First, some business: If you're just joining us, would you like to read my Lyme story from the beginning? Catch up a bit by clicking here.
Now- here are some of your bright moments. From brand new babies to corgis on SUP boards, I love seeing what we're all getting into these days. Thank you for sharing your color and adventure and letting me live vicariously just a little bit. Tag your Instagram photos #thewildercoast and join us!
Thank you @ielaraj, Christina (@nitrosister), @midbynorthwest, Sharon (@wakeforart), Aimee (@ahain0013), Jaclyn (@jccline), Amanda (@amandabuck), and Ellie (@barefootmontana) and Mackenzie Nicole (@oncewildhere)!
And finally, here is what made my heart explode this week. My cousins Tracy and Todd adopted a little baby! Welcome to the world and to the family, Mr. Finn Coogan Plants!! Wow....just....wow.
If you'd like to listen, I recorded an episode with The Dirbag Diaries. Click here to listen to The Miracle of Darkness.
Now. On with the story.
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| A huge thank you to Brenna Hersey. Check your mailbox girlfriend! |
Hello and welcome to the second Fun Friday Flip Out here on the Wilder Coast. So what if it's Saturday? I was not feeling too well yesterday, but today is A-Ok, so let's just go with it. Fun Friday is a time to relax, enjoy ourselves and focus on the good things.
It's one thing for me to want to give an accurate portrayal of life with a space-age, misunderstood, hotly-contested, often debilitating and fascinatingly complex disease, but I'd rather not do that at the expense of all the color and contentment in my life, because how long is this thing going to drag on? I have no idea. Maybe I just have to get used to living like this. Good days and bad days. Here are some of the good days. And remember, on these posts I get to loosen up and write just like we were chatting at a cafe.
David, the dog and I went hiking at Mt. Mitchell State Park. Mitchell is the tallest mountain East of the Mississippi, can you believe that? I would have put my money on Mt. Washington, and I would have lost my money. The views up there are heavenly and slightly overwhelming. The wind was blowing and I walked to the edge of every cliff and peered over, I have absolutely no fear of heights. David has a fear of me walking next to cliffs, however, because my balance is not everything it should be at the moment. I miss climbing a whole lot. I can't wait until the day I'm better enough to climb again. Better enough- that should be my new goal.
Most of the time, Lyme symptoms keeps me tethered to my neighborhood. I'm living very locally these days. I consider small outings to be great adventures. This week, Kelli and I ventured over to Villagers, the urban homesteading shop down the street, so she could buy a new cactus. I didn't like her cactus because it bit my finger, but she found it just delightful.
I pay much closer to very small things. I'm getting to know the immediate world around me in great detail.
Molly and Yonton took me to a brand new cafe by their house. It's gleaming and gorgeous inside and it made me miss Seattle for a moment. It was a brilliant day, clear and nearly 90 degrees, so we sat inside under a fan and drank iced coffee. Then we walked back to their house on a street I've never been on, stopping to examine gardens filled with poppies and azaleas, colorful walls and vines growing on fences.
It's wonderful to have friends who don't mind taking the smallest excursions with you.
There's a nasty man lose in the wilderness right now. He tied a woman to a tree up at Craggy Gardens and almost beat the life out of her, but she lived. He's been spotted a few times but not caught, so everyone is advised not to hike alone- not even in the local parks like Bent Creek or Richmond Hill. The poor dog is getting sick of trotting on pavement as we wait for this guy to be removed. A few days ago, Steffi and I went to Bent Creek together and ate strawberries as Hometeam took a grateful dip in the water.
Although, I am not supposed to eat any fruit. Too sweet. Can you believe that? What a bother.
Abby and Ella from Tera Preta Farms brought over a huge box of greens. They were off to Cincinnati for the weekend to see Abby's parents and they had a surplus of collards and enormous kale, bigger than the ears of an elephant, so they brought them to me. We sat on the back porch for a little while and drank cucumber spritzers and caught up until my eyes stopped tracking. When my eyes stop tracking I have to go lie down and lie black stones on my eyes, like some sort of old-school Egyptian corpse. That's me! I didn't think I could get through that jungle of greens all by myself but I did- I pulled up a stool next to my juicer and for two days straight, pausing only to sleep and use the bathroom- which, as one could imagine, was more than a few times- and juiced everything and then drank it. That's really all I did for two days. Now I feel like a superhero.
David and I went to our friends Laura and Steve's wedding. I had to spend most of the afternoon curled up on the couch (the wedding was at Laura's family's cabin) but luckily, around 8pm my energy came back. It does this- I wrote about it a few months ago- I really come to life between 8 and 10pm. I googled it once, because it is so pronounced, and it appears that becoming wildly energetic between 8 and 10 is a symptom of adrenal fatigue, if you choose to believe in such things. Whatever if is, I live for those hours. I danced for two hours straight. People told me I had a wild look in my eye.
A long time ago, a friend of mine named Jess taught me that when it's time to dance, put your hair in a side pony tail and just go to town. So that's what I do.
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On the dark drive home from the wedding, David and I wrote a lengthy and involved joke about a pack of marsupials, and when I see you next, believe me I'm going to tell it to you.
I drove Dave and his boys to the Greenville airport a few nights ago. We left the house at 1:30am and I didn't get home till 6am, then I slept for an hour and went to treatment at 8am. Come to think of it, that may be why I didn't feel so great on Friday. But it felt good to be Better Enough to be able to do that.
Dave and his 7th graders are in Costa Rica for the week. That means Hometeam and I are bachelorettes. Any ideas of what we should get into? We're up for anything that does not involve alcohol, dairy, staying up late, eating grains, being away from the bathtub for more than six hours, fruit, vigorous exercise or legumes. But beyond that, we're up for anything! Watch out world!
Now- here are some of your bright moments. From brand new babies to corgis on SUP boards, I love seeing what we're all getting into these days. Thank you for sharing your color and adventure and letting me live vicariously just a little bit. Tag your Instagram photos #thewildercoast and join us!
And finally, here is what made my heart explode this week. My cousins Tracy and Todd adopted a little baby! Welcome to the world and to the family, Mr. Finn Coogan Plants!! Wow....just....wow.