Friday afternoon, Adar took me to her friend's house to get some henna. I was picturing a small flower on some indiscreet part of my body. This beauty is what I ended up with. To be honest I've sort of fallen in love with it.  Looking down at your own body so familiar and finding something so new and lovely. It happened like this:

We knock on the door, no one answers. A quick phone call and some spitfire Somali and then from around the corner comes a tall figure wrapped head to toe in beautifully colored material, with another thin figure, half the size following close behind. 

"Welcome" and white teeth. And then we are sitting on a faded green sofa, the 4 year old having thrown off her head wrap and begun wheeling around the room on her tiny sparkly scooter, Anna running behind. The apartment is bare, but has a small t.v. placed prominently in the middle of the room. And so it is to the background of Scoobie Doo and giggling girls that the two women begin mixing and twisting, talking back and forth and laughing as they go.

And now I am sitting on a sticky kitchen chair, watching as she demonstrates how to cut and wrap an old spaghetti wrapper just so, until it becomes a tool ready for use. She pulls another chair in front of my bare feet and motions as she says "up!". Up go my legs, onto the scribbled-on tan pad of the second chair, and we begin. It feels like the hard end of a feather, scratching patterns into the soles of my feet. It is all I can do not to squirm and squeal. 

She tells me stories of raising children in Somalia as she guides the wet mud into flowers and swirls on my skin. She doesn't seem to care that I can't really understand what she's saying. Or that I am incredibly ticklish.

The door swings open and her other four children are back from school. They look at me, splayed out in their crowded kitchen, feet and hands now covered in black. "Somalia flowers" she says. India is patterns. 

When she is done, she goes into her room to lay down, leaving me unable to move as I wait for it all to dry. The kids are now bored with cartoons, and each stands by a window. The smallest is using a toothbrush to clean her flip-flop.

She emerges, finds a butcher knife, and begins scraping me clean. Flakes of black and red fall onto her floor. One more wipe off, and I'm done. I have become art.

"Faith is best thought of, not as belief in the absence of reasons, but as fidelity to something that one has been given, such as an experience or covenant, or trust in someone, such as God. That is how it seems most often to be used in the scriptures." James E. Faulconer

camp whitewood, or something similar

There was a time in my life when when I wanted to record things; thoughts, quotes, events, ridiculous goals, I knew exactly where my journal was and used its pages almost compulsively for this purpose. I have 8 books, each quite different, representing chapters of my existence in my own handwriting. I love each one.

Since moving back from Taiwan, I haven't found a journal I really like. I've started at least four, but each time I don't like the lines, or the gold leaf, or the binding, size, smoothness of page, etc etc, and they remain new smelling and unused. So my life has become pages in countless abandoned notebooks on shelves and in boxes. And the occasional blog post.

Having decided to try and reduce the number of things I own, I've been happily re-discovering trips and emotional dumpings and school days hidden but recorded in these forsaken books on their way to the recycling bin. And so I've decided to compile some of them here.

This is the only entry in one little black notebook I found tonight. Looks like it was written in the car.

"Valentines Day 2010--Zion's National Park

Perfect Sunday. Chilly morning, sun warming the sleepy air. Red dirt and oatmeal. And, thanks to Eric's clever sweetness, chocolate dunford donuts.

We left Friday afternoon--Eric had spent the morning doing laundry, cleaning the house, and preparing every last detail of the trip while I tried to change the world (or at least help 56 little worlds go a bit better) in my first grade classroom.

Spent the night in a cave at Green Valley Gap just outside of St. George. Brilliant blue and white stars and a cheap two man sleeping bag. Everything clear, warm, close.

Morning climb and hike. Ran into a kid from Archer's Apple (band we're playing with @ Kilby Court on Friday).   Want a dog. Then to Snow Canyon. Blonde bowl cuts. No climbing book. 8 quickdraws. Need 12.

Hiked my first volcano. Met hispanic grandpa Cal. Drove to Zions. 1.1 mile long tunnel though sandstone cliffs. Contemplating relationship of man and rock.

Getting dark. Hungry. No campground. Desert chill. Found a place. Stove has three, not four prongs, so we have to hold the pot in place for 18 minutes as it bubbles. Cold tomato juice running down my fingers and ciabatta. Satisfaction. Falling asleep as close to him as I can. Warm.

Summary: I love Eric. I love beauty and rocks, smells and desert. I wish life were as simple and vast as it seems down here. I believe in God."