Autumn comes towards a close

It's december now, as you know, and up here in Virginia it actually is starting to feel cold. I'm not really used to that, because aside from one year in Denver, I've been in the southern states (mostly Texas) for almost every December. It is rarely that cold there. Not that I am suffering. I actually like the cold weather. I think I llike that it comes and goes, just like the heat does in summer. I know it is cold but it will warm up. AndI kind of like the cold air. Maybe I'm wierd, but most Texans are very accustomed to the hot 7 or 8 months of the year and don't know what to do with themselves for the 2-3 weeks of cold weather that comes every winter.

It must be that I like it cold because there is so much to do when it is cold that I like. Snow sports are my favorite, even though the snow can make my fingers and toes hurt so bad if I let them get too cold. But then, as Ben would say, that's good training, i.e., that will help me when I'm on a cold mountain camping and climbing for several days at a time. I also love cold, clear nights where the stars shine brightly and the breath makes a fleeting fog when I exhale. It makes me feel so alive! It reminds me of so many good memories of vacations and trips up into the mountians, when we would go skiing with the family or friends, curling up by the fire afterwards, eating chili, and drinking hot chocolate; just relaxing and enjoying the feeling of being truly alive and involved in nature (ok, the whole skiing thing on groomed slopes with ski-lifts and gondolas isn't really a natural occurence, but it is close).

Meanwhile, back in Virginia I'm struggling to do anything outdoors. It is dark when I get off work, and there aren't any parks nearby where I live, so I'm left to forage for things to occupy my time on the weekends as best I can. So far in the past month I have been a few places. The first weekend I went to Colonial Beach, VA, which is on the Potomac River at a place where it is almost 5 miles across to Maryland. I worked in a clinic that Saturday at a Catholic church, seeing mostly Spanish-speaking patients. It was a lot of fun to use my spanish skills, and the people were so very appreciative of my time.

I left there and went to George Washington's birthplace. They were charging to see the house, but the house was not the original, anyway, having simply been reproduced, so I opted for the clandestine walking tour by myself (i.e., I went in without paying). I walked the grounds a while. It was late afternoon and the sun was going down. The place was really beautiful. It would have been a great place to grow up, I'm sure. Of course the family wasn't rich, but they did alright, so they had what they needed at least.

The next weekend I went to Arlington, VA, and stayed with my friend Kim. She showed me old Arlington, which was a short walk from her townhouse, and the next day we went to the Spy Museum, which was a lot of fun and very interesting. So for the next few weeks I wanted to be a spy, but turns out I'm over the age limit for the clandestine services, so who cares. For dinner we went to Old Ebbitt Grill and I decided to make it my birthday dinner party, since I had a birthday earlier in the week and hadn't gone out to celebrate. Needless to say I ate 4 varieties of raw oysters, had trout parmigan, and then a bread pudding that was too sweet to finish. Or maybe I was too full. I went to an old Baptist church with her the next day and really liked it. Nice people and a good preacher.

Then came Thanksgiving. I know, everyone has already written about Thanksgiving, and in fact I had a large post about it too, but I never said what my plans were. I left here in the morning, not knowing if it was really going to be icy or snowy as the forecasters had predicted, but as it turned out, the day was absolutely beautiful. Cold, but beautiful. I drove to Burke, VA, home to my friend Kelly's mother and step-father. Kelly is a girl with whom I attended high school, and she is about the only person from high school about whom I know anything, as I wasn't close to very many others at the school. At any rate, Kelly and her husband Carter invited me to join them for a few days. And boy was my stomach happy. We must have sat at the dinner table for at least 3 hours before doing anything else. It reminded me of a song by The Innocence Mission called "Where does the time go?" with a line that refers to "meals [that] last for five days." That is how it should be. Meals and other things are rushed and people so seldom spend real time with others, and though I am among the guilty, I want to truly take the time I am given and spend it wisely, being enriched and enriching others when possible.

The next day we went to Washington, DC to see a few sites. We started out our journey by visiting the Smithsonian Castle, where there is a smattering of objects that could be found in all of the various institutes that they have. We went from there to the Smithsonian Institute of Air and Space. Now I haven't been there in so many years, but I would go any chance I have, there is so much to see. Not having many opportunities, when I found out that they have flight simulators, I decided that it would be worth the money to try that out. It was. And I didn't even puke. It was made out to be like the F-18, and after a short time on a video game version, I was asked to completely empty all my pockets and deposit anything else I had that might become a flying object so that I might then get secured in the simulator.

wow.
That was fun. I had a hard time not rolling the plane too much, and several tanks met their end while I was flying upside-down, but I never crashed. Without peripheral vision of a horizon, and an altimiter that was hard to see, I became a little pale, but I had a great time.

Then we went to the Smithsonian Native American Institute, but unfortunately it was so packed with things to see and people to see them that it was difficult to really see much. I will have to go back sometime, as there are several really interesting exhibits there. So we went to Uno's Pizzaria! I miss that place. What more can I say about it.

For a look at some pictures from the month, go here.

This past week has been different from the others. I am working less at the office in which I was originally asked to work, and instead I am spending more time in a little town a few miles away helping out there. It has given me more to do, which is great, but it does make it more difficult to keep up with some of the things from the other practice. But my contract is up here in two weeks, so it doesn't really matter much any way.

I feel like this time out here has been good for me. I have been reading more simply because I have found myself with a lot more time on my hands. And I like reading, it's just that I forget it so easily and will go a long time between feasting upon some good paperbacks, prefering to subsist on fast-food tv and videos, which just can't be good for me.

The solitude has been good as well. It has given me a lot of time to think about things. Things that are important as well as not, but things that need to be sorted out. Sometimes we dwell upon things that are not important simply because we haven't had the time to think them through and realize it. The more I sort them out, the clearer the vision becomes for those that are important. As you have seen, the time here has inspired me to write more poetry, and for the first time to write it with knowledge that other would read it if I posted it. And the comments have been favorable enough for me to continue. I have written so many poems in the past that I hoped would never be shared except with one or two others, that to write for untold 5's or tens has been different indeed. I like it. I'll keep that up. Thanks.