Scribbles for Posterity

There's a tender little sprout of optimism that seems to have grown up through the arid, hard packed dirt of my overwhelm lately. I feel like it's possible to pay attention to creative projects again, to break the stillness and reach inquiringly outwards into life rather than just running in place or turning always inward. Curiosity is back, a sense of noticing and wanting to fiddle, poke, explore, try out/on. Sleep is still anything but abundant, and work is still over-full and demanding; but there is a space that has opened up for me, mentally. I don't know how else to explain it. And I certainly don't know how to summon it (wish I did), but I'll accept it gratefully while it's here.

I think I want to start blogging daily again. Reporting from the front, so to speak. Not that every day will produce something fabulous (it didn't work that way before, that's for sure), but I miss having some kind of record of what was going on, in my life or in my head. Scribbles for posterity. So back to the "online journal" concept I go.

And in that spirit, let me start right here, where I am, and report. It's 6pm. I'm sitting here in a comfy lounge chair on the lawn of the Jack London Lodge in Glen Ellen. Josh is sitting next to me, reading a book. I was reading a book before I decided I was getting too foggy and wanted to switch to something more creative (I'm sure I'll run out of steam soon here and go back to reading, though). Comfy chair? Reading? (Blogging?) In Glen Ellen? How can this be? That's right, we're on vacation! An all-too-brief vacation, to be sure, but we'll take what we can get. We were supposed to be at Comic-Con, and had already arranged babysitting for that, but decided a month or two ago that we'd bail on that and go do a more relaxing, anniversary-like vacation instead, so here we are in wine country doing all kinds of delightfully adult things: eating! Drinking! Sleeping late! And even, if you can believe this, spa treatments! And we've only been here a day…

Ok so let me back up. We got here yesterday afternoon, after having first dropped off the kids at Dawn's and camp (we got to watch Eli's swim lesson first though, and that was all kinds of cute). But instead of rushing off to wine country, we lingered in Marin to watch a matinee of Pirates of the Carribbean (I give it a solid B, mostly because I loves me that Johnny Depp as Jack Sparrow and the special effects were awesome) and have lunch at our favorite sushi place. Then we went back home and finished packing, and got up here around 5pm or so. We spent some time hanging out here on the lawn reading yesterday too and then walked to the "downtown" (it's two blocks, seriously, and mostly restaurants) for a delicious dinner at The Fig Café. After dinner, we walked back to the lodge and hung out for a couple hours at the Jack London Saloon, which has been around since the turn of the last century and is certainly the only nearby place for locals to hang out. It was mostly quiet and empty but we did have a good time talking with a couple of older guys from the 'hood (so to speak), and the bartender, who was a transplant from San Francisco that was around our age. We drank far too much and heard lots of interesting stories (proving that once again, everyone you meet has an interesting life--you just have to scratch the surface to find it), then stumbled back home to bed.

This morning, we slept in (oh bliss!) as late as the hard bed and bright sun allowed, then dragged ourselves out to the lodge's continental breakfast before coming back to the room to shower and get ready for the day. After a stop at the Glen Ellen Market (so foofy and upscale it could seriously give Woodlands a run for its money) for some pick-me-up drinks and snacks we decided to go out to Sonoma to MacArthur Place, which had a spa that was recommended to us. Stopped in there, made an appointment for a couple's massage package, and then went off to the Sonoma Plaza to poke around for awhile and have lunch. We found The Girl and The Fig, which was the older and somewhat snootier cousin to the Fig Café, and had a truly outstanding light lunch there (including cheese plate! I love cheese plate!). Then we had our blissful spa experience (which in and of itself may have to be the subject of its own post, there was so much detail to love about it), and drove home in a pleasant daze. And now, we're back on the lawn, waiting for things to cool down and the time for our dinner reservation to arrive. It's been a fabulous 24 hours so far, and my God, we have 48 more to go! Mmmmmm….