Three of My Winter Essentials

The past few days, Liv and I have had an icy walk to and from school. Even though I've salted my driveway and the sidewalk in front of our house, the city has sanded the streets, and the school has salted their walkways, there are still icy spots that are unavoidable.

Especially at the corner where Liv and I (as well as lots of other students) cross. This particular corner's at a somewhat low area where water naturally pools. So when we have weather just warm enough to start melting ice and snow, water pools at this corner. Then it gets below freezing, and that (seemingly giant) pool of water freezes up like an ice skating rink. It makes crossing the street a bit hazardous. We don't want to slip and fall, especially since it's at the corner - I'm always worried that either Liv or I (or another kid) will slip into oncoming traffic.

That got me to thinking about the winter weather gear that I'm glad I have.

Quite a few years ago - it must've been when I was in college and was home visiting at Christmastime - my brother Joe and I were at our local mall. He didn't have a car/ride and wanted to head to the mall to pick up some gifts; I was more than willing to go with him. I liked spending time with my brothers, and if that meant taking one of them to the mall, I was all for it.

Well, we'd walked past one of those kiosks that sells all those toasty warm shearling products. I tried on a pair of mittens and said I loved them and would have to come back another time to get them. (I don't remember why I wasn't going to get them right then.) As we walked along and Joe made a purchase for our youngest brother, Alex, and maybe another purchase for somebody else, he decided he had to go the the men's room.

Right.

He came back grinning, and I somehow noticed that he was hiding attempting to hide an extra bag among the other bags he already had. He ended up saying something like, "If you were to get those mittens you liked, you would pick the small ones and not the mediums, right?"

"Yep."

"Good."

Fast forward to Christmas day.

He'd gotten me those mittens. And I still have them, as evidenced by the photo above. They are SO WARM.

I'd used them a LOT (except for skiing/sledding, because I'd go with mittens that are a bit more water repellant), and they went with me wherever I moved - although when I was stationed in Tucson, AZ, they remained in a box of winter weather gear (like my snow parka and winter boots).

When Andrew and I ended up being stationed in Boston, and I knew I'd need these mittens at some point, I actually couldn't find them! They were lost! So Andrew, upon finding a similar pair at a similar kiosk at our "new" local mall, bought me a new pair.

The original mittens that Joe had gotten me were in that winter weather gear box and it had been temporarily lost on our household goods' journey between Tucson and the Boston area. I was glad the box finally showed up, though unfortunately, another couple boxes were lost for good.

Anyway, these mittens are perfect for those low wind-chill days when I'm walking Livie to and from school!

My other favorite winter gear invention: YakTrax.

These are things you put on your shoes that help you maintain traction as you walk on icy or otherwise slick paths, kinda like tire chains for tires. A few years ago, I'd bought a pair of the "walking" variety. They're thick rubber "webs" with metal coils that go on the bottoms of your shoes. They really help reduce all the sliding around you do on icy surfaces.

That's my very poor, poor quality photo of what they look like. (Yes, it's gunky out there with the sand and the salt and the gunk.) You can see a better pic of one here.

I actually meant to wear these one morning when I ran outside while visiting my parents over the holdiays (treadmills get boring FAST in the wintertime). But I hadn't realized that Andrew had brought them inside; I thought they were in my car. So when I got to the trail head, they weren't there. But I went running anyway, and slipped on a nasty patch of ice, wrenching my right foot and aggravating the just-about-completely healed tendonitis. I took a couple weeks off, and that morphed into a couple more weeks off and. . . well, I need to get back to running. I'm just about out of the habit.

Anyway, my third favorite winter thing?

My peppermint mug. Usually used for coffee, and occasionally for hot chocolate. I use it mostly in the winter, because it seems like it's a wintery themed mug, right?

Anybody else have winter gear you just can't live without?

Losing Oma

I got that dreaded call -  or rather, a text - from my mom in the wee hours this morning (though I suppose at the time I'm writing this post, it's still the wee hours).

My maternal grandmother, Oma, passed away at 1:13 CST today, Monday, November 4, 2013.

She hadn't been well physically for quite some time. She (and the rest of us) had been greatly robbed of her memory by Alzheimer's. It was not an unexpected death. But it is a significant one; there is never anyone quite like one's grandmother.

I was lucky to have my grandmother until the week before my 43rd birthday.

She was the woman who would do anything for me. ANYTHING. She would've fought off a wolverine with her bare hands to protect me (if that situation had presented itself, of course).

There was nothing better than her grandchildren. We were better than all the Olympic gold medals combined. Better than all the riches in the world. Nothing made her happier than her grandchildren. Nothing.


She has always been a constant in my life. I could always count on her for certain things. Riding the Dumbo ride at Disney Land (or the helicopter ride or haunted house at Western Playland) when I was very young. Her homemade beans, tacos, and rice. I've never had any better than hers (and had, as a matter of fact, craved HER tacos and beans when I was pregnant hundreds of miles away from her home in El Paso, TX, when I was  in the Air Force, stationed near Concord, MA). Occasionally having an "ice cream soda" with her (she loved having those - vanilla ice cream with Coke poured over it), or a Klondike Bar. Going to a movie or play. Heading to Mesilla, NM for a day trip (it was only about a 45 minute drive from El Paso). Going out to dinner. A birthday card with a check in it. Her slipping me some money on those days I had to head home after visiting her.

Once, while I was a student at Lake Forest College, I had flown out to her house one spring break. We decided to go to a movie at the Cielo Vista Mall's movie theaters. We saw a Julia Roberts movie, Sleeping with the Enemy. It was one of those psychological thrillers about a woman who escapes from her abusive husband. When the movie was over and we left the theater, she said, "I was so tense throughout that whole movie, I now have a horrible headache." I think she ended up making one of her "ice cream sodas" when we got back home. How's that for treating a headache?

Another time, while I was still in the Air Force and stationed in Tucson, AZ (probably in the summer of 2000), I had a 4-day weekend coming up. It was an easy drive from Tucson to El Paso. I called her and told her I'd be at her house for my long weekend. I think I'd had both Friday and Monday off, so I was planning on leaving early Friday morning, expecting to arrive at her house around mid-morning.

However, I unexpectedly ended up having wrapped up my duty day much earlier than expected on Thursday afternoon. So I quickly headed back to my apartment, changed out of my uniform, grabbed my overnight bag, stopped at the gas station, and headed to El Paso. Since it ended up being kinda late (around 9-10 PM) when I got into El Paso and they weren't expecting me until the next morning, I headed to Ft. Bliss and checking into their lodging facility for the night. I hadn't wanted to worry my grandparents by ringing the doorbell that late at night, as I knew they'd both be in bed.

The next morning, I got up, showered quickly and headed over. It was about breakfast time. I pulled into the driveway, rang the doorbell, and heard Oma asking my grandfather who it could be. When she answered the door (my grandfather rolling up behind her in his wheelchair), she was really surprised, but incredibly happy. She hadn't been expecting me 'til closer to lunchtime. Just the smell of her house at breakfast time was "home"enough for me. But she had pulled me in the doorway and squeezed me as hard as she could before ushering me to the breakfast table.

That was a fun memory of surprising her.

Know what she did to help me one night? I may have told this story here before, but I'll tell it again, briefly. While I was stationed in Alamogordo, NM, when Livie was just a baby and Andrew was deployed to the Middle East, Livie and I spent Labor Day weekend at Oma's house.

Livie ended up coming down with the coxsackie virus - hand/foot/mouth disease, as it's commonly known. She had little blisters inside her mouth and on her feet. She wasn't nursing or taking a bottle because her mouth hurt. Well, I was worried she'd become dehydrated, so in the middle of the night, Oma went with me that rainy night when I took Livie to the hospital at Ft. Bliss.

Livie hadn't quite been herself during the day, and had become increasingly fussy throughout the night, refusing to be nursed and refusing a bottle, which is what prompted the visit to the hospital. However, when the doc came into the exam room, Livie, wide awake at 2 AM, looked at him and smiled. (By the way, there was nothing we could do but wait out the virus. The doc recommended we get those pedia-pops because the cold "popsicle" would soothe her mouth.)

When I walked into the waiting room to get Oma after the doc saw Livie, I told her that Liv had smiled at the doc. Oma couldn't do anything other than smile, shake her head, and say, "Ay, Olivia!"

But the thing Oma gave me that night - since Livie was too uncomfortable to sleep unless being held, Oma took her and sat in the rocking chair in the guest room, rocking her and telling me to get some sleep. She sat with Liv in the rocking chair until dawn!

And then there was the time we were in Chicago in 2009 for my niece's baptism. One evening, we had all decided to go out to dinner. We ended up at Ruth's Chris steakhouse. That was one of the best steaks I'd had in a long while.

Oma ended up footing the bill. And it was a large bill, because there were a lot of us family members at that meal. Andrew, my Uncle Hector, and I walked away nearly speechless at Oma's generosity; we didn't talk about it in voices above whispers, we were so surprised and thankful.

Of course, one of Livie's favorite memories is taking Oma for frozen yogurt. You see, Oma always had a sweet tooth. She once told Livie that she doesn't have a sweet tooth "because all of them are sweet." The last time we'd taken her for frozen yogurt was a few of months ago, probably during the summer while we were visiting her at my parents' house. The local frozen yogurt place had coconut flavored frozen yogurt that day. Oma LOVED coconut. So, since it was a self-serve place (where they weigh your cup and you pay by the ounce), Livie helped me fill a cup with the coconut flavored "fro-yo," topping it with caramel (another of Oma's favorites), then adding plenty of shaved coconut and cashews. Liv and I had called the creation "the Three Cs" for coconut, caramel, and cashews.

Oma couldn't get enough. She lamented that she should've skipped dinner so she could have two servings of that delicious sundae. She had never had anything she'd enjoyed so much. After every bite, she would exclaim, "Boy, that's good!" When she had finished, she'd said that was a big disappointment - it was gone.

She talked about that sundae the rest of the evening, and surprisingly (due to the Alzheimer's which caused her to forget certain things within just minutes) she talked about that sundae the next day!

Oh, Oma. There are so many good stories to tell. Stories I'll have to tell Livie, so that Oma's memory lives on. Stories I'll tell Livie to take a little bit of the sting out of the loss of her great-grandmother.

Oma, it was time for you to go, but it had to be. You are greatly missed.

A Brief Report - Quad Cities Air Show 2012 Day 1

This past weekend, we headed to the Quad Cities Air Show. It was Livie's first air show. Sure, she'd seen a formation of 25 F-117s fly overhead once, on that ship's 25th anniversary (and she was only about 6.5 months old at the time, and doesn't remember it). But she's never been to an air show.

And it had been quite a while since I had been to one in person, so it was pretty exciting. (I think my last air show was when I was still in the Air Force . . . it was probably the Aerospace and Arizona Days Air Show in Tucson, back in 2002).

The Quad Cities are about an hour and a half away, by car, the air show taking place at the Davenport Municipal Airport. After packing overnight bags for ourselves and a cooler with lunch, we grabbed the portable DVD player and some movies for Livie, and then headed out.

Since this was a last minute trip, we weren't able to get a hotel in the immediate vicinity, so we'd booked a room in Muscatine, IA, about 25 miles away from the air show. Because we couldn't check in until around 3 PM, we headed straight for the air show.

It had been overcast all morning, turning to constant rain as we'd gotten closer to Davenport. Apparently it was due to remnants of Isaac, just lingering (seemingly endlessly) over the Quad Cities area.

So our first day at the air show was wet, wet, wet. It hadn't stopped raining ALL DAY in Davenport! But Livie had her rain gear, so she had no complaints. (Andrew and I got rather wet, even with an umbrella, simply because it was pretty windy, too.)

But regardless of the weather on that first day, we'd had fun. And Livie was impressed!

*However, there was a tragic event during the day. At some point, while Livie, Andrew, and I were distracted by the static aircraft displays, there was an accident. One of the aircraft (an L-39) crashed, killing the pilot on impact. (Click here for a news story.) Fortunately, Livie didn't actually see the accident. (And Andrew and I didn't know the tragic fate of the pilot until after we'd left for the day.)*

Anyway, after having that horrible gut feeling after seeing that (and again, not yet knowing the fate, but knowing search and rescue teams were doing their thing), we went on with the afternoon, since the FAA had cleared the rest of the day's performers for flight.

Here are a few photos of the first day.

Liv and the Air Force banner

An A-10 and Star Spangled Banner

Liv loves "Spooky"!

"Is that a Native American?"

Corn at the Davenport Municipal Airport

(Somewhere in between taking these two photos was when the accident had happened. As you can see, Livie was sufficiently distracted by a churro and a static display. By the way, we hadn't heard a thing. )

Checking out the bomb drop

Since it had been raining a lot, and the ceiling (where the cloud cover was located height-wise in the sky) was low, the Air Force's Thunderbirds had to cancel their performance for this first day. So we headed to our hotel, about a 30 minute drive away.

Once we checked in, got dried off, and relaxed a bit, we headed out to dinner and then went sight seeing at the Mississippi River.

More photos (from our evening at the Mississippi River, and from Day 2 of the Air Show) coming soon . . .

(Part 2 is here; and Part 3 is here)

Monsoon Season, Tucson

Just reminiscing a bit more about Tucson . . . here are a couple photos taken during monsoon season when the clouds had moved in, promising rain.

If I remember correctly, I'd been at the Arizona Sonora Desert Museum when I'd taken these photos, circa 2000 (with a visiting friend whom I knew from college) or maybe 2001 (when Andrew had come out to visit).

(These were taken with one of those disposable cameras - with film - and, of course, not "translating" very well when scanned.)

Another Photo Trip Back Home

While I enjoy taking photos while I'm out and about here in Iowa, I figured I'd take another trip (via photo) back "home" to the Southwest.

I say "home," because my maternal grandparents spent just about their whole lives in the Southwest, namely in El Paso, TX. My mom and her brothers were raised in El Paso. I spent the first three or so years of my life in El Paso. After my parents and I moved away, I still took many, many trips back to the Southwest to visit my grandparents regularly. I've even got a number of family members who still live in the area. Plus, I was stationed in the Southwest on two different occasions during the years I spent in the Air Force (in Tucson, AZ, and Alamogordo, NM).

Even when I was stationed elsewhere, I found myself in the Southwest, either for work or more often, on vacation.

So basically, the Southwest like home to me - my first home, my original home. (Chicago - or Arlington Heights, more specifically, is my "home of record" for the military, because that's where I'd been living when I'd gone on active duty . . . but that's a whole 'nother story.)

Anyway, when Andrew and I were stationed in Massachusetts for four years, we found ourselves in Las Vegas, NV for a week-long conference for work (October 2004). After we'd wrapped up on the last day, we had a bit of time for sightseeing; we took the opportunity to go to the Hoover Dam, a nice day-trip distance from the sensory overload known as Vegas (which I really enjoy, by the way). Not only was the Hoover Dam impressive on its own merits, the scenery to and from the Hoover Dam was spectacular!

So here are a few photos I thought I'd share. The quality isn't the best - I'd used one of those single-use "disposable" cameras (with film in it); anyway, their quality declined even further after I'd uploaded the photos and had them transferred from one online storage site to another. (The negatives, sadly, were lost/ruined in my numerous moves from one part of the country to another.)

(Again, you can click on each photo for a somewhat larger view.)

The reservoir, on one side.

The river, on the other side.

Andrew's looking down that dizzying downward distance.

Arizona Memories

I was thinking about and missing living in Tucson, AZ recently (and feeling that familiar, old saudade again). So I looked through some old photos and decided to share a couple. (I'm pretty sure I haven't shared either of these two before.)

These were both taken in the wintertime. I think they were on different days, yet both days happened to both be unusually cloudy (or partly so); Tucson has, probably, close to 300 days of sunshine per year. 

These were taken in either late January or early February 2000, when I'd gone out to explore the beautiful scenery in the relative "coolness" of winter.

I love the saguaro cactus "sentries" in the first photo.

Saguaro National Park, western

Near Sabino Canyon

So truly an "Under the Desert Sky" post today.

A Day in Iowa City and the Museum of Natural History

Yesterday, I had to go to the University of Iowa to get some pre-semester paperwork turned in. Plus, I had to pick up a graded paper from last semester, as well as return about two and a half tons of a dozen or so library books to the University's Main Library.

And, of course, I had to get "The Summer Shot, 2012," just outside the library's north entrance!

Since Livie was with me, I had to add in some fun things to do along with my quick (but boring) errands. So, after quickly turning in some paperwork at the Veterans' Center within the Registrar's Office in Jessup Hall - which took just a couple minutes, and then picking up my graded paper across the street in Gilmore Hall, we headed to lunch at the Bluebird Diner. (It was about noon, so great timing! Plus, we got there just before the lunch rush!!)

We've just ordered; waiting for lunch!

I think the Bluebird Diner is Livie's favorite diner. On days she has to come with me to Iowa City, we usually have to eat there.

This time, she had some chicken strips and a cup of delicious fresh fruit (blueberries, strawberries, honeydew melon, and pineapple). I had the BLT on wheat toast with applewood-smoked bacon and herb aioli. Delish!

Then we shared a piece of warmed cherry pie a la mode. The ice cream was so creamy, I think I liked that part best.

After we ate, and before heading to the "boring" library (which Liv thinks is a little scary up in the stacks, because it's such a huge place, it feels like you could get lost), we stopped at someplace fun.

Where did we go? The University of Iowa's Museum of Natural History, of course! I'd never been there, if you can believe that, even though I've gone past it many times.

This is located in MacBride Hall, where my anthropology class' discussion group met.

Anyway, here's an abbreviated photo tour of our adventure through the museum. I got a ton of photos, but I won't bore you with all of them.

 Outside MacBride Hall, ready to go into the museum.

Liv was absolutely fascinated with this prehistoric sea creature! We had to go back and look at this thing a couple times before we left this part of the museum. 

 She was also fascinated by this diorama replicating an area in Iowa, including Native Americans overlooking a river.

 She was also interested in seeing a common form of housing Native Americans used. In this photo, though, she was telling me how the floor was textured to make it look like the ground.

 She really liked this giant sloth; we had to look at this exhibit a few times, too. I'm not sure why she's not smiling for the photo, though.

Here's another one of her favorites: a "birds-eye view" diorama of a Native American village in Iowa. If you click on the photo, you'll be able to see the village is at an angle, like you're a bird looking down at it. Liv's pointing at a flock (a gaggle?) of geese flying over the landscape. 

Guess who's impressed with the stuffed polar bear?! 

This one was my favorite diorama: the Sonoran Desert, replicating an area where I used to live - Tucson, AZ! 

We both liked this one - the moose skeleton! Pretty amazing!

Of course, there's also a moose diorama. This is about as close to any moose we'll get in person. They're too huge to get any closer in person!

Another cool diorama that I had to include in this photo tour: the muskox/wolf one! 

I convinced Livie to take a seat in the MacBride Hall auditorium's balcony. She was a little nervous about it, I guess because it's a pretty big place.

And that's the end of the photo tour. Maybe another day, I'll share some more photos of the University of Iowa's Museum of Natural History.


But before signing off for now, Livie wanted me to share this photo of her next to the flowers at the Main Library's south entrance. She loved the bright pink of these "overflowing" flowers! 

The First 10th.

Andrew and I have two anniversaries. Today is our "First" 10th anniversary. Our "first" anniversary of the calendar year is the anniversary of our Justice of the Peace ceremony, which took place in Fayetteville, NC on June 21, 2002. (Click here to read about the actual day, which I'd blogged about last year on our "First" Ninth.)

The condensed version is as follows.

We were both active duty in the Air Force. As of January 2002, we were planning on getting married in December 2002.

But I was stationed in Tucson, AZ. He was stationed in Fayetteville, NC. I was expecting orders for a new assignment by the end of Summer 2002. He wasn't going to get orders for another couple years (maybe 3). Well, in order for us to be stationed at the same place at the same time, we couldn't be simply engaged, we had to be married.

Hence, the Justice of the Peace ceremony, which took place June 21, 2002, just in time for them to cut orders for BOTH of us at the same Air Force base, at the same time.

The Justice of the Peace ceremony was small, informal, and included a few of the guys from Andrew's office. Meanwhile, plans for the church wedding in December in Chicago were continuing to keep me, my mom, and the wedding planner busy.

(Our "Second" 10th anniversary - celebrating the church wedding - is December 14th, 2012, in case you're wondering. But I'm sure I'll blog about it when the time comes.)

Anyway, knowing Andrew was busy and probably hadn't planned anything to commemorate our first decade, I decided not to do anything big. I figured we'd keep this one small, like the original ceremony was 10 years ago.

Here's what I did. Yesterday, Livie and I went to the open art studio at The Dreaming Bear, here in town. Partly it was something fun to do inside (in AC!!!) on a hot summer day. But partly, I wanted to do something other than getting a boring ol' anniversary card. Because it IS the 10th anniversary, after all!! Right?

So Livie worked on her own art project (painting a wooden horse cutout).

And so I picked out a small, white stretched canvas (something like this, but about 4"x6"). Then I painted the base color (sort of turquoise-like) and then the letters and dots, and then it got glittered-up. Just to be cute.

Like I said, it's just something cute that we could hang somewhere in the house. I'm not good at painting letters freehand, so don't expect anything Degas-like, or something like that.

Better than a card, because I made it myself. Plus it was fun to make. However, I won't quit my day job anytime soon. (Or I'll stick to photography as my art medium!)

Remembering a Different Home

Normally, if I feel a little homesick (or have a feeling of saudade), it's for New Mexico (or El Paso, TX, or even Tucson . . . but generally somewhere in the Southwest).

But lately, I've been kind of missing my other home, Chicagoland. See, I went to college in Chicagoland - Lake Forest College (in Lake Forest, Il, to be exact). And before I joined the Air Force, I worked as a Certified Legal Assistant in Chicagoland (in Deerfield, IL) and lived in Chicagoland (Arlington Heights, IL, about 8-9 miles from where I worked). So I lived in the Chicago area for a number of years.

There's so much to do in a metropolitan area like Chicagoland. There are plenty of sports related activities, like my being able to go to Chicago Blackhawks games (my favorite NHL team). My brother and I would go to a home game together at the United Center at least once a season - the 'Hawks, a beer, nachos, and good company - you couldn't get a better type of fun than that. Plus Chicago has two MLB teams, an NFL team, and a MLS team. Of course, Chicago has plenty of cultural activities, too - the Art Institute, the Shedd Aquarium, opera, theater, various concerts. And restaurants - think of a type of food . . . Spanish tapas, Italian, deep dish pizza, steak . . . you name it, Chicago has it.
 
Andrew and I also got married in Chicago, in December, when the air was crisp and cold, Christmas-y lights were twinkling, and there was a hint of snow in the air and that special holiday buzz surrounding us.

(Oh, and here's a little-known tidbit: the best driver's license photo I ever had was for my Illinois license, when I'd renewed it in December 2002.)

So as you can see, there is something special to me about Chicago.

But I'm sure you're wondering what got me on a "I miss Chicago" kick.

It was a dog.

A dog? 

Yes, a dog.

Not a canine.

A dog.

A hot dog.

A hot dog?

Yep. A Chicago dog.

Poppy seed bun, hot dog, mustard (and NEVER ketchup!!!), sweet relish, dill pickle spear, tomato wedges, sport peppers, and a bit of celery salt.

There's a hot dog place near us that opened within the last year here in east-central Iowa. We'd never been there, but had noticed they advertised Chicago-style hot dogs. So this past weekend, out of curiosity, Andrew decided to go get some Chicago-style hot dogs, just to see how they stacked up to the real thing.

The dog (and a beer), via Instagram app on my iPhone.

(No, that's not the exact color . . . I tried giving it a little bit of an artsy look to it with the Instagram app.)

Well, it was pretty good - good enough to satisfy the Chicago dog craving. But it made me miss stopping at the hot dog stand I used to get my Chicago dogs from, when I was in the city - a little place called Hot Diggity Dog on Ohio St (off of . . . um . . . Fairbanks, I think?), where they had the BEST chocolate malts.

And that's what made me start reminiscing about all the other things I missed about Chicago (driving Lake Shore Drive at night, going for a run at the lake, the IMAX at Navy Pier, etc.) . . . and, well, there you go.

Homesick, Again

In my classes at the University of Iowa, we're at various stages of talking about native peoples of the American Southwest. Well, as some of you may know, I used to live in the Southwest (El Paso, Tucson, Alamogordo). So it's nice to read about the area. It's almost like I'm going back there mentally at a time I'm not able to go back physically.

Anyway, we've been having typical late winter weather here in Iowa, meaning Mother Nature is being fickle - one day giving us sleet, freezing rain, high winds, overcast skies, and the next, teasing us with one day of clear, blue skies and sunshine . . . only to go back to multiple days back-to-back of oppressively gray clouds.

It's days like this, with a lack of sunshine, our natural source of Vitamin D, that I begin to miss the Southwest. I was really homesick earlier this morning, having seated myself at my desk (supposedly to do homework), seeing my framed photo of "UH" (my Uncle Hector from Albuquerque) and Livie in my grandparents' house in El Paso, and another photo of White Sands in southern New Mexico.

I was so homesick, I could close my eyes and almost visualize sitting in my grandparents' home in El Paso, or my own home in Alamogordo, looking at the mountain ranges displaying various shades of copper, reds, oranges, milk chocolate, the sky an intense blue (and at dusk, purples, raspberry pink, blues, black). 

And - eyes closed - I could almost smell the desert - the dryness, the piñon, that distinct wet mineral scent (mixed with creosote and other desert flora) that the land emits after a brief rain.

Opening my eyes, I had an intense feeling of saudade - a Portuguese word, hard to translate - meaning something along the lines of a fondness and longing for something that you know you probably can't reclaim, or some similar such place to which return is unlikely.

While I'm sure I'll be able to visit the Southwest at some point on vacation (which I'm sure I'll greatly appreciate), I'll always feel a tiny bit of saudade because it won't be to my grandparents' home, or the home in which Livie, Andrew, and I lived when we were stationed in Alamogordo.

Anyway, I guess that's enough boo-hooing over my dislike of multiple days of overcast skies. 

So I'll end with a couple photos of my backyard in New Mexico, taken the day we moved in. It had been a bright, sunny day, that day I'd gotten the keys. But within an hour of being at the house, I noticed clouds moving toward us from over the Sacramento Mountains.

The next thing I knew (maybe within 15-20 minutes?), these stormy looking clouds were right over the mountains, and it looked like it was raining hard.

The rains never made it to our backyard. The storm dissipated, clouds dispersing into thin air in that space between the mountains and the backyard.

Gloomy Skies and Moods

Okay, I love four seasons. I love snow. I can't stand heat and humidity (I can, however, deal with dry heat when the humidity's low - like in Tucson, El Paso, or Las Cruces).

When we had unusually sunny, warm weather here in east central Iowa, I missed the snow, but certainly enjoyed the sunshine. It reminded me of how winters are in the Southwest - sunny! In Alamogordo, it's not uncommon to have somewhere around 300 sunny days per year. That's like 10 months' worth of sunshine per year!

So in moving back to the Midwest in 2008 (having lived for a number of years in the Chicagoland area, as well as having gone to school for 4 years in NW Indiana), I quickly remembered how gloomy it gets (and stays!) when it's overcast. And how long it seems to be completely overcast - days and days (weeks on end, seemingly) without a break in the clouds - without the smallest hint of the sun. 

Now the Midwest has it's good points. I'm not bashing the Midwest.

It's just that this time of year, I start getting homesick for "home" - for the Southwest. My grandparents were from the Southwest. My mom and uncles were born and raised in the Southwest. I've lived in the Southwest for part of my life. And while I loved many things about living in the Chicago area (and have grown fond of a number of things about Iowa), I think there must be a little part of me that belongs in the Southwest (or belongs to the Southwest).

And the overcast days without promise of sunshine . . . well, they just makes me miss the Southwest - the sunshine, the "perfume" the dry desert air gives off after a rainstorm (by the way, it never stays cloudy for long), as well as the familiar, distinct scents of creosote and piñon trees, the ease of finding good, local food (the kinds I always crave - Mexican, Tex-Mex, Southwestern). Well, the overcast gloom and its resulting saudade for the Southwest make me wonder if I should invest in one of those S.A.D. (seasonal affective disorder) lights! 

In the meantime, I'll just look through old photos for a temporary New Mexico fix!

31 December 2006 - the view from our backyard in Alamogordo, NM.

Reminiscing a Bit More

While I'm still on break, I've been working on a photo project. So, in looking through a bunch of my old photos, I found a few cool ones from Arizona and New Mexico I thought I'd share.

I'm at the Saguaro National Park in Tucson, circa late summer 2000. I would've gotten a little closer to a saguaro, if I hadn't been worried about an encounter with a rattlesnake off the main trail.

Do you see the javelina right in the middle? I saw it at the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum in Tucson, circa late summer 2000. Can you believe how close it is?

This was a storm rolling in, as seen from our back yard in Alamogordo, NM, circa early spring 2007. Lots of thunder and lightning, but not as much rain as I'd expected.

And this one of White Sands outside of Alamogordo - yes, I've posted this one before, but I'm posting it again today in honor of New Mexico's 100th birthday!

Reviewing Fun Times

So now that I'm on break and don't start classes (for grad school) again until mid-January, I've been working on a project that's been on hold during the fall semester.

Since I've been looking through old photo albums, I'm coming across photos I'd forgotten I have.

Ready to go on a "trip" to two very different parts of the country?!

I thought I'd go ahead and share a few from November 2001 and December 2002 from two locations I love: the Southwest, and Chicago.

These first few photos are from Tucson, AZ from November 2001. I was still active duty in the Air Force, and stationed in Tucson. Andrew, also active duty, but stationed in North Carolina, had come out to visit to celebrate a few occasions: my birthday, my promotion, and to be my date for the Air Force's Birthday Ball.

While he was out visiting, we'd hiked to Seven Falls (which I posted a photo of the other day), and visited the Arizona Sonora Desert Museum, which is one of the coolest museums I've ever been to - if you ever get a chance to spend time in Tucson, you need to plan on spending a couple hours there.

This is from the Arizona Sonora Desert Museum. We're on a bridge over a dry wash. Below us are a couple javelinas, scratching themselves against each other. The one in the front is facing to the right, and the one in the back (hard to see - you can see its hind legs underneath the front one's face) is facing left.

Again, at the museum . . . I got Andrew to smile for a photo. He'd never been so close to a cactus before, and thought they were pretty cool. However, he made me nervous because he kept kidding around about touching one; I got worried he'd actually touch one by mistake. 

 This one is from the Saguaro National Park area, just west of Tucson. It's a beautiful place to visit and get your fill (of viewing, only) of saguaros!

These next few photos are from Chicago in December 2002 (when Andrew and I had our church wedding).

This one was taken a couple nights before the wedding (and about two weeks before Christmas). Andrew had never been to Chicago before, so we were taking a walking tour through the city, beautifully lit for Christmas. (I'd been using one of those disposable cameras, so the photo quality is not great - I guess it proves "you get what you pay for"?) The Chicago river is behind him.

This one was taken from one of our hotel windows, the day after the wedding. I remember thinking as I fell asleep in this room, that the muted city sounds from way below were soothing.

A view from another one of our hotel windows. I thought this was a particularly cool view.