lora, check this one out tooo

~here is the camping blog i mentioned. it's kind of about it. but i never finished writing it..but due to popular demand ....

for the past week or so, as you may have gathered from my last blog, I've been camping on Lake George in New York state, with my cousin Lora and other extended family (her husband and his parents, her father, my cousins earl and anna and their own families).
Soooooo, as it turns out, camping isn't quite what i imagined it. MAYBE i tend to simplify things or idealize the future, but among more practical items in my suitcase were such things as flowy dresses, eyeliner, and hair gel. (i prefer to always be prepared for a photo op!)
First i arrived in boston, staying with lora and mike (Lorike? mora?) from thursday evening until saturday when we were to head off into the wild blue yonder. I don't know if this happens to other people, but it seems that i have this odd, recurring event: once i move from a place, i am back (not necessarily by choice) within a short period of time..and i am never ready to see the place that i've left. I'm still too caught up in the BEING there, and the last memories i had of the place...it's always too soon to want to see it again. This has happened to me for Clemson, for italy, now for boston. the memories haven't solidified; they carry no weight. I don't want to touch them yet.
so. camping. i got to sail again, i got to ride on mike's boat and learn to water ski and knee board, i got to throw my neck out while innertubing and i got to watch while dan cracked his rib in some odd sort of male competitive tubing. And then i got to be cold and damp and rained upon and afraid of spiders and the outhouse. The best part of the trip was hanging out with Knocked Up Lora, and Mike, and being able to relate to my cousin anna and her husband on an "adult" level (we are not that close of a family and she's nearly a decade older than me), and of course, the kids: ben and gwen and andrew and allison.
I have a picture of the Cinco de Drinko party 2006 at my apt. in cambridge: it's of me clutching lora and kissing her cheek. (Those of you who look at my myspace- it's one of my pictures on there). So, i think that sums our relationship up - i lurve this girl. Lora is four years older than me, and is generally four years ahead of me on many aspects. For me, it's like having an older sister who goes and paves the way for me (granted, she does so while being blond and thin...) We hardly knew each other before i moved to Boston; it wasn't until i announced my plan to my immediate family, my senior year of college, that my mom said, "you know, your cousin Lora lives there..."

travel // stay

well now.
i've clearly been on some sort of blog-break. Maybe because i've been so busy, maybe because i don't have any sort of burning quandaries that are worth discussing. I've been in sc...how long? i think about two weeks now. it's been lovely. and it's been warm, and it's been comfortable.
I have, however, been having trouble sleeping here, in this borrowed house: it's the house of a retired painter. The walls are literally covered with her paintings. At night it seems too big and too dark. it's been so long since i've lived in the suburbs that i get paranoid at night, surrounded by the quiet and the space. I sit out back, on the screened-in porch, smoking and staring at the lack of light in the yard. Listening to the crickets (maybe they aren't crickets, maybe they are cicadas or grasshoppers). Mostly i resolve this by not arriving back here until it is late: eleven or midnight or any of the wee hours. Then i just let myself in, and wipe off the dirt on my flip-flopped feet before falling into bed.
My hours are shifted: the curse of a summer break. Now i wake up at ten or eleven, debate going out into the heat. Yesterday was the first day that i wasn't able to bring myself to leave the house until evening: it was blistering, sweltering outside, and i was hungover from overindulging at Metal Monday. Laura and I rocked out to Cheap Trick with the band behind us, then later we went to the Chicken for free beer (bartender's a friend), then back to "my" house to laugh and nosh on munchies. I ended up falling asleep around four am.
Around seven pm, i finally left the house for a walk on the beach: forced quiet time, forced sober time. I drove past the tourists and McMansions on Isle of Palms before parking a short distance from the inlet that separates IoP and Sullivan's island. Walking up the sand path through the dunes and sea oats, I saw what i thought were kites: a multicolored dozen swooping through the evening/ocean wind. When i got to the beach, my view expanded and i saw that the kites were attached to people,zipping on the waves and being lifted in the air. Spinning.
I don't know if that's the first time that i've ever seen kiteboarders, but i've certainly never seen that many all at once. I walked to the edge of the surf and just stood still, watching.
I've never been attracted to the idea of skydiving, or of bungee-jumping...but even watching the kiteboarders was thrilling. Maybe it's a latent icarus complex, maybe it's just childish fascination with the new. I don't care for planes, but all i could think of then was i want to do that. I walked up to a few kiteboarders rolling up their equipment and asked how i would learn how to.
And then, of course, reality sneaks in and kicks me around again: I'm leaving in less than three months - i don't have the time to learn how to kiteboard. Enter worrisome quandaries.
I don't know how to describe, really, how i feel: i feel that i don't want to leave charleston - honestly, and not so unexpectedly. But the idea of saying that, of PROMISING that, is terrifying. I know that i'm not ready to stay here without feeling that something has been left undone. I am not ready to stay yet. So, you know..i walked, and i thought, and i watched the kites swirl. And I came to the conclusion that i'm happy living the way that i am...travel, and return. Travel, and return. If i could, i would buy property here. Who knows, maybe in a few years that will be a possibility. Maybe next year i will be done, and i'll stay. Or maybe i'll come for the summer again before going somewhere else. Maybe it'll never happen, maybe i'll fall in love and settle somewhere else.
Tomorrow i get back on the plane to head to boston, we're driving down to New York from there. I feel that i've just put my feet on the ground here though, and i'm not so thrilled to be going as i was last month. But i am a traveler, and i am a leaver, and i always welcome a chance to gain perspective.

what we keep

oh i am sleepy.
It's the night before the fourth of July. It has been extremely random where i find internet access. Here in the house where i'm house sitting, it worked once last week..but now it's working again. I'll take it.
Charleston has kept me busy. It feels like vacation. I feel vague tinges of responsibility, but i accomplish my tasks quickly or file them away for later.
My mother, in return for helping me drive that long long drive down here, requested my help in sorting her belongings. This isn't an ordinary task - My parents are both packrats, to the point where i suspect they suffer from that disorder...what is it? Hoarding. (friends might laugh to discover that I am considered the organized one in the family. This morning La asked me i ever learned to put things away. My answer was no.)
My mother has "her" room in their house, it's a nice sized room, sunny with two south facing windows and a stained glass door. it's buried in boxes. Literally, buried. For two days now, I've spent the morning throwing things away. It's hard. She resists, accuses me of no sentimentality. I don't think i understand - these are the people who taught me how to move, to keep moving...and yet i can fit everything i own into half of a minivan, but they acquire spaces and fill it and fill it and keep filling it with stuff that has no meaning or purpose. I've explained that i will not throw away anything that has a purpose or looks like it might hold memories, and still she watches me, eagle eyed, mistrusting. She digs a water bottle out of the trash bag, it's yellowed and smells musty and the writing has scraped off.
Her: "how can you throw this away? We got this in Yosemite, on that trip when you were twelve!"
Me: "It's old, and it sits covered on a shelf. when was the last time you used it?"
Her: "i can't use it anymore. It leaks...and when i use it, the writing flakes off."
With that, she smiled shamefaced, and put it back in the bag.

For lunch, my father arrived with bags of ruby, fleshy, summer cherries
I spent the afternoon first at the library, filling my arms greedily. Then i went to Laura's house. We drank white wine and i painted my toenails cherryred.