The Numbers

This week I began writing Part Two of my book. Or, actually I wrote PART TWO at the top of the page and then sat with George on my lap, staring at the screen for an hour. In the bottom corner of the document, it told me that I had already written 87,005 words. Those words are on 117 pages, single spaced. Not bad, I thought.

It’s not enough to tell someone I’m writing a book – I feel required to give some type of information to quantify it and make it real. And numbers give it validity - people hear how much I’ve written and know I take it seriously.

So while I waited for the first sentence of Part Two to come to me, I thought about other numbers I could give myself for validation. I often see on facebook that a cousin of mine ran 2 miles or rode her bike for 5, and I have to admit that these numbers show me she is serious. Just like in gym class in school, we can judge people’s fitness by the number of sit-ups they can do in a minute (I did over 30 back as a freshman) or how long a girl can last in the “Flex-Arm Hang” (about 5 seconds).

I have lived for 14,370 days on this earth, and according to life expectancies I have about 14,830 more to go. Or maybe I should count up the minutes – it makes them more precious, more important, by doing so.

During my singing & dancing career, I performed live for over 4,000,000 people. I always wish I could look at a map and have a light pinpoint every person who has seen me perform; it would feel like I have friends all over the world.

It took me 10 years to get my bachelors degree, and 2 to get my Masters. I am still paying for it all. I used my Masters for exactly 2.25 months. (But I don’t regret it at all; I would never regret education.)

I have been with my husband for over 1/4 of my life. My Mom was in my life for about 2/3 thirds of my years so far. George has been with me for about 1/6 of it. Those fractions will change in good ways and in bad ones over time.

I’ve lived in Vegas for 16 years and lived in my hometown in Indiana for 13, I think. That is a truly weird comparison – am I a Las Vegan now? The numbers may say so but my heart doesn’t.

I spend about eight hours a week at Starbucks. (I won’ t tell you how much money I spend there.) I go there to write, so I don’t feel guilty about those numbers.

As I write this, I am still sitting with George on my lap, waiting for the first sentence of PART TWO. Now I’m going to go buy another Chai Tea Latte (#5 for this week), write (or try to) for another 120 minutes, and then drive the 1.8 miles home. I still have 2,206 minutes left of my weekend!

"Ripe, rich and round, with lots of spicy, earth-scented black cherry and berry flavors, hinting deliciously at chocolate on the smooth finish.”

This weekend was a weekend of wine, as a friend and I went to Temecula, California for wine tastings. And it was gorgeous – warm weather, sunny skies, and the vineyard-covered hills – all within a five-hour drive of Las Vegas. (Add some Billy Joel & Beatles for the drive and it is a completely perfect weekend.)

I wasn’t much of a wine drinker until I met my husband – I have to admit that I used to wrinkle my nose every time I took a sip, but over time I learned to appreciate, and then to enjoy, a nice glass of wine.

Growing up in the Bible Belt, I was never around alcohol very much. My family weren’t major drinkers, but they’d have the occasional beer or glass of wine. I learned that alcohol wasn’t a very big deal. Even my high school & college friends weren’t major partiers – we were theatre people who didn’t need alcohol to be silly.

My first memory of wine was at my Dad’s relatives’ house, when I was offered a small glass of wine at large Thanksgiving dinner. I was probably ten or eleven, and I felt so special! Grown-up! Worldly & cultured! It smelled interesting but didn’t taste very good. It stood by my plate during the whole meal, looking haughty, important, and sophisticated.

Not long after I married my husband, I joined my Dad in Valdivia, Chile where he was sent on business. While he was in meetings I explored the streets, finding pottery studios, coffee shops, and interesting little museums where I was forced to use my Spanish when a nice woman offered to open a closed gallery just for me.

I also found a wonderful wood-paneled wine shop, and I wandered around inside after deciding to bring home a bottle for my husband. I had no idea what to get – a red? A white? Dry? Sweet? I didn’t really know what my husband liked – he always bought the wine. I had almost decided to choose one based on the prettiness of the label when the nice salesman offered to give me a tasting. At his bar by the tallest wall of wine I copied his swirling and sniffing and finally took a taste. “It should taste like vanilla,” he said in his thick accent as he watched me sip. The wine in my mouth, I looked at him in astonishment - I could actually taste the vanilla. Never before had I been able to taste the oak or cedar or tobacco or berry or whatever else I was supposed to taste. But this one went down smooth – deep and red with a very slight hint of vanilla. I bought two bottles.

Since that fun experience in South America, my palate has matured. This weekend I was proud to announce several flavors I detected in the wine. But I have to admit I still get a little giddy when I do so. It’s nice to feel grown up.

Bug Season

I stood in the backyard this week and stared at the lavender that is growing tall and blooming bright purple right now. There were five bees enjoying them, too, their buzzing punctuating the air as they moved from blossom to blossom, their engines starting and stopping every time. I watched them for quite a while, marveling at their little wings that make such noise.

I don’t think I’ve ever been stung by a bee; surely I would remember if I had. More likely I was stung by a wasp – a much less appealing bug compared to the adventurous, hardworking bee. Wasps are silent and fly around slowly, awkwardly, with their limp legs hanging blow them like bug zombies. Or maybe they’re not legs, but I imagine them to be.

Some bugs gross me out, such as centipedes (which I’ve only seen on TV) and those huge fat green tomato bugs - I don’t even like to look at them. But coming from the Midwest, where bugs are part of life, most bugs don’t bother me. It was okay to pick up a Daddy Long Legs by the leg and throw him outside if he happened to wander indoors; I don’t think I’d want to touch many bugs in the same way, but who could resist one with such a friendly name?

And a lightening bug was fine to catch and hold cupped in your hands so his light shined through your fingers, then open your hands up to watch him walk around for a bit before spreading his wings and flying off again.

Lady bugs are fine to touch, but don’t squish them because they stink. And rolly-pollys are fun to poke lightly with a stick so they’ll roll up into a perfect tiny grey ball.

So far I can’t find any fun bugs in Las Vegas. Like the desert, bugs here are big and harsh and hardy, sometimes with spikes and weird shapes, looking like aliens. So I will continue to watch the jovial bees in our yard and will continue to plant flowers and bushes that they, and their hummingbird friends, like. I want to invite some nature into our yard, even in the middle (or outskirts) of the big city.

The answer, my friend...

Lately it has not been hat weather in Las Vegas; I pity anyone who tried to wear an Easter Bonnet this week. The wind has blown and blown, turning anyone who dares to go outside into Medusa.

Vegas does have great weather – you can golf year-round and can plan outdoor picnics and backyard parties without much fear of rain. But instead of rain, beware of the wind. In regards to enjoying the outdoors, wind is to Vegas what rain is to the rest of the country.

This week the roof our backyard gazebo ripped off its supports and flapped in the wind, forcing my husband to brave the whipping canvas as it whirled around him and tried to tie it down. I had trouble sleeping, afraid that it might come off completely and land on a house a couple of blocks away.

Our trellis also got blown over, its sad vines cowering down in the dirt, another victim of the wind. Every pillow on our back patio ended up against the block wall on the side of our house. And a patio plant blew over and rolled across the patio until it got wedged between the patio table and a chair.

Not wanting the wind to thwart my plans, I took George to the dog park one morning when it was really gusting. I stood in the completely empty park while he ran around, and as the wind literally blew me off my feet, I thought about how crazy I was to be out in the storm. But it was also a little exhilarating. It’s not often that you stand outside and let nature unleash on you completely, and you can truly feel her power.

I stood there quite a while, until another person entered the park and hunkered down on a bench to endure the wind while his dog explored. I was glad I wasn’t the only crazy (or brave?) one.

When it’s windy, at night we have to turn on the bathroom exhaust fan to drown out the noise outside – the clangs of pots as they turn over, the patio curtains that whip around and hit the wall of the house, the whistle of the air as it gets sucked through our window cracks.

And please kill anyone who hangs wind chimes outside their house in Las Vegas. It's a very, very dumb idea.

Hoosier Hysteria

For those of you who don’t know the term, “Hoosier Hysteria” refers to basketball. And if you’ve never experienced it, you simply cannot grasp the unbridled fun it represents. So in honor of March Madness, I want to explain what it’s like to grow up in Indiana, the Basketball State.

My hometown’s population is 3,500. Our town’s high school basketball gymnasium seats 5,000. That fact alone could allow me to end this story right here. But let me explain further.

My family were not fans of Bobby Knight – I think we tended to be basketball purists. Knight was rude and unsportsmanlike; we respected fair play, hard work, and quiet talent instead of in-your-face victory. Boston Celtic Larry Bird grew up in French Lick, the town next to mine, and he exemplified the talent I refer to – a good old boy who made it big due to his talent, hard work, and ambition. Qualities to respect.

In my high school in Paoli, Indiana we were taught to respect the sport and to respect the other team. If our crowd’s cheers started leaning toward disrespect, our principal let us all know the next day in the morning announcements what was appropriate and what wasn’t. We were taught right and wrong through basketball. We sang along with the National Anthem, cheered on our team, and then clapped for the losing team when it was over. But don’t get me wrong, we weren’t too Goody-Goody; we had our share of slams, like at the end of the game when we were about to win and we’d yell to the opposing team “Go start the bus!”

My earliest memories of basketball, besides the men in my family playing ball at the basketball hoop that was requisite at every house, was in 1979 when our high school basketball team won the sectional. I received an autographed picture of the team when I won a kindergarten poster contest, and I treated that photo as if it contained movie stars. I got to go to the Sectional and see the packed gymnasium in all its glory, with the band playing, the cheerleaders yelling, and the crowd members – every single one of them – on their feet and into every moment of the game. It showed me that basketball was important.

This was back at the beginning of the good old days of Celtics vs. Lakers, and we watched every game in Grandma and Grandpa’s living room with my uncles and anyone else who dropped by. To this day, the ambient sound of a crowd on a TV is the most comfortable sound I can think of on an otherwise quiet weekend afternoon.

When I was in the fifth grade, our fifth grade team was undefeated, and I predicted that when we were Seniors we’d have a great team. Little did I know…

In the late 80’s, Indiana’s high school basketball was not divided into divisions as it is today; we played the teams in our area, no matter the size of the school. So it was amazing when our little town of 3,500 won the Sectional, then Regional, and went to Semi-State for the first time in our town’s history.

We were like the movie Hoosiers. Our team was featured in the big-towns’ nightly news and in Louisville and Indianapolis newspapers. We were the tiny town with smart players who went up against Goliath.

And boy was it exciting. The whole town went crazy, putting our slogan “We play ball!” on the sides of semi trailers and buildings. Townspeople attended our pep rallies and joined in caravans to our games. The whole town was decked out in our purple and gold school colors. In fact, they already were, year-round.

Hoosier basketball fans are like Cubs fans, supportive no matter what. When our guys lost their semi-state game, our fans – all of them on one side of the huge big-city gymnasium – stayed in place far after all the other winning team’s fans had gone. We stayed and continued cheering for our guys, who had played with honor, talent, and wholesome ambition.

I watched that whole basketball season from the edge of the court, my press pass allowing me closer access as I took photos for our yearbook. Later I went on to college, excited to attend my first basketball game and get all excited again, but in Missouri it was different. Yes, the fans cheered, but it wasn’t the same. The people were there but almost seemed indifferent. That’s when I learned that Indiana basketball is special.

Indiana is the land of corn, cows, and basketball. If you ever get a chance, please go to a basketball game there (preferably between rivals like Purdue and IU, or Paoli and French Lick). Now and then I go to a UNLV game to get into the spirit, and although it isn’t Indiana, it reminds me of home and those good old days in the popcorn-littered stands, together as one town, cheering for our boys. I can just hear the PHS fight song now…

"The human spirit needs places where nature has not been rearranged by the hand of man." ~Author Unknown

To celebrate Las Vegas’ recent gorgeous weather, George and I took a stroll around Floyd Lamb State Park, a literal oasis in the desert with lakes, trails, towering trees, ducks, and peacocks. In addition to nature, the park also has historical value: it is full of fossil remains of mammoths and other prehistoric animals, and it is a dude ranch where women used to go in the 1930’s to wait for their divorces to become final. All types of history!

During the same week, I heard an interview on NPR with Richard Louv, the author of the book Last Child in the Woods: Saving Our Children from Nature-Deficit Disorder. He discussed the fact that kids (and adults) are getting more and more disconnected from nature, as time goes by and kids spend more time in front of computers and TVs and we pave over more and more of our environment.

Kids who don’t go outside tend to be more overweight, but this wasn’t the main focus of Louv’s interview. Instead, he stressed the need we have to be in nature. We don’t need to learn more about nature in a book or google search; we need “hands dirty, feet wet experience.” I so agree.

If I go for a while without being among trees and green, I start to lose a part of myself. This probably comes from growing up in a rural area, where at any moment I could run out the back screen door and into nature. Our house was surrounded by rolling hills and dense forests. On the weekends I explored the hill behind our house; our tradition was to walk to the very top of our property, and we weren’t allowed to turn around and look at the view until we got to the uppermost part where the fences of the bordering lands met. There, out of breath, we suddenly turned around and surveyed the view, all the way across the valley, past tree-covered hills and lined cornfields, to the farm in the distance with its black dots that were cows.

On our land I had many adventures. I flew kites and had picnics. I followed the cow paths to wherever they might lead, and I played around the spring that overflowed when it rained and created a river across our yard far below the hill. In the summers I stomped across the tall grass with my cat; in the Fall we harvested vegetables from our garden; and one winter, we met our cousins on top of the hill for a snowy, nighttime campfire. It was my wilderness.

My husband also had freedom in nature as a kid in New Jersey. He and his friends would leave the house in the morning on their bikes and wouldn’t return till dusk, having filled their whole day exploring nature (and probably getting into trouble, too, but at least they were outside!).

Someday when we have kids, I hope to give them the same experience in nature. While they might not have it right outside their back door, I want them to feel that it is nearby, and part of them. I may have to drive them somewhere to experience it, but it’s worth it. According to Louv, being in nature increases kids’ attention spans, reduces stress, and gives a sense of awe and wonder. And adults get the same benefits that kids do.

I think we’ll be taking a lot of trips to Floyd Lamb State Park.

Happy Birthday, Blog!

My blog gives me a running total of how many times I’ve posted something, and last week’s was number 52. So, since I post once a week, that means I’ve hit the one-year anniversary of this blog! I started something and actually kept it up for a year! (Now if I could just transfer that momentum to exercise…) So I think I’ll take this opportunity to give an overview of my experience of writing Sundays at the Dog Park with George.

I never had any grandiose visions for this blog. Of course it would be great for it to become the next Julie & Julia, but my only goal was just to force myself to write. Putting my writing out there every week – knowing that people were expecting it every week – was a good, self-inflicted routine to follow.

And because I wanted to always post something with a positive vibe, it forced me to look back at every week of my life and find something positive to write about. Putting my life into prose every week somehow gave it added meaning, like people who write in a diary every day because they believe every day is important enough to write about.

Trying to find an appropriate photo for every week has been a challenge, but my husband helps me by holding a treat up so that George will look in the appropriate direction. The scene we make, holding hats on George’s head and putting him in weird poses, is quite funny! And then we see the final photo (the one of George cleaning the table is my favorite) and we laugh even more.

I’ve tried to always connect my writing to George or the dog park, at least enough to make the blog’s title remain appropriate. George is my muse, after all. It has been interesting to see how my writing often morphs into stories about my Mom. That was never my purpose, but I guess it was inevitable, since she’s such a part of me.

The map counter at the bottom of the blog was a fun addition. I never advertized my blog; I only passed it onto family and friends and facebook. So it has been so fun to see that people in other countries have looked at it. I wonder if the two people in India or the person in teh Russian Federation liked it? Or maybe they couldn’t translate it but liked the pictures? I love making the world smaller through the internet.

So, Happy Birthday, blog. I hope you have a long life.