Like Usual.

The other day, I was hanging out with three of my favorite kids. We were playing kickball with a smaller-than-a-kickball-type rubber ball. After striking out, I poutingly sat on the sidelines with the four-year-old, who couldn't figure out that after kicking the ball (further than I could have), she was supposed to run to first base. "I can't do it, Lizzy!" she screamed. "I don't know where to run!"

I excitedly pointed toward first base and said, "Right there! You're almost there! Keep going!"

But "right there" was too obscure for her four-year-old brain, which saw so many possibilities. She didn't realize that there were four bases connected by straight lines--she saw a million directions in which she could run. That way? That way? That way?

I watched her little eyes dart in all directions, earnestly trying to figure out where "right there" was supposed to be.

And then she collapsed on the dusty ground and began to sob.

So I scooped her up and we had a short rest on the sidelines while her brothers attempted to play baseball with the larger-than-a-baseball-type rubber ball.

While we sat in the shady grass, both of us recuperating and nursing our egos, we took off our shoes and wiggled our toes in the late summer breeze. "Ooh!" I said, "My toes are a little stinky!"

And Theo, being four, picked up her shoe and put it to her nose. Then she pulled her foot to just below her nostrils and announced, "Mine are not stinky. My feet smell....like usual."

I laughed, thinking that was such a strange thing to say. "And does 'like usual' smell like?" I asked her.

"Plain," she said. "My feet smell plain."

"Plain, just like usual?" I said, smiling.

"Yep. Just like usual," she said.

Then she put back on her shoes, stood up, and announced she wanted to finish running to first base.

Extravagant

In the past week, I have been at altitudes of 2,400 feet and over 12,000 feet. My legs have carried me up and down Arizona's highest and lowest places. Well, second highest place, to be exact. I attempted to climb to Humphrey's Peak, which really is the highest point in Arizona, but an unfortunate mistaken deviation from the trail led me to Agassiz Peak instead. Second highest. But close. And only two days later, without fully recovering from the climb, I hiked to the bottom of the Grand Canyon and then back up the following day.

I have lots to say about both of these experiences, including other mishaps and potentially dangerous situations from which I gratefully escaped with only a few sore muscles (situations which may or may not have to do with unpreparedly climbing the San Francisco Peaks in monsoon season without adequate attire and then actually being caught in a monsoon, descending steep drop-offs of loose boulders and falling rock while watching the lightning pierce nearer and nearer, scaling a "no hiking allowed" fence out of dire necessity, and things of this nature).

But, alas, I am not here to write about my hiking adventures. Not yet. That will come later, along with a top ten list of the most exciting non-life-threatening things that happened during my trip (you know, freestyling in broken French while suffering mild heat exhaustion, biking in the dark while pretty much unable to see at night, Charlie the bike-rental kid who was either hitting on me or hating on me, depending on the day, etc.)

I am here tonight, instead, to gush about my extravagant compensation for volunteering to give my airline ticket to a standby passenger. Well, maybe it's not really extravagant, considering that I am stuck here in Phoenix overnight, but to a month-by-month fiscally irresponsible young lady like myself, getting a free hotel room, a free breakfast, a free shuttle to and from the airport AND a free round trip ticket to anywhere in the contiguous U.S. is pretty luxurious.

So here I am, using free internet after my free swim in the underwater-lit, outdoor pool, under the open night sky, after a free shower with free lemon-verbena shampoo and lotion soap, just winding down from my adventurous trip with a free stay in a fancy-shmancy hotel room with two double beds (which one should I choose? How does one choose between two beds?). There is free coffee, free towels to use, free toothpaste, free air conditioning (it was 106 degrees in Phoenix today), free TV (which I won't use--even free, I still hate that animated box), free wake-up calls, and even free food for me, compliments of the airline.

Apparently there are people who seek out this sort of situation--who immediately ask at the ticket counter if they need volunteers to give up their seats. I didn't seek it out--I wanted to be in St. Paul tonight, snuggly in my bed (er, well, the borrowed bed I am sleeping in for the next few months). Instead, I got bumped from my flight, which was delayed anyway, and here I am, soaking up the luxury that only an unsuspecting, strapped-for-cash wide-eyed, lovestruck traveler can really appreciate.

This free stuff doesn't come without some amount of guilt for me--do I really deserve this? I mean, really, two beds? Three towels in the bathroom? Air conditioning?

But...for now I am just going to enjoy it. Luxury awaits me and my stinky backpack.

Anyway, if I were really going to be extravagant, of my own accord, I would have turned down the fancy-schmancy hotel room offer and rented a car and driven the three hours back to Flagstaff, from where I just came, even if for just overnight. Free food, multiple towels, and an outdoor pool are nothing compared to the extravagance that a little bit of romance can inspire.

My sensibilities keep me here, in this free hotel. Extravagant or not, even leaving Arizona is an adventure. Let's just hope I can get on my return flight tomorrow...

Prairie Mountain

Today I am at my parents' house in North central Iowa. It is the farm I grew up on, surrounded by miles of cornfields and prairie. As I drove up to their house last night, my car filled to the brim with my cats and their belongings, a kayak strapped to the roof, my anxiety high from a day of trying to pull my shit together and learning how to secure a boat to my little Ford Focus all by myself, I couldn't help but feel awed at the tranquility of their big, old farm house, the familiar, long driveway (that is now paved but was a duration of loose gravel for most of my childhood), the rows of tall, looming evergreens that my dad had planted when we were small, and the nostalgic, comfortable images of grain bins, the barn, the shed, farm machinery, and various animals squawking and braying to announce my arrival.

Their house is West of town, so as I approached the farm around 8:30 pm last night, I could see the sun, huge and orange, lazily lowering itself into the horizon. My sister, who is living at home now and working on the farm, had recently said to me, "Do you know what I notice about Iowa? The sky--there is so much color, and there's always a little pink in it, and you can see forever."

And as I watched the sun slowly, slowly settle herself into the head-high rows of corn, then sink amidst the crop, and then disappear into the endless horizon, I saw what she meant. It was beautiful.

Later, after a jovial dinner with all five members of my family (which included ridiculous banter about the donkey, a thoroughly detailed narrative about the lives and character maps of the roosters, and the inevitable plays on words that describe all the animals--"The cocks are chasing the ass again! Ha, ha, ha, ha"), I stepped outside to unload my car.

There were fireflies blinking everywhere! And I glanced up, and there was Cassiopeia, Orion, and all the late summer constellations, brightly gleaming above my head.

There is a lot of charm to this place.

And then, this morning, I woke up to the sound of roosters crowing, the lone donkey braying, and my mom's cat chatting with my two cats through a closed door. I came downstairs and looked out the window, to the South. To the North, the East, and the West, you can see for miles. You see nothing but rows of corn, soybeans, or prairie. You can see a blanket of unending sky, unfolding in all directions, whatever weather it holds taking it sweet time as it makes its way across the enromous palette of flatland.

To the South, however, you see something different. You see crops, you see miles of land, but in the center of the horizon, you see another, strangely misplaced vision.

You see something that looks like a mountain. A mountain?

Yes, a mountain. And it's a growing.

Each time I come home to visit my parents and marvel in the simplicity and beauty of the nature that surrounds them, I notice the mountain to the South, and how it gets a bit taller, a bit fatter.

That "mountain" is a giant landfill that acquires trash from all over the midwest. Less stringent disposal rules and cheaper taxing on dumping in Iowa keep Minnesota garbage spilling over and onto the mountain that lives just a couple miles South of my parents' house (70-100 truckloads from Minnesota arrive daily, according to my dad. He calls Waste Management Systems the Mafia of Garbage--"Google it, Liz, you won't find anything. They're the Mafia.") There was a big uproar about this practice a few years ago, including a write up in the Star Tribune about the landfill just outside of Lake Mills, IA, but apparently nothing has changed. (When I was a first-year in college, my choir director said, "Oh, you're from Lake Mills? I just read about the landfill there!")

So the ungarnished, natural beauty of rural Iowa is interrupted. Garnished, if you will, by pepperings (er, dumpings) of out of state trash, inevitably seeping into the groundwater and nutrient-rich soil.

My sense of awe in the infinite sky and the miles and miles of prairie is disturbed by a mountain of trash.

My enchantment with the loveliness and fresh air is also disturbed by the sound of a low-flying plane outside, right now, at this very moment, spraying fungicide on the crops. "It's crazy out there right now in the farming world," my Dad said to me this morning, when he told me about the pesticide plane. "Farmers are doing everything they can to make more money. Get rid of the aphids, get rid of the fungus, they increase productivity--and they'll make more money."

That lazy sun setting softly into the horizon last night sees all of this. I wonder if her heart breaks, like mine does, at the sound of fierce streams of pesticide, or the vision of a completely unnatural mountain growing by leaps and bounds in the middle of the cornfields and native wildflowers. (And don't even get me started on GMO corn. On Monsanto. On the ethics of hybridization. On hog farms. Among other things.)

Yes, it is beautiful here. And we are completely destroying it, one truckload of trash at a time.

Eye of the Storm

Someone recently said to me, "You are like the eye of the storm right now."

I'm telling you, people, I am stirring it up wherever I go right now. I turn to the left, and the dust erupts. I turn to the right, and the leaves scatter. I turn around, and an avalanche falls. I walk forward, and glass shatters.

I'm trying not to take it personally, but a few too many of these sorts of chaos have happened for me to really believe it is purely coincidental.

My most recent theory is that I am living a really, really intense version of the old adage: the only way out is through.

Apparently, I have been so deeply entrenched in the muck that every attempt I make for clarity is obscured by flying debris, at least for now, at least while I keep trudging along, making my way through it.

(Example. Ring, ring. Liz: Hello? Potential Landlord: I know you are planning to move into my property in three days, but by the way, your cats are not welcome here after all. Find other arrangements.)

So...here's a very mild request to you, in case you have some life-altering news for me: Give it a few days. My plate is full.

Least Helpful

When I tell people about my recent break-up, I usually get really empathetic responses, but I have also gotten some very strange reactions.

The most helpful responses go something like this:
"Oh, honey, I'm so sorry. Are you okay? Do you need a place to stay? Indian food? A book to borrow? Help moving? Hugs from my three adorable children?" ...and generous offers of that sort.

The most indulgently vindictive response I have gotten was this:
"Ooh! I hope you dig up all those perennials you planted!"

And the least helpful response, by far, was this one:
"Oh, Liz, that's good. It was such a terrible neighborhood!"

Piano Movers

The second most frightening thing I have ever seen in my entire life is three grown men with beer bellies and missing teeth putting my hundred-year-old Behning upright piano on its side and heaving it down a flight of steps.

I hired the less-reputable piano movers this time, because they quoted me a (nominally) cheaper price than the more-reputable, (nominally more) expensive company, and also because ever since I got word of the failing state of the piano, I haven't been quite so uptight about the upright.

Even so, seeing these men literally dripping their salty sweat onto the ivories while complaining of bad rotator cuffs, knees, and backs pretty much panicked me.

I watched them, wide-eyed and amazed at the terrible physical condition of the people I had hired to move a sacred 900 pound piece of wood. Who goes into the piano moving business with bad shoulders? Wouldn't it seem to be a strange career move? Perhaps a certain injury?

And as I listened to the three stooges yelling out warnings to each other, via cutesie nickname ("Hey, One-Leg! Catch that corner before it smashes into the siding!"), I began to think of all the questions I should have asked before hiring the less-reputable piano movers.

I should have asked:
1) Am I responsible for any injuries which occur while you are moving my piano?
2) If you bust my ex-girlfriend's brand new siding, will you pay up?
3) If you drop the piano, will you fix it?

As all these questions swam around in my head, I watched the three of them grunt and heave and shove my poor, sweet, heavy piano down Stacia's new front steps and into their truck. I wondered if I had made a wrong decision by hiring the underdogs. I was worried about my piano, but even more so, I was worried about the three seemingly fragile men, with their scraped up shins and bumbling banter.

"Whoops, we just ran over a garden! Those look like weeds anyway." (This wasn't my garden; it was a shade garden at my friend Dan's house, where my piano is being stored, and now his rental property is missing a few ferns.)

In any case, the piano made it in one piece, and so did all three of the men. However, the process took much longer than it should have. Besides the smashed ferns, the piano movers managed to bust a couple of pieces of plywood and nearly take off a door handle, but other than those minor infractions, all went well.

Dan stood next to me when we arrived at his house with the piano, and he watched, amazed, at the struggle and sweat that the three men exuded. "Thank God I'm not doing that," he said. (Previously, he had volunteered himself and his roommates to move the piano. I thanked him for the generous offer but had declined and insisted on hiring professionals.)

And after all was said and done, piano safely in place in its new temporary home, one of the men sat down and began to play.

...And he was fantastic!

He immediately commenced with an eight-octave jazz improvisation, rocking the entire house into a daze. I instantly forgave the hassle (the 2-hour late arrival, the inevitable jokes about such a big piano for such a small girl, the tramped-down ferns) and listened to the best piano playing I have heard in quite a while.

Dan and I were a buzz of questions for the pianist. He shrugged and said nonchalantly, "Oh, I don't perform much anymore. I used to accompany Bette Midler, though, you know of her?"

......

And so, you must wonder, what was the first most frightening experience of my life if it wasn't this?

Easy. That was watching the same piano give another set of movers quite a struggle. But those piano movers? They were my dad, my brother, and a few friends.

I don't care who you've accompanied, especially if you are my family. But I will hire someone who has the right equipment, even if they have bad knees, over my friends and family any day. No way would I want to lose my brother to my Behning New York Upright.

Vacation

I am supposed to be on vacation this week, at my parents cabin on Spirit Lake, with Luna and Stacia.

However, a series of gut-wrenching events occurred, which has catapulted me into the ambiguous land of extracting myself from a broken relationship, and which has now given me a week on my own, free from vacation and also free from teaching.

When we called off our vacation (it's no fun to go on vacation with someone with whom you have just broken up), I decided not to reschedule my piano lessons. I planned instead to fill my days with therapy, writing, hot tea, music, friends, running, stretching, and reading.

What I got instead were days and days of no sleep, not enough food, the inability to concentrate on anything creative, and a knot the size of a mountain in my stomach.

I am coming around now, able to eat and sleep again. I have consumed massive quantities of chamomile tea and even attempted running (which didn't turn out well--trying run after a few days of hardly sleeping and eating is a bad idea). I have depended on my friends to the point of running out of cell phone minutes this month (I usually have hundreds of minutes left over at the end of the month). I have tried to take it day by day, moment by moment, and have even succeeded at enjoying some of those moments, in between fits of sobbing. (Like whitewater kayaking for the first time ever--pure fun. Or visiting the butterfly tent with the girls I babysit and watching the kids immerse themselves in a hunt for caterpillars. Or even getting the chance to watch Persepolis, the film based on the comicbook-style memoir by Marjane Sartrapi, not once but twice.)

All in all, I will come out of this alright. I know it because I have done it before.

I will eventually pick myself up off the floor, reassemble the pieces, and walk on.

I didn't really consider that it might be dishonest to cancel the vacation and then stay in St. Paul and not teach piano lessons. It never occurred to me that I might run into my students and their parents, and then have to explain why I am hanging around St. Paul without maintaining my regular schedule. Of course, I am not obligated to give any explanations at all--I am self-employed and get to set my own schedule. But I am also pretty friendly with most of my clients, and it wouldn't be out of line for them to ask, "Why are you not on vacation? Is everything okay?"

Case in point: I have spent the past few mornings at a neighborhood cafe, drinking full throttle coffee (my half-caff attempts have gone out the window during this emotional turmoil) and using the internet. In the past 24 hours, 2 of which I have spent at this coffee shop, I have run into not one, not two, not three, but FOUR parents of students.

FOUR.

What are the odds? I only have like 20 students. Running into 4 different parents is a full 20% of my clientele, right there, using the same coffee shop that I am.

So to most of them, I have just said, "Oh, my plans fell through, and I am taking a week off anyway."

But I can't help feeling a little squeamish about hanging out at what is apparently the rendezvous point for all of my students and their families (it just occurred to me that I should advertise here--holy moly potential student jackpot), and then pretending like I am just taking a leisurely week to relax. I mean, maybe I am. But I feel like there is a lot going on inside my head and heart these days, which isn't all that conducive to ease of relaxation.

All in all, I am not going to remain anxious about running into my students this week. Whatever. I never cancel lessons, I'm always (usually) on time, and taking one week off during the summer, even if I haven't left the city, is perfectly reasonable. So I'm not going to perpetuate that guilty feeling of being busted, of being found out, of being clearly not on vacation during the week I had canceled all my lessons.

(I have enough to be emotional about.)

And, besides, if 20% of my clientele is an accurate sample, I can safely say that most of my clients would be perfectly fine with knowing that I am taking a week off, for personal reasons, rather than for a family vacation.

Some of those clients (maybe more like 10%) double as friends. To those few people, I have given a more straightforward explanation of the situation, and from those few people, I have received generous offers of a spare bed, help moving, and an open phone policy.

"Call anytime, Liz," one client/friend told me, sincerely. "You're not just our piano teacher, you know."