Lemonade and Izze – Living in the Moment

Lemonade and Izze

Lemonade and Izze © 2012 Bo Mackison

A glass of lemonade and a cold bottle of Pomegranate Izze. Living in the moment — ahhh!

So this photograph of two beverages is the perfect reminder to live in the moment. It’s not every day I get to spend a couple of hours with my younger daughter – the youngest of my three kids – sitting in an outdoor cafe in Bisbee, Arizona, sipping freshly squeezed lemonade – the puckery kind – and a Pomegranate Izze. Munching on chorizo and cabbage burritos. Laughing and telling snippets of life stories – some recent, some a decade old, some two decades old. Walking along the up and down sidewalks of Bisbee Arizona, peering at the window displays of the shops and galleries, occasionally wandering through a gallery, oohing and aahing over a painting or a sculpture. So much talent! Admiring the many buildings – schools, homes, businesses – many perched in precarious positions against the mountains.

At one point our conversation drifted to Manda’s propensity for conversation when she was a toddler and preschooler. She loved nothing more than to carry on a  lengthy conversation about any topic. She was, and still is, one of the most inquisitive people I know. We played a game for several years, one I devised so that I could get some work done while still entertaining my young conversationalist. When we were talking about it the other day, we both wondered how much this game influenced Manda’s education and the way she thinks and comes up with answers.

We played our game throughout the day. It would start simply enough.

I would make an observation. “Look, the first robin of the season. The robins are back.”

My then three-year-old would say, “Where do they come back from?”

I would offer a simple explanation. “They don’t like the cold weather and snow, so they go to a warmer place during winter.”

Manda would look at me as if I had just told her the biggest whopper ever heard by a three-year old.

So I would counter offer. “Well, what do you think happens to the robins?”

And this is where the fun would begin. Looking back, I wish I had written more of her answers in my journal. Only a few were documented.  Some of her conclusions were hysterical, some were thoughtful, some were fanciful, but they all displayed a certain ability to think and be creative. What an amazing thing, yes?

Here are a few lines I once wrote about the return of the robins. After I gave her the straight answer, I would ask Manda is she could think of any other answers. She would give me one and then another, and another. The game continued until she ran out of answers or lost interest.All answers were acceptable.

“The robins go down in the holes with the rabbits.”

‘The robins fly to Grandma’s ( 300 miles south and considerably warmer) and live in her attic.”

“The robins sleep under my bed and they are very, very quiet. I only hear them when they fight.”

“The robins play hide and seek and you don’t see them. I know where they hide.”

And on and on.

Then she would go off and play. That is, until we began the next question and answer game.

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Bo Mackison is a photographer and owner of Seeded Earth Studio LLC, living and photographing in southern Arizona. Visits from her family are always appreciated. 🙂

Modern Conveniences

Maybe I Should Get a Set of These?

Maybe I Should Get a Set of These

Soooooooooo. I have been without a washing machine since the Monday before Thanksgiving. It’s beginning to seem like a really long time. We ordered the replacement before Thanksgiving Day. The economy is stagnant, no one is buying big ticket items, so I foolishly thought my big ticket washing machine would be an easy get.

Wrong. I was wrong, Really wrong. No washing machine is in sight. And the darn thing is manufactured in Iowa AND Iowa is just across the border from Wisconsin. So how hard can this be, folks?  Will someone please send a truck for my washer?

Or perhaps I shall be forced to set up some outdoor tubs – like the ones in the photo, the ones the historical re-enactment ladies use at Old World Wisconsin, the state’s historical outdoor museum. The tubs they use when they pretend it is summer and 1890 and indoor plumbing is non-existent.

Oh wait. I can’t do that. It’s mid-December, and we’re in the middle of a blizzard. Depending on how accurate the weather folk are in the area, we are likely to get eight inches of snow tonight and tomorrow, give or take two inches.

I’ve already been to the laundromat once. It’s not a horrible experience. Though it’s not at the top of my list either. Two hours and $21 to wash and dry eight loads of clothing and linen. (I had overnight guests over Thanksgiving, or it wouldn’t have been quite so bad.) And I even was treated to TV – a TV bolted to the ceiling so neither I nor anyone else in the place could turn down the volume or change the channel. The TV host was describing fast food horrors, sandwiches and such, complete with such high calorie and fat counts that they should satisfy a grown man’s food needs for several days.

Sorry,  I got a bit distracted. I’ll get back to the good part. Seems I’d planned on a quiet evening tonight. I worked with a new computer program for five solid hours today, and then wrapped Christmas presents for another two hours, so I was ready to relax with a nice book and a cup of Earl Grey tea. My husband, however, after surveying the silent laundry room, thought it would be a great time to move the machines and prep the walls for a quick paint job. After all, there would be no laundry to get in the way.

Seemed like a good idea – at the time. He turned off the water, or so he thought, and then disconnected the hoses. Except the water wasn’t completely turned off, and the first floor laundry (and the floor below) was well soaked by the time he wrangled with the shut off valve in the basement. Yuk. Water. Mess.

Hey, but it gets even a little better. (One of those nights when you can be glad you were in your own home, rather than being a fly on the wall of my laundry room – you really didn’t want to hear that conversation, did you?)

Jazz, whom we are now fondly calling the Velcro Vomit-er, sized up the situation before we did. She grasped the obvious quickly. She noted her litter box had some major flood damage. She couldn’t be expected to use that litter box, could she?

So, all things considered, it was an exciting evening.  And if we don’t get our snow dump, not only will I have to go to the laundromat with a lot of wet towels tomorrow, I’ll have to fork over cash for a plumber, too.

Maybe those old wooden laundry tubs wouldn’t be such a bad solution, after all.  Hmm.

 

When in Rome, Do as the Romans…

Star

A Foreign Place ©2008

Good advice, right? So while I’m in the West, I’m thinking I should do as the Westerners do. Except I can’t find any Westerners to emulate now.

How on God’s earth do the people out here camp? I know they camp. Surely they camp. But I sure in hell cannot figure out exactly where they camp.

As a solid, card-carrying camper – hey, I belong to triple A, and they give campground discounts, correct? – I feel as if I know a little something about camping. Plus, I have been a camper nearly my entire life and I have camped in nearly every state in the country towing along three kids. I know how to pack, plan, and head on out into the wild, wide blue open. And it has always worked.

At least, it has always worked until now.

Now, I am not so sure, and I am having a hard time finding any Westerners to ask. I do know that campgrounds seem to be few and far apart out here in the Southwest. But in my prolonged searches, I seem to have uncovered three types of campgrounds.

Type I: The National Parks. Now this is my idea of a great place to camp. A bit rustic. Great scenery and knowledgeable rangers who want to expand your camping pleasure by offering you a choice of a hundred things you absolutely must do in the 48 hours you are going to be there. But here is an observation and a problem.

The observation? There are not very many Westerners camping in these campgrounds. There are many, many international campers in these campgrounds. (You cannot go by the license plates because most travelers from Europe and Asia rent a car and camp across the West.) In the last few days I’ve met great people from Germany, Holland, Japan, Denmark, Australia, Puerto Rico and the Netherlands. And just a couple of campers from east of the Rockies – one family from Ohio and a couple from South Carolina. I keep wondering just where are the people who live maybe a state or two away from these national wonders.

And the problem? I camp with a husband who seems to think it is every camper’s right to experience a hot shower in the morning before experiencing mind- and body-defying hikes through the wilderness. And, as hard as I find this to comprehend, he is rather stubborn about this idea. Cold water poured over his head and a bit of soap lather apparently does not count. He’ll appease me for one night, maybe even two if I really get desperate, but he’d really rather do his shower thing in the morning.

Type II camping spots – I’m guessing these are the places where the locals camp. The ten- or twelve-unit campgrounds tucked in forests and along streams on federal and state lands. Or a wide spot off the road in the same federal lands – National Forest Service lands, Bureau of Land Management lands, State Parks. Many of these are tucked away so you have to look for them. That’s not the problem. The problem is already listed under Type I campgrounds. No showers. Egad.

So that leaves Type III – the third category of camping places when you are a stranger in these parts, and you mostly rely on published materials. I’m referring to the private campground. These often come with many qualifications in writing.  Horseshoe pits, playgrounds, laundry, WiFi, sometimes a pool, usually a game room and a mini-store. More often than not, they note the availability of that most welcome of commodities – the hot shower.

They also usually come with pull through sites and 40+ foot RVs that most people on this globe would easily mistake as second homes for royalty, pop stars, and oil magnates.

All I really want is a shower for my spouse. Instead I get convenience which, when translated, means “next to a very noisy road.” And as a bonus, I also get next to the railroad tracks. I’m figuring every road of any worth west of the Continental Divide also has a train track nearby, complete with freight trains that run approximately every 30 minutes on the hour.

The trains –something I don’t see (or hear) too often where I live – were charming the first dozen or so times. The novelty has worn thin. Type III campgrounds, as far as the camper in me is concerned, are not really places to camp. Not by any stretch of the imagination.

The Type III campground I am writing from at 4 AM this morning is the worst of all possible Type IIIs.

We came in very late – I had a migraine much of the day which threw a big wrench in our travel timetables – and we couldn’t make our planned destination. I’m not certain, but by the light of the half-moon, this area is more than a little seedy. There are trailers parked here that I think have been here since the fifties. There is no WiFi as advertised (one luxury I admit to liking, though it is not at all in the same category as the shower). The showers here are unusable and the bathrooms require a “punch code number” to access.  And the 5 million watt lighting from the truckers’ parking lot next door makes it all feel a little too eerie for comfort.

So, though I am enjoying my trip and the places I am seeing, the camping has been off and on. Tonight is definitely one of the offs. I can hardly wait for daylight so that I can assess where I am, exactly, and then skedaddle as fast as I can away from the place.  In another day, we get a treat – a “not-camping” overnight with a friend who has kindly offered a real bed in a real house. And guaranteed showers, no howling trains for background music, no big rigs running generators all night.

And to sweeten the deal even more, her husband is a hobbyist brewmaster.

(Remember my Wisconsin roots?)

Yow-zaaaaaa!