twenty-three years/twenty-four moves.

My things are all packed again, the boxes neatly lined up next to my bed in my room, waiting for another move, this time number twenty four. It has been awhile since my moves have surpassed my age, but it has finally happened again. I should like to move a little less now, but that is not in my hands.

When I move I examine all my things, turning them over and trashing or giving away what I cannot use. I did this over Christmas at my parents house, and now I am doing it here in Detroit, though I have learned simplicity and own far less stuff, so I have less to give away. Our new house is tiny and we will have to move through the house weekly and remove the clutter that builds up while living, so perhaps that experience will help. There is little storage, which will force us to be creative as well.

I am tired of moving, exhausted and overwhelmed by ownership, of carting my things from place to place like a restless, sleepless nomad.

So again I move, and again I will move, always, always. This is a great blessing, and a great burden.

I don't believe I will ever stay still.

The most and the least of it...

There is at once so much and so little to say. There are great changes stirring in my life, expected, lifelong anticipated ones - a first house, a marriage, a second cycling season, perhaps a new category. (I got a new one in mountain biking last summer, this one would be for road.) Still, I am only on the cusp of these moments - this part of winter is all anticipation - and not in them. My life moves on in it's even rhythm, the days breath in and out with sunrises and sunsets. I go to work, I go to the gym, I go home, I go to sleep.

Life, it seems, is just like breathing. It is steady, ignorable, and often not recognized, but when it is gone, harder, easier, gasping...well then you really pay attention. And that is just now it is.

***

Next weekend I will be heading back to Milwaukee to pick up my Fiancee and all of our worldly possessions (or at least those we think we can fit into our new, tiny house!) and move him and them to Michigan, where I have been living with out him and them since July. I have been living simply here - I own a spindle bed, a desk, my clothes and bikes. I miss my books terribly. I miss my treasure trove of antique furniture that I've hand selected through the years. I, most of all, miss the comfort, warmth, security and laughter that Jon brings to my life.

***

He makes me laugh.

I have no sense of humor, really. Very little makes me laugh but somehow every time I see him he has me rolling with the deepest most healthy laughs, tears rolling down my face. This is one thing, among many, I appreciate about him.

***

We are moving, perhaps, to the country. A combination of a terrible Detroit job market along with a providential find of a tiny cottage on a lake in our price range is leading to this decision. Jon needs to be able to look at cities other than detroit for work and I am in love with this house.

I send the lease tomorrow. We, Lord willing, will move in on Feb. 1st.

The house is very tiny, no more than a shoe box, but it is beautifully done inside and we are allowed to paint, renovate and make whatever changes we want. The lovely landlady is allowing us to keep some of the furniture in the house, including a beautiful antique hutch and some of the more modern pieces. I am thrilled with it and already have a 'honey-do" list of painting and home improvement projects as well as the task of finding diminutive furniture to fit the house's proportions . We will even have a washer and dryer!

The house is 45 feet from the water, has a boat lift, and is one of 6 houses on the all sport lake. right now there are cross country ski paths criss-crossing it. I will be doing lots of open water swimming and we are planning on getting a kayak or a canoe as well. There is space to garden and bee-keep and two huge decks overlooking the water.

***

I finally taught my first spin class. The instructor never showed up for the Wednesday class and the class asked me to teach the spin class so I complied. I gave them two five minute intervals with five minute recoveries (it does take some of the people in the class that long to get their hear rates down!) and then one Psuedo-climb of seven minutes that included two "breaks." We had no music so I did a Q&A session about cycling with them. I taught them about anarobic and aerobic work and about what sort of bikes to buy. I also explained to one person that no, you don't put disc brakes on a road bike.

Other than that I've made it outdoors twice this week, for about an hour total. My knees cannot deal, for whatever reason, with the shimano pedal system and I have some different pedals to try out. The first day I drove the hour it takes to get to a place I can ride, made it twenty feet and my seatpost collar was stripped and wouldn't hold the seat up. Bummer. I can't wait to live in a place I can just get on my bike and ride, without the hour drive.

***

And as always, everything is beautiful.

Winter Hiking

I had planned to go hiking for the first time this winter, and it just so happened that another mountain biker was determined to brave the foot of fresh snow falling on the roads and paths in the woods as well so we went together.

It was great to meet someone new, and enjoy the beauty of the outdoors. We both brought our cameras and took a brisk walk through the woods that was punctuated by picture taking.


The first excellent thing we saw were a flock of wild turkeys. There were about six or eight of these giant, rather ugly birds.



Photo credit for above photo: L. Turner






Self Portrait in the woods with the help of a handy fencepost acting as a tripod.


Photo credit for above photo: L. Turner

A smidge of an update...

My life is involved in a lot of planning right now, which means there isn't much doing. I had a blissful week or two spent at home in Wisconsin recovering from a pretty nasty case of what-have-you but it's nothing permanent and I'm back on the bike. Well, not the real bike anyways, the fake bike in the spin class at the gym, or the real bike hooked up to a trainer, or even the fake video game bike they put in at the gym where you chase a little video game cyclist around. I tried it for five minutes once after my weights and it seems sort of promising, maybe.

But here's the low-down:

- I'm planning a wedding. To the best man in the whole wide world. For serious. I kid you not! This wedding planning thing takes up a lot of time.

- I am racing my bike, but only when I'm sleeping at night. I'm starting to have bike racing dreams, so I must be forgetting that it sometimes hurts, like when you have to go faster than you think you can go, or when you crash. Or hook your way too wide handlebars on a tree. Any of those other bike things hurt but I haven't been on a real bike for so long that I seem to have forgotten them.

- Aside from sleep racing and wedding planning I am working. I like working a lot, but my job is sort of slow right now. I am getting a great grasp on Michigan politics though, and it is infinitely interesting. So yeah, I like work. And working.

- It's snowing. Still. I want to go hucking in downtown detroit but I fear slipping on snowy wet marble. Maybe I should go to canada and ride my bike where I expect to have to ride my bike in the snow, because, you know, it's canada.

- and lastly, God is good. Because he's always good.