Toast

I last wrote in Asheville, North Carolina, still one of my favorite places on the planet. Thank goodness Yonton gave me the aforementioned place to keep my marbles, because a few days later I was thrown into a tumultuous existence where most people would have lost it. Somehow, I managed to keep it (mostly) together.

I drove from WV back to Asheville, to the Talulah Gorge in Georgia, to Rock Island TN, back to West Virginia, to Ottawa city, to Vermont, to the Ottawa River, back to West Virginia. During that time I experienced storms of all kinds including freak southern snow storms, was imprisoned in a Cleveland, TN hospital, lived out of my car, burned up with a fever, was facebook de-friended more than once, lost 15 pounds in three quick days, paddled the Ottawa river at 22 feet, had a few screaming arguments, spent my entire paycheck on gas money, ran the New River Dries and the New River Gorge successfully, consulted an energy healer who told me I was 'covered in death' and swam above the strainer at Middle Keeners while my friend Gilad shouted "KEEP FIGHTING!" in Hebrew. I learned how to hate, which may after all be a necessary tool in life. I learned that sometimes the boldest act of defiance is to stay, other times it is to run away. The key is to determine which is necessary.

Like a long trashing on the river, knowing if I pulled my skirt I would be toast, I kept fighting and managed to roll up in the safety of Seattle, and then I let go.

Now I'm back in Seattle, and the thought of leaving makes me itch.