I'm listening to the wind toss the trees back and forth, and watching the orange light of evening slowly make its way across this particular corner of the world. Not that the world can have corners, it being spherical and all, but sometimes the words that fit aren't the most correct ones. Let's hear it for occasional incorrectness.

I'm taking the evening off work so J9 and I can go see Marissa Nadler and Alela Diane up in San Francisco. Looking forward to both the company and the music.

Autumn just seems to be the time when everything happens. Funny the difference a year makes.

This is the kind of sight that inspires me. The sky is a vast, ever changing canvas of light and moisture, and the interplay of the two can be awe inspiring. On days of bland blueness I find myself... maybe "depressed" is too strong a word, but at the very least, unmotivated. There's no expectant energy there when the sky is blue. On the other hand, when dark clouds come roiling in over the hills, it seems that anything is possible. It doesn't have to be clouds either. I can be a bit of perfectly placed fog, or a high, lonely contrail, or just a wisp - a promising little cowlick of vapor waiting for its big dark friends to join in the fun there at the invisible air-mass boundary.

Let it rain! Or at least let it look like it's going to rain!

Yesterday, Willow and I spent a couple of hours playing at Oak Meadow and Vasona Parks, which are pretty much the same park, except that you have to pay to drive into Vasona. It goes without saying that we always park at Oak Meadow, although I'll have to start paying to park there too when I renew my license (my present license has my old address, showing that I'm a park-approved Los Gatos resident).

But I digress. What I meant to write about is the incredible feeling of Autumn inspired nostalgia that hit me as we rode the small steam train, splashed in the creek, and wandered through the park(s). It had something to do with the falling leaves and the autumnal smell wafting through the air - a smell that transported me right back to a childhood spent in creeks and drainage ditches. It was just the right combination of plant smells, humidity, and mud. If I could figure it out, I could bottle childhood! It's funny how memories of scents are stored forever, with near perfect recall.

Mmmmm! Blustery, power-flickery, gusty, drippy, torrential RAIN! I love it when the moan of the wind and rain is punctuated by the staccato noise of items crashing to the ground outside.

The power at work went out at about 6:30 this morning, causing the generator to kick in. The power at home flickered on and off earlier, and just to the west of me, streetlights are out.

Currently listening to the sound of the rain, which meshes perfectly with Mountains "Choral" cd.

The wind is gusting up to 36 mph outside. I know this because they finally fixed the wind gauge/weather station affixed to the wall of the building I'm sitting inside. I also know this because I can hear things being blown about camp, and the wind is howling. There isn't a lot of rain yet. Hopefully that will come soon.

Also, hopefully nobody else will throw up tonight. Rain is good. Vomit is not.

My counterpart at our other site saw a Mountain Lion tonight. Some people have all the luck. All I saw was a pair of frogs. Still, frogs are cool too.

The sky is gray and still, with rain perhaps a few hours away. Tomorrow, it's supposed to storm on us, with much anticipated wind and rain finally giving the parched hillsides a chance to swell with moisture. I am more than looking forward to it - I'm fairly singing with anticipation.

This weekend, I went on another long hike up at Almaden Quicksilver park, visiting Hidalgo cemetery, an abandoned rotary furnace, and finding yet another old car in a ravine. The cemetery was perhaps the most interesting, despite the fact that all of the grave markers have succumbed to time and vanished. Wooden markers tend to do that, I guess. The white picket fence, also made of wood, that surrounds the cemetery, will no doubt also vanish in time. That will probably be replaced. It's interesting that nobody thought to do that with the original grave markers though. Did all of those families cease to exist?

I also found a squished tarantula, which made me sad. The poor little guy was struck down while in the process of looking for a mate, so that one death also cut short a whole line of descendants. I just hope that he wasn't killed on purpose. people need to deal with their fears in a more constructive fashion.

Before the hike, I watched Willow's soccer team wipe the field with their opponents. Willow is so fun to watch - she literally dances with excitement sometimes out there on the field. Sophie spent the whole game braiding my hair, which was funny. I'm not sure when she learned to braid. I feel like I'm missing out on her life these days, but on the bright side, it makes the time I do have with her (and her brothers) all the more precious.

Friday night, I went on a very nice date up to San Francisco to experience some music. I'm very happy about the way things are progressing on this front.

I also got a rare chance to lead a field class last week, which in some ways explains why I haven't updated this blog in a while. I've gotten used to having my days free, so when they're suddenly filled, I don't blog as much.

The week was great though. The kids were from four different private schools - all catholic schools, I think. This means that, for the most part, they were well behaved. The cabin leader who hiked with me had been up the week before, so he was more experienced than some, which is always good.

This was the first time I'd led a whole field class for a week since I started working nights a couple of years ago, so of course it was also the first time I've led a field class as a newly credentialed teacher. I did consider creating lesson plans for everything, but ended up not doing it in the end. I've taught all of these lessons many times before, so I just went with what I've always done, with a few little tweaks and variations thrown in. I perhaps spent a little more time focusing on the journal writing aspect of things, and I paid a little more attention to the skill levels of individual students than I used to. They were all pretty evenly matched though, with maybe one or two exceptions. Still, I felt there was a freshness to the week because it's no longer part of my weekly routine. The classroom teachers even commented on my obvious excitement. Of course, we had to visit the Rattlesnake family up in the chaparral. I recently read an article on Rattlesnake parental care brought to my attention by one of my Flickr friends. Apparently the babies usually stay with the mom until the first shed. Of course, the babies I showed my field class are still with their mom, even though they've already shed. I took one of the shed skins and laminated it with a photo of the snakes, making some pretty cool prize bookmarks to give away during the end-of-the-week review on Friday. We also found a ton of small Bullfrogs (as well as a couple of toads) up at Lake Ranch Reservoir. The kids were extremely excited by this. Just imagine 19 sixth graders all screaming and laughing as frogs go leaping everywhere. The cool thing was that they were under rocks near the shore, so we could easily catch them. Some rocks had nearly a dozen frogs hiding underneath. Talk about hands-on outdoor education! It was the first time that a lot of the kids had ever gotten to do something like that. I think that they'll remember it fondly. They didn't even complain about the nearly 5 mile round trip it took to get to where the frogs were.

That said, one of my favorite moments of the whole week was when we came upon a Youth Science Institute group on the trail, and I quickly realized that it was Sophie's class. I hadn't even realized that she had a field trip on that day. The odds against me running into her on the trail are pretty big. First, there are a lot of trails, and second, I'm not usually hiking them these days. We were very happy to see each other.

This week, I'm back in the camp office at night, just in time for the torrential rains to hit.

Things have cooled off a bit, and there's a nice breeze. This makes it much more bearable when I'm sitting out on a sunny field watching Willow play soccer. It also prevents Willow from turning an alarming shade of pink from exerting herself in the heat.

Today, after soccer (damn, I feel like such a soccer dad all of a sudden - I'm still not a fan of organized sports, but the exercise and teamwork is good for Willow, so I'm a fan of that aspect of it at least) we went to the Children's Discovery Museum, a place which is singularly important in that Willow owes her very existence to it. It's where I met her mom, back when I was an employee there.

Nowadays, they still let me in for free, and it's nice to see those among my old coworkers who are still there. One such old coworker was leading a "make a play" workshop, during which participants got to alter an existing story ("The Three Little Pigs", in this case) and act it out. Willow played the brick seller. The three little pigs became two little dragons, and the big bad wolf became the big bad princess. Fun was had.

This coming week, I get a rare chance to be back in the field at work. I traded schedules with a coworker, so he (the appropriately named Bat) will work the nights, and I get to lead a field class. I've got to dig out all of my naturalist teaching supplies, but I'm looking forward to mixing things up a little.

The moon, ghost white
Leaks light through cracked clouds

I woke up this morning to clouds, and now I can hear the trees rustling as a slight breeze passes through. Tomorrow, the temperature has been forecast to stay below 70 degrees, but of course a week ago they were saying it was going to rain. Yesterday, the forecasters were predicting rain for the following Tuesday, but now they've changed their minds. I don't know why I even bother looking at the forecast.

My work week kicks into gear in a few hours. Before that, I'm going to have dinner with Willow. I predict that she's going to want frozen peas. Strange kid. Won't eat them if they're cooked.

A couple of weeks ago now, Willow and I were standing in the middle of Los Gatos Creek, dropping leaves into the flowing water and watching them drift away downstream. Sometimes they would get caught on rocks. Sometimes they would hit the rapids and go bobbing off into the distance. It occurred to me at the time that there was a ritualistic aspect to what we were doing. I began imagining things that I would like to let go, and picture the leaves as an embodiment of those intangible sections of psyche. There was a great peacefulness to the process, and a great relief.

Flowing water is somehow magical, but only if you are open to it.

The one thing that I would most like to let go of is the anger I feel towards my ex-wife. There were some lies told to me at the end of our relationship, and despite the fact that I know, and to a certain extent, understand, the reasons for the lies, I am still angry about it. I still feel that it is a profound betrayal of trust, and it has colored every interaction I've had with her since, and in a way invalidated every previous thing she has said to me. Once I find out that somebody is capable of lying to me, especially somebody that I have opened up to - somebody who at the time I felt love for - I feel that everything they say and have said is immediately suspect.

So I watch leaves float away in the cold creek water.

This soccer season, her boyfriend - the one she started dating before telling me that she was filing for divorce - is coming to the games. I finally saw him, and to tell you the truth, had no real feelings about it one way or the other. One of the reasons I'd been avoiding being in the same place as him for so long is that I thought it might bring up some pretty serious negative feelings. I'm happy that it didn't, because I'm really bad at hiding how I feel if strong feelings are involved. Sure, I'm not interested in interacting with him on any level, but it was nice to not want to go drown him in the creek.

Much better to watch the leaves float away.

After the games, during which Willow ended up being almost as pink from the heat and exertion as her team shirt, and Nate ended up not playing much because he didn't feel well, I decided to go on a solo hike up in Almaden Quicksilver Park. I used a different park entrance than usual, and picked a trail that in retrospect was a poor choice. It wound steadily uphill on the sunny side of the hills, heating the water in my water bottle to the extent that it tasted like warm tea. Still, I ended up in the area of the park known as English Camp, in which several ancient buildings are barely standing. It's interesting to become steeped in the history of the area like this - feeling the silence and solitude of forgotten people and the weathered remnants of their works. Last week, I wandered through an 150 year old cemetery in Saratoga, so this was the second time in less than a week that I found myself reflecting on what life used to be like. People lived and died in these hills, tunneling into the hillsides in search of mercury, and leaving their decaying buildings behind. There were even a couple of old cars among the trees downhill from where I was hiking. One looked as if the tree had begun its life as a sapling in the shadow of the car, slowly displacing it as the years passed.

I almost went back up there today, but ended up staying home and making hummus instead, adding more garlic than was reasonable. I'll try not to breathe on you for a week or two.

In the middle of our annual open house at work, I was leading a hike for about 50 kids (mostly elementary school kids who will be coming to camp later this year) and their parents, when a couple of the girls said they wanted to find some snakes. Not one to disappoint, I took a quick detour to a nearby rock pile where I'd been seeing Rattlesnakes over the summer. I found the cutest little cluster of baby Rattlers there, looking like they'd just been born. I think I even managed to convince the most cautious of the parents that it was a good thing. I then stood between the snakes and the kids, and let them approach to where they could peek over the rock and see the snakes. After about 7 or 8 kids got to see them, the snakes crawled off one by one, heading for the cover of one of the rocks. The rest of the people had to be content with the quick, slightly out of focus photo I took, just like those of you reading this will have to be.

Strange thing though - even though I was standing right there, I miscounted the snakes. If you look very carefully at the photo, you can see there are 4, not 3, as I originally thought. It was almost as if they were remembering being inside their mom, so tightly clustered together they were.

Always know how many snakes you're actually dealing with.

Definitely another snake geek moment.

I found a Wolf Spider last night, and as usual, started taking pictures of it. After a moment, I noticed that there was a rolled up Pillbug underneath one of its legs, making the spider look like it was on its way to soccer practice or something. It reminded me of the Far Side cartoon where all of the attendees show up for a lecture with ducks under their arms, except, of course, the one guy who forgets his. I imagine a room full of Wolf Spiders, all with Pillbugs, except for one hapless arachnid who shows up sans crustacean.

It's funny the way my mind works sometimes.

On another subject entirely, Willow became alarmed while we were talking about eyes. I was explaining how pupils work, about how they expand to let in more light, when she nervously asked, "what happens if my pupils get too big and my eyes explode?"

I sometimes wish that the world was still that mysterious for me.

The first night of the 2009/2010 science camp year is behind me now. The air was crisp enough to warrant an extra layer. The usual suspects were out in force - homesick kids and patrolling Raccoons. The Raccoon family was pretty cute, with the harried-looking mother urging her troupe of black-masked puffballs towards the apparent good eatin' to be found in the camp trash cans. I could have done without the anxious kid who woke me from my nap at 3:30 in the morning, but that kind of thing is, after all, what I'm paid to be available for. Sometimes I feel like a psychiatrist though. Maybe I should ask for a raise.

It's funny being back. I feel refreshed after my break from work, but I still remember the end of the last school year when I wasn't expecting to be back doing this for another year. Not that I mind. It's a great job. Still, I'm going to redouble my efforts to find classroom work. Actually, I feel like redoubling my efforts in every way right now. That's what Autumn does to me. I hope the feeling lasts.

Currently listening to Nurse With Wound "The Memory Surface"

The clouds crept over the horizon at some point while my attention was elsewhere. I awakened to discover that local people on Facebook were talking about thunder and lightning. I wish I'd been awake at 4am or whenever it was that it actually graced the sky.

It's all right though. When Willow and I were at the park a short time earlier, fat drops of rain started plopping down out of the dark gray sky, and soon we were doing some pretty serious frolicking, getting wetter and wetter by the moment as the other park goers rushed for their cars. Only the weather-hardened dog park crowd stuck around - even the ones whose dogs didn't like the rain.

Now, as the sky darkens, we're back inside watching BBC dinosaur documentaries. Life is good.

A year ago today I was moving into my current apartment. Nearly all of my possessions were in boxes, except of course for those things that I just lazily threw on top of the pile.

Today, I'm sitting here with Willow. She's just had her first soccer game of the season. Many of my possessions are in bags out on the patio. No, I'm not moving or anything like that. I've had to quarantine a number of items in order to make sure the head lice that one of the kids brought home from school don't make a comeback.

The day after tomorrow, I start the new school year as night host up at camp. The lumbering, bureaucratic beast that is the California Commission on Teacher Credentialing has finally managed to officially issue me my credential. I guess that means they found the fingerprints that they claimed not to have. For this school year, I plan to use my credential to get some work as a substitute teacher (while still keeping an eye open for something more long-term). Maybe I'll stumble across a permanent position this way.

Either way, I'll be doing something I like doing.

The coin-op laundry machines are working overtime today as I re-wash all the bedding in an attempt to eradicate every last trace of the head lice that one of the kids brought home from school. Homework, yes. Lice, no. I love insects, but I have to say that love doesn't extend to the ones that try to move into the forest of hair at the top of the mountain of me. These particular insects can take a damn hike into nowhere land, and I'm here to issue the maps.

Actually, lice are pretty cute. It's a shame about their eating habits though.

At least the Eucalyptus-based homeopathic anti-louse spray smells nice.

Willow is with me for the next 8 days, which is nice. After Labor Day, it's our in-service week at work. I'm looking forward to it, and in some ways I'm glad I'm still working nights. This won't stop me from continuing to try to land a job in a classroom, but I like my current plan to do some subbing first. I also have to figure out why the California Teaching Credential people don't have my fingerprints. They were sent nearly two years ago, and just now I'm finding out that they've either never received them or have managed to lose them. This bolsters my opinion that bureaucracy is a dirty word. I really don't want to pay to have them redone and re-sent. I'm too busy spending my money on head louse remedies. I like the idea of releasing trained spiders into hair to eat the lice, but I have the feeling that wouldn't go over well with the general public.

Summer is over, its end marked by the exodus of kids out of swimming pools and off of lawns into new classrooms, where they are no doubt fidgeting in the confinement of their chairs.

I'm in the middle of a couple of weeks off. I haven't found a teaching job, so I'll be going back to working nights when outdoor school starts up in mid-September. My plan, for the time-being, is to pick up some work as a substitute teacher while hanging onto my night position. This will give me more classroom experience and expose me to a larger number of teaching styles and classroom plans.

I haven't been writing here much, mostly because summer camp wipes me out, and also because I'm in the middle of a novel reading and movie watching streak. As usual though, with summer once again fading into an idealized memory, I feel the urge to renew my efforts to just get on with things. It's a good feeling, and I feel that I've had a well earned break for the last few months.

The weather turned cold and breezy last night, with clouds pouring in over the hills. This morning, a light rain got everything just wet enough to foil the driving attempts of the unwary.

I love it! My energy seems to increase a hundredfold when the wind picks up, and the rain is a balm to my spirit. It also doesn't hurt that I've been leading a group of kids this week who do nothing but sing and jump around. I'll often discover that the group of 16 (12 boys and 4 girls, all 9 to 11 years old), have divided down the middle, with one subgroup singing a different song from the other. The two favorites appear to be "The Song That Gets On Everybody's Nerves" and "The Song That Never Ends".

To top it all off, the moon is so beautiful tonight that it made me gasp. I first spotted it when I merged onto the freeway coming home. There it was, immensely orange and a day past full, seeming to descend as I barreled towards it down the sinuous, darkened freeway. As my direction changed, it dipped beneath overpasses and cavorted through the treetops.

Stone Breath's "Knotwork" cd provided the perfect soundtrack for the journey.

I kind of feel like I've hit the doldrums. Maybe this is due to the seasonal nature of my job, which makes summer seem like an extended period of slacking off. I feel like I've blinked and while my eyelids were traveling towards each other, June vanished, and while they were traveling away again, July got eaten up. August waits like a torpid beast in a sun-flecked meadow.

We went to the Oakland Zoo yesterday, where I enjoyed watching the sleeping Fruit Bats, and Willow had fun spying on the rollicking Meerkats. Such trips are expensive though, especially when one factors in gas and food, and even more especially when it is followed by a visit to the record store. For once, I bought Willow more than I bought myself, and we're now the proud owner of the dvd version of Totoro. Willow is singing the theme song as I type. Such a magical film. When I watch it, I'm always inspired in way that I can't quite put into words.

Summer camp has been wearing me out. For a job that I don't consider work, I sure come home tired. The sun beats down all day, and if I don't come home covered in duckweed, I come home under a layer of dust and sticky plant seeds from bushwhacking after snakes. At least the Yellowjackets and ticks haven't been as much in evidence this year. It's funny how the Winter months can determine what wildlife is about and about during the Summer. We had a dry Winter this year, and there seem to be fewer animals about right now.

The kids are all being helpful at camp, although I caught Sophie swiping otter pops from the freezer last week. Still, despite minor infractions like this, I'm proud of the way they're all behaving, and happy that I get to spend so much time with my stepkids. In fact, I've been spending much more time with them than their real mom and dad. I had Nathan and Willow along on the night hike I led this week, and later, after I finished up my assigned night duty (herding children down to the lower field and their sleeping bags), I discovered that Willow had decided that my sleeping bag was more comfortable than hers and had fallen asleep in it. I crawled in next to her, and spent a rather cramped night trying not to roll over on her.

So, really, all is well. I just feel like I haven't been inspired to do much lately. It's almost as if I'm going through another phase of the healing process after last year's breakup, one involving lots of reading and music listening, and not a lot of introspection. Oops. I just did some introspection. Maybe the next phase is on the horizon...

Currently listening to Elm "Bxogonoas"

Summer is blazing by and I find myself enjoying the deceptively lazy seeming days of summer camp. I say "deceptively" because, despite all of the fun, the work day leaves me pretty wiped out. I'm always marching off somewhere with a gaggle of kids behind me, whether it's down to the pond, or out into the meadow to look under logs and rocks. Sometimes I'm down at the ropes course or climbing wall, and sometimes we're adding wheelbarrows full of duckweed to the satisfyingly full compost heaps in the garden.

At home, I find that I'm more likely to pick up a novel or slip in a dvd than do anything really useful (that said, I just finished cleaning the bathtub...). I still sort of miss being free during business hours, but I manage to find time to go to places like the bank, library, and post office anyway.

I've been loaned several seasons of the more recent Battlestar Galactica series, and I'm finding that diverting and entertaining, not to mention occasionally thought provoking. I re-watched Satantango for the fourth time, and still find it just as captivating as ever. I'm reading a detective novel. I'm listening to music. I'm enjoying the slight breeze and noticing that there are clouds drifting by overhead. This makes me look forward to the coming rainy season, which might be a good one, since a new El Nino (one of these days I'll figure out how to type a tilde over a letter) is forming. Tomorrow Willow and I are meeting friends for a playdate and renting a boat (paddle boat or small canoe, probably). Everybody is several shades darker from the sun. At night, up in the hills, the raccoons are squabbling and the coyotes are howling. There's a pair of ravens nesting nearby, and the air resounds with their gutteral croaks. I found a three legged frog in the pond, with the fourth leg ending in splinter of bone. Prevailing opinion is that the rest of the fourth leg provided a raccoon with a fresh drumstick for dinner.

As of now, I have no specific plans for any more summer trips, and I'm feeling like I should make some. To much time slips by when plans are not made. I think that looking forward to certain dates actually makes time go by much more slowly, and sometimes that can be a good thing. I'm not always mindful enough of the passing time. Maybe it's just because I'm getting older. The days are the same, but the years seem so much shorter.

Currently listening to: Onna "s/t"