both hands

For some reason, it seems like everyone I know is tired lately. What's up with that? Is it the change of seasons? The pollen in the air? All I know is we're all acting like we're about ninety years old - everyone from my kids to their teachers to our neighbors... Maybe it's not necessarily a bad thing, though. Maybe we're gathering our energy and strength for the months to come - months that are shaping up for my family to be full of baseball games and barbecues, horseback rides and hikes, visits with family and friends scattered far and wide...and let's not forget home improvement projects (which promise to be ongoing, possibly for years). But it's okay. There's not much I'd trade for our little house on our little acre, especially now that the spring bulbs are sprouting up along with the red hot pokers and new buffalo grass.

I was blessed with an awesome hike with some cool chicks down in Sedona last weekend. We did the Brin's Mesa trail, which involved a drive in to the trailhead that was shockingly reminiscent of the Indiana Jones thrill ride at Disneyland. I didn't feel like schlepping my camera along this time (which I, of course, regretted as soon as we set foot on the lovely trail and were immersed in all that wildness). The halfway point is an outcropping that affords a 360 degree view of Sedona's famed Red Rocks. Vortices and rock cairns abound, as do cacti and some surprisingly lush greenery - even a creek or two to cross. We ate lunch, sunned like lizards on the mesa for a while, and then headed back toward home, stopping at a Sedona watering hole on the way. Oh, we got some yard sales in as well. All in all, a lovely day spent with the girls.

What else? Oh, yeah. Wanna laugh and cry? See Young at Heart. I added it to my NetFlix queue on a whim, and I was so glad I did. Never seen anything else quite like it. Reminds me a bit of what Eddie V. has to say in one of my favorite Pearl Jam songs.

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a place in the clouds, a foundation of stone

A dear friend and I hiked The Bell Trail last Friday. While downtown Sedona and the Village of Oak Creek may be chock full of fruits, nuts and flakes (just like a good gorp), the outlying areas around the various plateaus and otherwordly rock formations are nothing short of sensational. Okay, yes, you can still probably get mother nature to cleanse your chakras and/or fluff your aura by visiting one of the many vortices in the area, but if you're just looking for a good, basic day hike (as we were), then the azure Arizona sky is the limit. Here is what you see at the start of the first climb, heading toward the rock:

We found that March is a great time to make this hike, which is largely in full sun. Get too far beyond April and it's no doubt a scorcher.

Here are some lovely, hearty, trailside agave (I think). Any botanists out there who know better, feel free to correct me. 

And here's the rock as you pass right by and look up:

Our halfway point was a rushing creek fed by the intense run-off from all the melting snow up here in the high country. Not a bad place to have lunch, as we discovered:

Of course, now we're hooked and ready to do more. And I can't think of a more fitting way to celebrate the beautiful, sunny months to come here in our state of wide open spaces.

:-)

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