Harry Potter.

Today,July 31, is Harry Potter's birthday. Do something dorky and Harry Potter related today. IE, watch a HP movie marathon (*ehem* Chris).

Journal Series, part 2: 10/5

Dearest E-Diary,

How’s it goin? [Yes, I did just ask an inanimate object how it ws doing.] Back in school again. Lucky it’s a short week, or I think I’d explode! I seriously think I’m going insane with all this school work. I am still really lost on this math poster, but, hey! What does it matter? I’m going fail math anyway. [I didn’t fail math that semester.] I’ll also be failing Spanish [I didn’t fail Spanish that semester either…]… and Language Arts [nor did I fail Language Arts that semester…]…. And Social Studies [nor Social Studies.]…. Ughhhhhhhh. It is seriously all I can do to keep from running over idiotic Gilgamesh with the family car. Unfortunately, that would cost me 9.97. Almost worth it…. [I’m kind of tight with my money, you see.]

Spent [wasted] more time on the PostSecret Archive today. No more archive anymore! I have read them all. I don’t know what I’ll do tomorrow after school if I ever finish with my homework besides write in you, dear diary. Guess that’ll be all I have time for.

Yesterday, I didn’t get a chance to tell you what I did that day. Mom had her birthday on the second; I’d say it’s her least favorite day of the year. She always screams at us. I hate her birthday, too. We’re all doing our best to spoil you rotten Mom, I get it! Anyway, she spent an overnight in Cottonwood with D [her best friend who I dislike] without us. Hope she had more fun than usual. When she got home, she sure was grumpy. She always hates coming home to us. We ended up going to --------[a local independent bookstore]; Mom was totally pestering me to come to the grocery store with her, so we ended up with ------- and --------. Mom pestered [yes I do like the word “pestered, whatever gave you that impression] me about my skirt (It’s not that short!), and I left them at the teen section. [blah blah blah insert stuff about intolerance, books, and mean people here] I spent 30 bucks at -------- a whole month and a half’s allowance! It would have been more, but luckily I had my 5% off Kid’s Card and $10 off because of my reviews. [If you review a book, they give you like 2 dollars off your purchase.] Otherwise, I would have had some problems in my piggy bank. [I don’t own a piggy bank, you see- it is a problem.][Insert about 3 paragraphs on how intolerant people are, how much I hate stupid people, and where I call everyone unthinking wretches, then close by saying how intolerant people are. I’m a bit repetitive.]

[I’m also going to cut out my closing sentiment, because it makes no sense.]

Celly

PS. [Insert a whole 8 paragraphs on Wizard Rock (wrock) which I discover at this point.]

Journal Series, part 1: 10/4

Dear diary, or e-journal, or whatever I should call you besides just “new diary,”

It’s nice to be able to type up my thoughts. It makes it so much faster. I’ve always actually hated writing. I just love expressing my thoughts through it.

Spent the entire day watching TV and working on my science project. It looks pretty cool, but not nearly as cool as some of the others Mrs. K showed us. I also spent [wasted] some time on the PostSecret Archive. It’s so strange how there can be some secrets that make me absolutely sick and some that are so similar to me, they make me wonder if it’s me actually writing them subconsciously. I hate the comments people post in on the archive site, though. Almost every single one makes me sad, and almost every single one is cursing at the writer of the secret. (“Insensitive [minimus of hidering knotgrass made]! How could you say such a thing!”) This is why people don’t tell their secrets to physical people!! Because you can’t stop criticizing them for long enough to realize that they’re about to commit suicide! Gosh. Dummies.

Anyway, I have been home sick with the H1N1 virus (swine flu! Get out your surgery masks!) for almost the whole school week. I got reeeaaaallly behind on school work. On Friday, I ended up taking two science tests and a couple of other tests, too. Bleh. I totally freaked out in LA, because I totally forgot we had a test on our vocab words. I hadn’t even opened my vocab book all week! Mrs. A lectured me in front of the entire class, but it turned out ok, I guess. I get to take it on Monday at lunch, instead, anyway. (I have to take a math test, too, I think.) That’s good, but it totally made me lose it on Friday. I was worried I would bite a big chunk out of my lip. [Yeah. When you’re obsessive like me, and you bite your lip, you can get close to biting it off. It’s a real fear.] And of course, right after that I seemed to have lost my lunch box, which made me even more freaked out. I always put it right at the foot of the stairs by my locker so that I can pick it up after school instead of right after lunch because I don’t have time to put it in my advisory between classes, y’no? No one has ever messed with it, ever since I started doing it in fifth grade. And then I come out on Friday after LA, and it’s totally vanished! I have to go to Mrs. T [the head of middle school], and she lectures me, and I end up feeling way worse than I did before. Strangely enough, when I come back, there’s my lunchbox (And there’s C, [my old best friend who I am no longer friends with] too, but I don’t think it’s a coincidence.) Lame. I mean,iIf you’re going to take my lunch box, just take it. It doesn’t stay closed anyway.

I really lost on my math project. I hate math, and Dr. C makes it confusing. I wish I had Mr. D again. I wish I didn’t have to even take the effing [Yeah, I’m pretty sure I thought I was English back then] subject. Number systems are lame. I should have done my project on something easy, like Roman numerals, or Pi, or something I didn’t have to think about. I wish math was like that, too… Just recopying out problems, not actual thought. I hate wasting thought on mathematics. [Don’t waste your time telling Little Me that mathematics are important. I don’t want to effing hear it.]

I came back to school just in time on Thursday to see the Shakespearean play “A Comedy of Errors” as performed at the ---- Arts Center. (Mom played outside there one time; I read that book “Heir Apparent” by Vivian Vande Velde and sold CD.s [My mom plays piano and has her own band and CDs.]. Then we went to Subway and I got a really dry sandwich.) The play was fine, I guess. We had just finished studying the book, so that would make anything lame. [Or awesome and easier to understand.] The actors were good, and the set was ok, I guess, but it seemed to me that the director added in more humor and violence, and skipped/changed a lot of the original Shakespearean dialogue. What’s the point of a Shakespearian play in Shakespearian old English if you don’t use original Shakespearean phrases? Huh? {Yeah, huh? HUH PUNKI?!]

I thought it was really lame that the people behind me were being so rude to all the people who worked so hard on this production. The whole row of people from our school behind me were fast asleep with their heads on their laps. I mean, at least be a little bit secretive about it! And the people in front of us were texting! NO PHONES IN THE EFFING [Yes, effing again.] THEATRE! Gosh. Deal with it for an hour and a half. I bet you won’t explode if you don’t text for an hour and a half. At least E was watching. She may be a rude little religious girl, and she keeps asking me about my religion and won’t leave me alone, but she is pretty attentive in school.

The bus ride home was the real show. It was so hilariously crazy, even if they were kind of laughing at my expense. W asked me out twice. He’s such an idiot. (And now he’s in the hospital with head issues!) And then S asked me out, just because it’s so crazy for someone to ask me out. I know that’s what it’s about. I don’t need you to tell me otherwise. I hate it when people do that. And B just wouldn’t leave me alone, and then he asked me why I hated him. Hmm…. Maybe because you’re being a total doofus, that’s why.

Goodnight,

Celly [actually I didn’t sign it with my pseudonym, but with my birth name, but I don’t care, kay?]

Journal Series.

Well, I’m going to make a whole series of blog posts now, and give you insight into my mind… years ago! When I was younger, and my laptop was brand new, I liked to use it as a little diary. I’ve actually had a diary for years, on and off, but now I just sort of use the blog instead. Sometimes I write in a journal, but not often. Anyways, I used to write all the time for about a month, so I’m going to edit some of those entries up a bit, make them readable, take out names and boring things, and add some notes. [You’ll know it’s a note if it’s in brackets like this!] So, enjoy, I guess.

Servant of the Little People. (fiction)

Wind buffeted the dry, powdery snow. The dark outline of the small, wind-blown figure on the horizon blurred as the sky, mountain, and air turned slowly to an endless, ever-moving sea of white. Shivering and struggling, Morganna made her slow way up the terribly steep mountainside and began to fill with despair as she came to the realization that she may never complete her quest- may never find that which she sought.

As these thoughts, long suppressed, surfaced, so did her weariness. Sinking to her knees, Morganna lost all desire to continue. The snow piled in drifts around her huddled form as she kneeled, still as stone and just as cold. Thoughts and memories swirled in her head like the snow, but her face remained blank and emotionless. Morganna had learned to keep her feelings hidden and her mind guarded when she had served the Little People. Few humans were “gifted” with the ability to see the Little People, and fewer still ever visited the Faerieland, where the People lived when not playing tricks or “helping” peasants, but Morganna had lived in the Faerieland for longer than she had lived in the land of her birth, doing their bidding and performing whatever chores were given her.

This life had been hard on Morganna. More abused than a normal servant, even in a family with a cruel master, her back was crooked and bent, hands rough, bare feet hard as hoofs, cracked skin, numerous cuts and scrapes, even though she was but eighteen years old. Only recently had she been dismissed from service and left to find her own way in the human world with nothing but body, her freedom, such as it was, and the clothing she wore. Slaving away since she could walk, and nothing to show for it but pain, and horrible memories, and dreams long forgotten. She had longed for freedom for so long, and now that she had it, the world was bare of all she could remember as good and wholesome.

Time passes differently in the Faerieland than in places where humans live. She had been stolen from her human family when she was still in the cradle, but even then, her mother should still be alive. Her father, too. Perhaps even some of her sisters and brothers had survived childhood, although the childhood death rate was high. And yet, before she had left, one of the People had spoken to her with cold laughter in his eyes.

“You came to us but eighteen years ago in the time of Faerie. In the time of the Big People, everyone you knew, and all their sons and daughters, have long since died. No one now remembers you. Slave girl, you must move on from here, for you are of no more use to us, but the Outside will be cruel to you, and I see Death in your future. We shall not speak again.”

And so she was truly alone, deep in a snow filled, silent world she felt she did not belong in.

The Aftermath of War. (fiction)

Burned, scabbed, bruised, and desperately thirsty, Celina fled the scene of the violent battle as though her life depended on it- which it very probably did. Within minutes, the women of the enemy would come out on the field to gather the dead, identity their wounded, carry back to camp those they would be capable of saving, and stab each and every living enemy left to death with viciously sharp knives. Celina had no idea how she had survived, when so many of her companions, commanders, and friends had died all around her. Nothing more than an ignorant peasant desperate to help her people and avenge her beloved brother, Celina had committed a dangerous crime, and one that had been almost suicidal. Taking clothing, dagger, bow, and scant armor from her dead warrior brother’s possessions, Celina had left her long, straight red hair in piles on the floor of her family’s hovel and joined the Army.

Now, she saw, it had, indeed, been a foolhardy idea. For weeks Celina had travelled with the Army, making tentative friendships, falling into place, practicing with her dagger and bow whenever possible. All girls in her country were trained in defense, but war was different to be sure. Hand to hand combat was bad enough, but the roar of the battlefield, the spray of blood, the screams of the dying… it struck fear into the heart as surely as if Death itself had driven his ice cold sword deep into one’s chest. She shivered now to think of all that had passed in the last few hours. The terror of her companions’ faces as they fell to enemy blades filled her tortured brain, and she knew she would remember the shock and pain, the hands scrabbling feebly to staunch the blood, the last gasp of each soldier she had witnessed fall, be they friend or foe.

Shivering, Celina tried to clear her mind of the terror of watching her friends die as she stood by. There had been nothing she could do, she knew, but still… the dishonor… Celina’s pace quickened as the first wails of wives and mothers of the enemy drifted to her on the wind. To be caught alive on the battlefield by the grief-stricken widow or tear-stained mother of one of the dead… it was a fate that would be worse than being struck down in the height of battle. At least there death was quick.

Reaching the eaves of the Forest at the edge of the field, Celina felt that it was hardly better. As a churl living by the ocean, this was one of the first times she had ever ventured into a forest. The darkness, even when the sun was bright overhead, or the moon shone bright, as it did tonight, seemed unnatural. No light shone through the branches, and growls and creaks seemed to issue from every dark shadow. Surely she could not be the only survivor? Surely someone friendly was out there… but if they were, they must be cowards and deserters. It was dreadfully dishonorable to flee from the battlefield, especially while the brave fell and died undefended. And yet, it seemed she was the only soldier of the Army not lying crumpled, dead or dying, on the field. Would the women go into the forest to search for deserters, as well? Better to travel as deep into this foreign forest as possible. Better to face the beasts and magic of the Forest than to die at the hands of a wailing lady torn by Death. How many lives were now left broken? How many families, how many mothers, wives, sweethearts, children, sisters, brothers, aunts? How many people were now left to pick of the shreds of their tattered lives?

The thought, more than the cold dampness of the Forest, made Celina shiver. Was Celina’s life so much better? Her hair, a sign of honor for women of her culture, was gone. She could have no respect, now: only slaves, convicted criminals, and pleasure women lacked hair. Her family would have disowned her for taking the guise of a man, for stealing the belongings of her brother, for failing to die in battle after doing these things. Her family was left to sew up the threads of their lives, and she was no longer part of them. And Celina herself? Everyone she knew was either dead or as good as dead to her. Alone in the world in a land far from her home, in a place of magic and darkness and strange foul beasts, Celina had nothing. No family, no hair, no home, no life. She was worse than a slave, for she didn’t even have a master. All she owned was a heart heavy with dread and grief and sorrow, and that could hardly lead her far in her new life.

Lost from Memory (fiction)

`My first memory is comprised mainly of darkness, and cold, and a tight constriction in my chest as I flailed for the air which seemed so utterly far away. They tell me it was four months ago I struggled to breathe in that frigid river, and my savior had come in the form of a chubby teen as pale as a cave fish. How I had gotten into the river – and pretty much everything else, for that matter- is a complete mystery to me. The few things I have remembered from the time before the hospital are these: the name Anaxandra, drowning in the river, and books. I know not whether Anaxandra is me, or my mother, or a friend, or a name I merely took out of a book and stored in the back of my brain, but that is what I am called now, for I have no other name to call my own. The river I have described to you. As far as books go, well, I remember reading them. Hundreds of them. I remember plots, main characters, places, how I cried at the death of Dumbledore, how afraid I was for the hobbits as they crossed into Mordor… and yet, I do not recall where I went to school, my mother’s name, how old I am, or where I lived. And, of course, all of these memories surfaced weeks after my admittance into the hospital.

Therapy takes up much of my time, although my time is not particularly important as it is. I am shown novels of all kinds (many of which I recognized immediately), and faces of all colors and shapes (none of which I have recognized yet). I am made to fish, dance, do gymnastics, sing, and eat various dishes in the hope that any one of these activities will trigger a suppressed memory. None has yet helped. The doctors are beginning to give up hope, especially as with no relatives or money, I cannot –pay for treatment. I know that as soon as I am recovered enough, I’ll be sent off to be adopted. Still no relation can be discovered. I know not whether I had no living parents or whether they merely do not care about me enough to find me. I prefer to believe the first.

People are frightened of my lack of self, and so avoid me once they know what I am. So often I will be on one of my many minor excursions into the outside world in search of memory when someone will ask me about myself, oddling of a person as I am. With dark red hair highlighted with purple cascading in a waterfall down my back tied under a kerchief, blue-grey eyes, square rimmed glasses, usually witty shirt, plastic Time Turner, bag covered in buttons, laptop covered in stickers, and, of course, the ever present wheelchair, also highly decorated, (I would need one for the rest of my life-the fall into the river had not done wonders for my health) made people give me a double take, for I am not the sort of figure common in a small town like the one the hospital is located in. In fact, I am often surprised that there are any people left to question me, especially as few ever come back after their first encounter. I try to be polite, but it rarely ends particularly well. For example:

Stranger: “Hello, I’m George, what’s your name?”

Me: “Uh…. Anaxandra.”

Stranger: “Nice to meet you, Alexandra.”

Me: “Sorry, it’s not AL-exandra, it’s AN-axandra. Most people get it wrong the first time.”

Stranger: “Oh, that’s an interesting name, what nationality is it from?”

Me: “It’s Greek, actually.”

Stranger: “Is your family Greek?”

Me: “I don’t know.”

Stranger, laughing: “What do you mean, you don’t know?”

Me, sighing because all my conversations end like this: “Well, I was in a horrible accident in which I almost drowned, but I survived, however, I can’t remember a thing before it. I have no idea who I am, where my family is from, what my name really is, or anything else about my old life. All I can recall are the events of the last four months.”

Stranger, no longer laughing: “Oh. I… see. Well, goodbye then!”

And then they run away, and I continue rolling around town, feeling more lonely and lost than ever. I am told to consider myself lucky to be alive, but I must wonder- is someone truly alive if they have no identity and no sense of self? It frightens people because they see themselves in me- they see their own lack of self, I think, and see what they could be if they forget their history. I suppose I’m a sort of warning to them, but I’d prefer to be one of them than to be a warning.

Soon, I suppose, I will have an identity- another orphan up for adoption, like a puppy no one wants. Someday, I shall have a new life, and my old one may be forgotten, but for now, I’m stuck in limbo. This is both exhilarating and terrifying. I can create for myself a personality, recreate myself in a whole new place, with entirely different people. I can be who I want to be.

An Introduction to and an Obsession with AVPM.

So, for those of you who aren’t aware of this fact, A Very Potter Sequel comes out tonight. Actually, by the time I post this, it’ll probably have already come out. Which is TOTALLY AWESOME! I bet some of my non-existent readers are right now saying, “But Celly. Did you just say A Very Potter Sequel? “ And others of you are saying “A Very whatsa-WHOSITS? And to that my response is, “Who’s Celly?” Oh yeah, right. I’m Celly. Anyway, A Very Potter Sequel (AVPS) is the sequel to A Very Potter Musical (AVPM) which is a fan made, parody musical of Harry Potter that was made by some students at University of Michigan. And it’s really, really quotable. So, if I say anything that doesn’t make any sense to you, it’s probably from AVPM- or soon, from AVPS.

Since the Harry Potter series has kind of come to an end (although I’ll be the first to say that Harry Potter will only truly be gone when none here are loyal to him), we’re all looking for something to keep up the Harry Potter spirit- DH part 1, WWoHP, and AVPM. It’s really, really cool! I love it so much.

So, AVPS premiering on YouTube today is a huge deal. I naturally prepared in the way I would for any Harry Potter related event- I listened to some of the books on tape, I put on my homemade Harry Potter shirt (Slytherin Pride/ Not All of Us Are Evil), got out my time turner, made a necklace in Slytherin colors, made a necklace that says “Harry Potter” on it, made Harry Potter medallion necklaces kind of like the ones on MuggleNet crafts, made a cork Nargle repelling necklace, watched one of the movies (HBP), listened to the soundtrack of AVPM all day, sang along really annoyingly all day, wrote “I must not tell lies” on my hand, drew Draco’s homemade Dark Mark on my arm, painted my fingernails green (I had no silver), and made two new AVPM related shirts- “Dumbledore? Pfft. What an old coot. He’s nothing compared to RUMBLEROAR/ He’s a lion, who can talk.” And “You think killing people will make them like you, but it doesn’t. It just makes people dead/ Okay is WONDERFUL, Quirrel!” I commented on Average Wizard, wrote stories for Average Wizard, changed my Facebook status, commented on StarkidPotter’s wall, screamed about it to all my friends, changed the signature on my cell phone from “Luna Lovegood” to “Starkid Potter,” retitled all the programs on my laptop with Harry Potter n ames, and was generally totally awesome… and annoying. I’m kind of like that all the time, really.
NOTE: So, AVPS came out a couple days ago, and I saw it, and it was AMAZING, but I didn’t have enough time on the internet to post this beforehand, so I’m going to post it as soon as I get internet, even though it is way after the release date.

AVPS.

Oh my wizard god. THAT WAS FREAKING AWESOME!

Car trip, part 2.

I’m baaaack. Did you miss me? No, you didn’t, because this is going to come up on the blog just seconds after the first post. But just remember- hours have passed.
I didn’t manage to sleep after I talked to you last, nor did I read. I did, however, text pretty much everyone in my phone and listen to some music. Then of course there was some more family fighting, and we played Botticcelli for about 10 minutes (it’s like 20 questions, but it’s just people, and you have as many guesses as you want). I always get in trouble because I pick obscure historical figures- Lady Jane Grey, Nicholas Flamel (he was a real person, I swear it!), Hatshepsut, Akhenaten, Phillip II… you know. So this time I picked easy people- Alan Rickman, Elijah Wood, Orlando Bloom, Marian Anderson, Helena Bonham Carter, Tamora Pierce, JKR, JRRT. When I play with contemporary people, it’s really easy to guess, since they’re all either related to LOTR or HP. And then there’s Tamora Pierce, of course.
Well that ended in a fight, as it always does, and after that, no one talked much for a while before we stopped in a little tiny desert town for lunch.
Burger King doesn’t have much for me to eat.
I still have a headache.
My mom’s pretty sure she lost her keys.
I think I’m going to go deaf with her shouting and screaming at us.
All the Rest Stops are closed because of lack of funding which means no stops until we get there.
Oh my wizard god.

Car trip, part 1.

Back on the road again. I’m typing this in Word because it’s kind of hard to get WiFi connection in the car, and even when you do get it, there really isn’t enough time to type a whole blog post. But I can still type- or at least until the battery dies out. So you can get semi-constant updates on everything that’s going on in the cramped backseat of our Honda Oddyssey van. It’ll be like your own mini family vacation! Yay!
We’re hardly out of the driveway, and already we’ve stopped 3 times.
My dad’s tone in quickly mounting to something near shouting range. It won’t be long before we get the typical full flung argument where no one can storm off or go cool off or anything, because, we’re stuck here! I’m trying to avoid the inevitable argument by putting my headphones in and generally ignoring all warning signs. And using my laptop, of course.
Mom’s phone rings- again. Would it be possible for her to put text messages as vibrate, or do they have to make that annoying noise every time her friend says “Okay good?”
And- oh hey, what are the odds? We’re stopping again.
Just came back from a giant super grocery store – I won’t say the name, in case they’re only located near where I live. We’re equipped with snacks – the usual stuff, like a box of Oreos (unfortunately, we couldn’t FIND DoubleStuffs, since we’re not Hufflepuffs, so I’ll have to be content with shouting “Accio non-DoubleStuffs!” or something) Chex Mix (Traditional), a gallon of orange juice, pineapple squares, and 6 bell peppers. What do you mean, you don’t eat whole, raw bell peppers when you’re driving most of the day? Crazy people. You should try it sometime, they’re delicious in the car, don’t leave a lot of mess, and are healthy, and crunchy! I just finished a red one, in fact. Yum.
Anyways, I have a headache. A really bad one. And I don’t really want to do anything right now but just stare at the road in a lethargic state until my brain comes back. I might do just that in a minute, in fact. Either way, I’m not really up to listening to the whole soundtrack of AVPM, which is what I really wanted to do. *sigh*
Oh, lookit! My parents are fighting. Again, what are the odds? And we still haven’t left town yet. They’re ignoring each other now, which is kind of hard when one’s navigating and the other’s driving.
I’ll probably try to read a little, even though I get sick when I read in the car. I always do, anyways. And then I’ll eat, even though I’m not hungry, and maybe sleep, and then stare out the window with my headphones in but no music playing for the rest of the afternoon. Hooray for car trips! At least tonight I’ll get to watch AVPS from my aunt’s studio late tonight. Well, I’m really not supposed to watch the whole thing, because I’m supposed to get some sleep, but I’m going to anyways, even if I have to stay up all night. And I mean all night. Anyways, goodbye! Don’t make any loud noises, please!

Sleepwalking.

I suppose I should mention something that affected my trip pretty significantly, and something I do often. That thing is, as you might have guessed from the title, sleepwalking.

I sleepwalk, if not regularly, than fairly often. And even when I don't actually go anywhere in my sleep, I often sit up and say something. For example:

At girl scout camp: "I was petting it and now they want me to eat it!"

At home, after my mom came in to check on me after I had been shouting quite a bit: "A bucket was chasing me around the backyard." My mother asks, "In your sleep?" And I reply, "No." And give her this odd, eery smile before falling back asleep.

There have also been times when I've merely woken up with random objects- a paintbrush, a teapot, a potted plant, the iron...

And, the odd occasions where I actually communicate with others. One particularly memorable event involved me getting up, walking into my parent's room screaming, shouting "I need a pencil! Help me! I need a pencil!" Of course, my dad responded, "You don't need a pencil, dear, it's the middle of the night!" Already very grumpy, I say, "I'll take a stinkin' pen then!" and grab the sheet out from under them, carry it to my room, drop in on the floor, and climb back into my bed, where I promptly drift back to sleep.

However, the most terrifying and potentially dangerous nighttime escapades I have had have been the ones where I'm actually trying to go somewhere, and all of them have been while I've been traveling.

The first such adventure took place in Washington D.C. I was staying in a hotel with my parents, and my grandma was just down the hall. I was in a separate room connected to my parent's room, closer to the door. As my mom tells it (I don't remember any of this) I got up in the middle of the night, and she, fearing that I was asleep, walked to the door to check on me. And good thing she did, for I was in the process of unlocking the door to the hall when she stopped me. Curious as to what she thought I was doing, she asked me where I was trying to go. My response? "I'm going back to my bed." She asked again, and told me I couldn't go back to my bed, since it was hundreds of miles away. I told her again, "I'm going back to my bed." Finally, she pulled me back to the hotel bed and pushed me into it. Stern, she told me not to leave it again. "Now, you're not going to leave again, are you?" "No, I'm not allowed to." "That's right. Now stay!" In the morning, I had no recollection of this at all.

The most recent happened this summer, night 7, at Trinity Camp, in the Grand Canyon. For those of you who don't know each and every camp in the Canyon, Trinity is below Phantom Ranch, and is down in the dark, black schist. It's deep, and narrow, and rather scary, but very, very pretty. It's a kind of small camp, so space is limited, and people are all around you, no matter where you camp. This time, I actually kind of remember leaving camp, as you might remember a dream when you woke up- unzipping the tent, climbing out of my sleeping bag, carrying it with me, and setting out in search of something. I went downstream first, still most likely asleep, and didn't stop going downstream until I woke up, still scrambling. It was a little bit before I realized what was going on, and started to panic. Wouldn't you? I went downstream some more, unaware of where I was, before deciding camp couldn't be down in those huge boulders, and I headed back upstream. I think I must have gone right through camp (above where everyone was camped) and past it without noticing, and I ended up far upstream of where I should have been. Then I really started to freak out, and I stopped on a rock and tried to figure out where I could be. Then, realizing I must have passed camp, I turned back around and was heading in the right direction (or so I hoped), shouting all the while for my parents, for anyone to help me. No one came, and I had just decided I would curl up in my sleeping bag and wait for morning when I saw a flashlight, and my dad came to help me. I was on top of a huge water polished boulder, maybe 20 feet up, without a light, or my glasses, or shoes, or anything but a sleeping bag over my shoulders. I was, however, entirely uninjured. I was helped back to camp, and for the rest of the trip was forced to sleep between my parent's paco pads for fear that I would leave again. Any time I sat up, my mom tackled me to the ground, and I was had to shout "I'm awake, I'm awake, i just want some water!" to keep her from pushing me back to the ground. I must say, it was one of the scariest experiences I've ever had, and one of the scariest for my parents, too- waking up to find my paco pad empty, no sign of me, in the middle of the Grand Canyon. Oh, and did I mention, my pajama pants were soaked up to my ankles? I had been ankle deep in the river.

Grand Canyon.

Okay, today, I'm going to do a post with... *gasp* pictures! Which is really, really rare, because I'm trying to keep the internet safety level up to a maximum, here, and also keep everyone from seeing how horrible I look in photos... /:'



This is my cute little camp site on one of the second night. I've got my little purkle paco pad (which I'm going to sleep on in a few hours), my big blue bag (where all my clothes and my sleeping bag are), my ammo can (which has everything else I brought on the trip in it- my toothbrush, hairbrush, reading books, headlamp, etc.), and my swimsuit and some assorted junk. This was such a cute little spot I just had to take a picture. Of course, with 16 people camping on just one little beach, there's not much privacy- if you look in the upper left you can see someone else's camp site.



This is at North Canyon, the next morning (Day 3), and that's me.



Here's the Little Colorado. Isn't it a lovely color?



This is Day 9, at Elf's Chasm. And yes, that's me in the pool.




The pool at the end of Blacktail Canyon.



The falls at Deer Creek.



The view from a very, very steep, dreadfully hot hike.



Havasu.




One of the rare times we had the opportunity to relax. I'm the short one, with her back to you, wearing white and purple and black flip flops.

Introduction to a true Grand Canyon trip.

When I think of a boat, there's a lot of things I see in my mind- sea kayak, canoe, dingy, rowboat, Montana pram, sailboat, houseboat, catamaram, and a big, yellow raft, among others. This is due, of course, to my upbringing in the house of a river guide. I don't even consider a motor "boat" to really be a boat- more a tourist trap, and an amusement park to those who consider themselves to be "outdoorsmen." No offense to those of you who have motor boats of course.

So, when I say I went down the Grand Canyon, I don't mean I went on a comemrcial motor boat trip. This wasn't any week long endeavor, where the guides point out the sites, help you with the hikes, serve lunch, clean out the groover, make dinner, do dishes, and steer the "boat." This was a river trip, 16 days long, 226 miles, and if you can't help with dishes, and cooking, and if you can't hike, and swim, and purify water, and set up the kitchen, and carry bags off the boats, and sleep in the sand with no tent, well, you're screwed.

This ain't no picnic.

Summertime.

Well, it's been almost a month since I last wrote, but, I'm sure you know how summer is. Time flies, and trips are planned, and packing,and school assigned reading, and endless hours of boredom in which you know you have better and more interesting things to do but you really don't want to do anything at all and you end up just lying on your bed in a state of lethargy, thinking about all the things you should be doing while summer passes by.

So, I mean to be writing, but I never do. And of course, I was gone for 18 days in the middle there. I suppose I should tell you about it, and I suppose I should have told you about it before I left, but, as I said, things get away from you. Anyways, I went on a Grand Canyon trip, which is really a big deal, and I had a lot of fun, but I'll tell you all about the trip in another post.