turning heads, purple hair on a bike, at night, waat?, had a beer in the one place I ever went out there, and reveled around in memories and reflections. I typed a bit of the following... 

This place has so many dive bars. Ithaca has maybe two, which may intend and work towards being dive bars. Here, it's by default.

But the very first thing when I rolled on campus was play the pipe organ I studied on here.  I was the only organ student for four years, the only organ student who studied for four years, and my lessons and practice time were sacred to me.

Opening the door into the chapel, and a big whoosh of memories was upon me. The new carpet smell in there flushed me back, my memories linked to new carpet smell unfortunately, smells being the strongest associations of the senses. And the memory was more of a  feeling, the feeling of safety and peace. Because I would come in after classes, and after trying to be social, awkwardly, and enter this space and then fill it with big music. I knew it was a special place, but smelling the memory 5 years later, I realized how critical that organ music and peace space was for my soul then.

So I approached the instrument like going back to an old lover, but found I had grown and changed, and that organ which had once been all-powerful and overwhelming now seemed smaller and obedient, compared with the gorgeous beast I play now at the first Presbyterian in Ithaca.

And wow, I love Ithaca. In Ithaca there's no smoking in bars and spitting (I even witnessed a small boy, no more then 10, spit on the street corner; he's learning from Pa? Getting started early for the snuff?).

I had a fascinating discussion with Professor Bread about this. About living in Ithaca, which is almost too precious with all its bike lanes and multiple co-op locations and community gardens. It's pretty well improved and is thriving with community.  Compare this with living in Meadville, where there is little community and so much work to be done. I could be living there, being the ONE girl on a bike going for groceries, supporting the farmers market, being an example. But I am not; I'm enjoying a really special place to live, and at least now I can fully see that.

How that such a mundane thing of going into buildings can be a charged and peculiar and meaningful experience. Again, it was the smelling. I went into the old dining hall (which smelled like Resignation: I never really enjoyed eating in the slamming and rushed environment there), I went into the student center (smelled like Opportunity: to meet people, and more importantly, to  "rescue food" from catered events), I went into my old senior year house (smelled like Coming Back After A Day, but not like Coming Home). I wandered the campus feeling flushed of memories and thoughtful and present. It was like a giant meditation on time changes and sense of self.

In this small rust belt town I never went out, except for here, "the penny bar". My friends were the ones who'd track me down, or give up on me since I lacked a phone. And now, I've been out all over Ithaca, and I'm the one bugging my friends to come spend time with me. Something happened to my social self since leaving this place, and I am pleased with it indeed.

After the beer I went for a slice of pizza, which they didn't have, but they made a pizza so I could have a slice of it, if I didn't mind waiting, so i hung around soaking up small town PA. Listened to them talking about "jeee-roes" (gyros) and making me cringe, talking with a man with a few teeth mourning his cat who had died.

Since I wasn't at the sports games or ribbon cuttings of homecoming, I had time to fill, and how splendidly serendipitous it was that there was a pipe organ workshop by one of my favorite composers! I joined the organists group of northwestern PA, decidedly an outlier (for being both female AND young; I've met only a few young organists but they have all been male), and felt like a little green alien who had finally touched down on a planet that spoke my language. Organists are an insular bunch, because we're all at our respective churches separately Sunday morning, and never play in ensembles (a pipe organ kind of IS an ensemble already), and there's few of us anyway. So to find all these people, all doing that same magical thing I do, was super exciting. I was talking to anyone I could, asking about hymns and congregations and the Worst Mistake You've Ever Made. I learned some gems of organist technique and the composer gave me a book of his music (!), looked me in the eye, and told me to keep practicing. I kind of have no choice; I love it too much. I caught up with my original organ professor, and we padded around the campus together (I found her a four-leaf clover by the path), running into the other organists not leaving campus either, all of us unable to not launch again into enthusiastic music nerd conversations. 

Then I had beers with my dearest Professor Advisor, realizing I had followed his footsteps and was also now a soil scientist, and that we picked up like I had never graduated, laughing about his terrible handwriting on my papers and talking about leaf decomposition. I rode the old bicycle trail I used to take as a student back when 12 miles was a long ride, I played organ for the college chapel service, a good closing of the loop.

I had visited my favorites, visited a self of mine, talked Organist, and went smelling. I'm so glad I visited.  But I drove back into Ithaca, in its newly-recognized preciousness, and there felt a sense of homecoming. 

Survival guide for the pipe organ

"That's a work out!" observed an alto about the organ part for the anthem this week. "Someone should bring her a bagel!" "Or some Gatorade." It was true, I had to swing my legs south to the low notes, alternating with reaching for the volume pedal, then stretching feet way up north to land on unexpected notes again. I must have some specially evolved bench gripping muscles in my butt, because sometimes I don't know how I stay on.

This is piece by John Rutter, that moves at the speed of light, has enough notes to break a wheelbarrow, an organ part that goes north and south while the singers go east and west, and charges helpfully into 7/8s time signature at one point.

I feel like I'm jumping out of an airplane when I begin the intro. Into the mess! Heave ho! Faster louder harder!

Double tasking at its most insurmountable. Watch conductor (somehow, out of my third eye that's not blocked by the massive organ console?), play both feet, play both hands, modulate volume with feet, turn pages with hands, stay adhered to bench. All at breakneck speed.

Somehow our conductor is the nicest man alive and does not fault me for the 35 additional unexpected notes I offered during rehearsal.

I asked him for survival advice, and the best way to live through battle was to not worry so much about the exact notes, but stay in the rhythm and feeling of the thing. Better to leave a few notes out than to try for every one and gain ugly addendum notes in the process.

I practiced this piece doggedly all week, starting with a shapeless lump of clay, and working with it to create some art. The clay starts cold and unapproachable, difficult to mold, and I can watch the process of learning and adapting take place as it becomes something recognizable.

"Phil.   ...   Phil.   Phil!    Phil!"  Its Sunday morning before church and I'm clinging to the bench and paddling away at the pedals and then realize there is a gentleman staring at me. And his wife is trying to get his attention. I'm practicing the finale of the choir piece. "Its just so exciting!" he gushes and then his wife comes over and we three realize we have similarities of gardening and places we've been before. I do love living here.

All this work for 3 minutes of glory Sunday morning. Or at least 3 minutes of adrenaline-pumped energizing praise. We do not over-rehearse in this choir, aiming not to exhaust the singers over too many details. Efficiency and preparedness instead. Everyone's still excited about the piece this way, a little raw, like that energy of a first kiss. I draw on that which I cultivated as a horse girl--Forced Calm--where the horse can feel what you're experiencing and magnifies it. Such on the pipe organ.

They sang. I expressed notes. I landed the final tower of a chord and that was glorious; the director made the International Relief Sign at me (brow wipe) and that was that.

After the smoke cleared I realized my sparkly scarf was shimmering with movement, my heart beating so bigly that the scarf picked it up. I'm rarely nervous anymore (history knows this has not always been the case, one of the unexpected boons of having "grown up"), on the pipe organ or elsewhere, so its kind of a novelty for me. I just wish I could work to be more present at these times when all I see is flames. But the afterward felt really grand.

The Beatles In Pennsylvania

Well here we are again folks, as my dad would say. Its 4:50 in the morning, and that's what one says when one has been lugged roughly into it from the bliss of sleep.

It feels like I should go to the airport now.

But instead I am driving to Pennsylvania.

Life of a research technician in crops and soils. I don't actually mind my task today, it is one of helping and following directions and not making my own decisions. My own project and grant writing and telling others what to do can wait--and this is why I like this job so much for its diversity--and instead my role is as Helper. Graduate Student #5 in our lab, or The Clever Irreverent One, has a beetle diversity project in two different locations, one being the foreign and incorrigible land of Pennsylvania. We're looking at how different densities of organic corn and soybeans influence beetle population and weed seed predation. All week I've been focusing on this project with Clever, as its Northeast Bug Week or whatever, and I've spent much of every day setting out little round plates of appealing weed seed snacks for beetles to browse. Then we, or rather, some other unfortunate research assistant, will count what's left to determine what was eaten.

One of my favorite little portions of this job, which I didn't expect, is serving a support role, a little bit being the mom of the lab. I've been a consoling ear to overwhelmed and upset grad students, I've made people eat my backup banana chips when I've noticed them get stoic and silent and hungry during field work. I've helped with all things logistical.  "How do I get the biomass samples taken and get the seeds counted all before my class at 2pm?" It's logistics. "It's not a crisis: it's a puzzle," I'll say and we calm down and accomplish things.

So Clever and I are driving south through thick morning fog, talking about artificial intelligence, listening to the BBC or Sirius radio. The light is growing imperceptibly up through the fog, even a thick gray fog seems bright in comparison with the black early morning.

Clever groans about Pennsylvania; "careful yuh don't git spit on", he'll say, as everyone seems to be chewing tobacco, 
or roll his eyes about the hunting shops and diesel mud-spattered pickups idling in the gas station parking lot, the occupants eating massive sandwiches.

But for all the redneckosity and the mines, and granted this is not all of Pennsylvania of course, there are some beautiful bucolic vistas, low mountains rolling and crossing, views down into valleys green with crops.

The research site in Pennsylvania is a testament to the power of organic weed management, ie, tine weeding, because it had none. I'm walking through the corn plots, the lambsquarters and pigweed as tall as I am, pornographic terrible trees these things are, leaning aggravatingly into the rows. I'd traverse through, flapping blindly through the corn leaves, pulling myself thru these grabbing weeds, like combing dreadlocked hair. I'd put out my little plate of seeds for the beetles, then turn around and exit that plot and comb everyone the opposite direction again.

Clever and I arrive in the dewy morning, a large research cornfield of work in front of us. "It's sunny and beautiful!, put on your rain gear everyone!" calls out Clever. This is because the dew here is insurmountable, as if every leaf were supporting a thin flat pond; walking through the plots would soak us. So we kit up and slosh through the plots. My feet carry a sludge of mud, water, and weed seeds. We're itchy from the grabbing weeds and work stoicly, hours on end of going into every single one of the hundreds of plots, doing the same little task systemically and carefully.  Champions of Science.

When we finish, Clever and I are hooting and cheering, and there's muddy high-fives and yah! how happy are we to have finished this experiment. A latte, shower, rest, lunch, whatever, becomes immeasurably more satisfying after something like this.

100 miles of rain musings

I write this sitting in my bed, listening to the rain. This is an appropriate way to appreciate the rain right now, in a distant non-interactive format. Because I bicycled 100 miles in it today, circling Cayuga Lake, for the AIDS fundraiser ride.

My socks became as sponges in my sandals (laugh you may, but my feet must breathe); the fenders which had for the first 10 minutes been my pride and pleasure now guttered drainage directly into my feet. The raincoat wicked water over my arms, clammy extensions that they were, though blessedly my torso stayed dry. Water beads conglomerated at the rim of my helmet and slid smoothly to and fro, primary glinting things in my vision.

And I was really quite happy. I settled into the rain and it eroded out of my priority. I was drinking electrolytes, which I've not treated myself to before (astonishingly!) and now I know why they are called sports drinks. That sugar and salt plumbed itself directly where it needed to go and my legs churned on.  Gone now are those days of finishing a long ride feeling starved but also pregnant, the equivalent of 7 meals sitting heavily and unactualized in my gut.  Liquid calories! I must have consumed thousands upon thousands of them today, and I felt fierce and fine. I was a hummingbird.

Humming along, i had lots of time to think and gaze out over the still misty lake, and so I decided that for me, biking in the rain is a little like learning to live with a heart break or sadness. And it has been a year of falling for and trying to get over unattainable people, so I've had plenty of fodder. Both rain and heart sadness can be startling at first, and uncomfortable and you resist it. But then, eventually, however long it may take, you come slowly to accept it. Then you look out and notice the farm houses and the misty lake views. But you're still wet, though it may not overtake all your thoughts, its still a backdrop.  Sometimes it may pour, others it may only drizzle. Disappointment or sadness may in fact make the rest of the experiences more compelling or poignant in comparison. Who knows, I'm still working on this.

I was quite happy with my 5:30am decision to don myself in a sparkly sequins shirt under my raincoat, appearing ready for a dance party, and one green bicycle tall sock and one block bicycle tall sock. "Hey sparkle lady" one rider called out, and an older man, upon seeing me, cracked this huge smile: "your outfit! This totally makes my day! Thank you so much." Also, lots of: "love the SOCKS" as people passed or I passed them. I realized these non-standard wardrobe choices are a way of interacting with the world, and I was enjoying this easy excuse to look up from the pavement or away from the corn to connect, however briefly, with some other riders.

7 hours and 51 minutes in the damp saddle, and somehow the time never dragged. I celebrated reaching the top of the lake, I noticed the switch from quaint cottages to farm houses and double-wide trailers as we rowed around the Seneca falls inland area. I enjoyed the company of my indefatigable uncle, where we talk or not talk. But a lot of the ride was in solo silence, not really having thoughts concretely or intentionally ("and now I shall think about THIS") but instead sitting with my life. 

I sat with how blessed I am to have so many FRIENDS, really sat with this and was warmed in the rain. And also how supportive everyone has been with their donations to this ride. Thank you! And also how this lake and Ithaca have always actually been a section in my life: as a child coming here to float whimsically around on my grandparent's sailboat, the child's imagination burgeoning of pirates or pilgrims or Columbus. Ithaca itself meant the science center, feeding the ducks, Lego's and spaceships with my highly novel boy cousins. Being shuttled around by parents, aunts and uncles, grandparents, to enjoy the time with other family members.

And now I am here as myself, forging ahead with a "grown-up" job, making friends, tending my apartment, going out and walking the commons at night if I want.

Its amazing that two very different versions of myself have existed here. I thought about that in the rain too. 

Thoughts from the Mom Van

Science needs to happen! Cover crops to cut and bag. Soil to core. Weed-free plots to make weed-free. Soybeans to count. Ah, studying sustainable agriculture. And for all this to happen our lab has hired a number of undergraduate research assistants this summer.

Which means I am now a supervisor.  (!)

I have never really served this role before, and had you told me that I’d be doing such even a few years ago, I’d be mighty surprised.  Myself and Master Chris, (lab manager and brilliant with any farm implement), work together to make science happen. “Champions of Science!” Co-worker Brian called us one day, and I’m kind of adopting the moniker for our lab team, in a way laughing how us Champions of Science spend our days ingloriously hand-weeding, counting soybeans, and identifying various grasses to species.  Not flashy work, but the quiet pumps behind the goal of making agriculture as sustainable and efficient as possible.  

It’s no small task to help coordinate the field work that needs to happen in a number of experiments, helping the grad students if they need it, partitioning the research assistants out to different projects.

When we first had out group of new assistants on board, and I was realizing that I would be Supervisor, I wasn’t sure at all how to deal with this. These first weeks were wearied confusion, as I wondered about authority and strictness. Should I be maintaining distance and mystery like a classic field boss? But it was too tiring moderating myself all the time, wondering what was the Correct and Conservative way to be.

And then I decided this was stupid. I was going to be myself.  (how trite, right, a Disney movie take-home message, but sometimes in this life—thanks to mores and all—surprisingly difficult)  I played loud beatsy happy music in the van while I drove people to and from the field site, pumping the brakes to the beat while approaching a stop sign. I teased people playfully and joined in jokes. I brought chocolate to share. I shared stories of embarrassment, hilarity, or heartbreak from my own life. And others did too.  Instead of quietly keeping my four-leaf clover finds to myself I victoriously crowed out and gave them to people, not caring if I seemed eccentric.

I enjoyed our field days so much more now, and I think our group did too.  People were bringing ice-cream and watermelon to share. We left the key in the van and listened to music while we worked in the field. We had long discussions about relationships and travel and personalities. “I love this lab!”, “I’m going to miss this so much when the season is over!” the research assistants shared. Our field work sometimes felt like hanging with a group of friends (just friends who I frequently reminded to be more efficient). I’m going to miss our group too.

Some funny faces in the field.

It makes me wonder about group dynamics. What makes for a “good group”? A certain pivotal member of good humor? An underlying subculture of spirit and pride? Everyone realizing that everyone else is participating with dedication and that becomes the norm?

But in all this fun I still am the one who paces about the field, suggesting ways to be more efficient (“you know, having one dedicated bag-labeler instead of everyone reaching for the sharpie might be a good way to go”) and encouraging people to drink plenty of water.  I also recommend people pee in the non-research corn field (“go sidedress the corn!”) rather than driving all the way back to the field house for bathrooms. “Just pretend you’re camping!” 

When I was a child, we had an imaginary town called Beanville, where we each had a play-family of Lego-people and farms and played commerce and trains and town meetings. Because our game moved through time, we decided to have Night and Day occur at the same time for all of our play-families.  Somehow, little Sandra became The Night Mayor (this word-play delighted us) and would strut around, arbitrarily calling out when it was day and night and we all had to scurry our little Lego people to bed or out to milk their little plastic cows in the morning.

And now, relating to time, I noticed that lunch-break would continue endlessly because nobody was mindful of the time. So I took upon myself the responsibility of getting everyone back into the van after lunch. A Lunch Mayor of sorts. “With great responsibility comes great power” one of the grad students pointed out to me. “Five minute warning!” I’d herd everybody.

For all these people we have both a big aggressive 4-wheel drive research truck and a white maternal van for going to and from the field, lugging soil probes, bags of samples, and people. “Which vehicle would you like to drive?” Lab Master Chris (my compatriot supervisor). “I don’t care,” I replied, “I can be a badass or a mom.”

And most of the time I am the mom, whizzing around in the van with music blasting and kids in the back singing and dancing. I joke about soccer practice and ballet lessons. The assistants told me, “we’ve decided we’re like a big family: you’re the mom, and Lab Master Chris is the dad.”  “What about our professor?” I asked (who is mostly writing and thinking about cover crops from his office, rather than playing in the field). “Oh, he’s the Wizard” they responded.  

There was no room in the mom-van, so Mom rode in the back.

Southeast Asia, Unplugged

It’s raining. I have an unfortunate and fettering cold. I haven’t bicycled in 4 days.  Blug.  

So, to divert myself I went back and read the battered yellow journal I carried with me on my bicycle adventure around Thailand, Cambodia, and Vietnam last year. Sometimes, installed in this world of stationary apartment, with cat and academia job and a wardrobe, with the ability to drink the tap water and read the road signs, my time in Southeast Asia feels very far away indeed.  But it IS my handwriting.

I feel like sharing with you some bits from in there. Just to relive them. This was my personal journal, not the glossy carefully-preened blog I kept, and so I wrote with no objective. I often just made lists of what I was eating. Or risible quotes of hilarity between traveling partner Lady Elise and myself. Or just stream of conscious end of day downloading.  (in no particular order)

On Breakfasts, uninspiring

Feb 2. Thailand.

Started with too sweet yogurt and “Muesli” which was all dumb corn flakes and 3 oats. But riding quieter roads, dipping around potholes. Lunch was unidentifiable fish and rice. The morning had some cloudy-ish patches and that was nice.

On snacks

Feb 1. Thailand.

I have so many snacks! They make me eager, pleased, and resourceful. [then there was an exhaustive list of everything I had gleefully purchased in the Thai market]

On environmental awareness

Feb 1. Thailand.

New things! I pooped into a squat toilet this morning. Which went straight into the sea. I remember reading about raw sewage into the water, but half dismissed it somehow, too far away, too horrid to be possible, too astonishing? But when I hear it splash down there, it’s true.

On wardrobes

Jan 31. Thailand.

I’m wearing color blotch shirt with floral pants: appalling combination. But I really do not care. The young people don’t, but older ladies wear all sorts of arguing prints.

About clearing our guest house rooms of mosquitoes

Jan 30. Thailand.

After mosquitoes. Could be a game on the Wei. Jumping, reaching into air, then diving to all-fours, slapping across the tile floor. You hear a solid slam! on the wall and then a victorious HA!... “what are those people doing?” [someone might think upon hearing us]

On rainy days for the poorly equipped

Mar. 21. Vietnam.

We have camped here in the clean-floored lobby of the “Something Long” Hotel. The weather is so miserable that you can only revel in the misery and irritation it brings you (the cold froth in the sandals, the damp hair, arms clutched ineffectively about your person) especially when we are lacking boots and proper coats. This town has little more than lots of Everything Else Shops (“everything else you don’t want”) and the beguiling lights flashing on the bridge and that eerie skeletal cathedral.

On luxury earned for the weary

Mar. 15. Vietnam.

Ok so maybe it’s not named the Imperial Hotel, but this hotel sure feels luxurious and I am thoroughly enjoying it. This day: had no idea how it would work itself because in the beginning there was diarrhea and rain. But Bahn Mi [sandwich] was so delicious for my wearied self. I love the process of eating them. Mine was so good because it was so hot and there was so much egg. … Falling asleep with pen in hand here, because of the wine and HOT BATH and smoothy yummy scent oil. Mmm.

On ingredient lists, inclusive

Mar. 12. Vietnam.

Ingredients on the Vietnamese packaged fruit chips I got (delicious!): “Some kinds of fruits and vegetable oil.”

On hotel beds, the unexpected

Mar. 8. Vietnam.

Just pulled a hopefully clean pair of panties from the fitted sheet in this bed! Ha!

On food choices

Mar 4. Vietnam.

Been pregnant with farts all windy evening since I ate that puffy white Chinese style bun with pork and two whole boiled quails eggs in it. Was eyeing up Elise’s Pho with all the greens jabbed into it…ends up being quite healthy.

This is funny because bathroom = shower stall

Feb 26. Cambodia.

Sandra, after a Cambodian shower: “Sorry Elise, I made such a mess! I got water all over the bathroom floor.”

A probably typical Cambodia day

Feb 15. Cambodia.

Road was very jostly and jangly. Dusty, honky, pummeled with traffic. Was afraid of full boredom in this place once we got here but painted nails, did yoga, went for a janky massage. That was hilarious though. Only 10,000 riel, not at all like the Bangkok massage. Mostly a bunch of kneading. Like they were little girls playing Town and they decided to be Massage. But nice.  …  Had a green mochi-like thing that had an odd, slight, flavorless-ness so was probably “melon.”  And then some Chocolate Orange Filled cookies simply because they were marked with a price and that pleased me.

On hotel room habits

Feb 6. Cambodia.

[Note on our post-ride routine: Elise would wash out her riding outfit every day and hang it out to dry; Sandra would empty her panniers and set out her belongings]

Sandra: “Where would we be without your clothing to decorate the rooms?”

Elise: “Yeah, well, YOU make the place look like a market. Sometime I’ll just put price tags on all your stuff.”

Laughing at our expat selves

Feb. 13. Cambodia.

After our rope-heaving hike we stopped at lovely little restaurant with strings of lights and colored stars. We had $3 cocktails and my first fresh spring rolls (the sweet sour garlic-chunk sauce so good I drank it) and some chicken. A little loopy, quite content, decidedly beat. I sat there, holding my fistful of foreign money, picking my teeth. And Elise nearly forgot her bra she’d hung on a chair. [ok, so it was very very hot there and any item to be removed from the body was a relief] Imagine the servers running after her, “Madame! Madame! You forgot something!” I laughed so hard I was nearly in tears. ….I was basting in this on the beach, looking at the islands: that I like being in Cambodia and I love traveling.