I found a wild thing and a produce stand/bakery in my suburb!

These things did my heart wonders today . . .

Entered into my most beloved and sacred topic of conversation this afternoon: the kind regarding photography.

Walked into a precious local produce shop that was until this day completely hidden from me. It is only a few blocks away from my apartment; they sell homemade soups and fresh baked breads!

Heard a yelling match between two squirrels in the icy trees.

where do you find wild things or bakeries in the suburbs

“When despair for the world grows in me, and I wake in the night at the least sound in fear of what my life and my children's lives may be -- I go and lie down where the wood drake rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds. I come into the peace of wild things who do not tax their lives with forethought or grief. I come into the presence of still water. And I feel above me the day-blind stars waiting with their light. For a time I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.”

Wendell Berry

the trek to witness history in action

what is this WINTER that tortures me so?

I've been thinking a lot about weather lately. Perhaps because the transition was hard to ignore, from a foot of snow and ice in Salem to the hot thunderstorms of Kampala to the icy cold and bleak of Philadelphia.

Did you know that people outside of Europe and America dont identify with all four seasons? Ugandans told me they only distinguish between the rainy and hot seasons. What fortune.

Apparently I am not cut out for cold winters. To begin with, I am a bit naive about what cold is. I got off the plane in NYC in my flip flops. Unfortunately, my connecting flight to Philly had been canceled and I was left to my own devices, and insufficient winter clothing, to get back to my apartment. I can't tell you how many people gawked at my bare feet. I kept telling them I had just come from Africa and they seemed to be satisfied. But what I really wanted to tell them was that I have grown up in a place where winter does not mean you cant just throw on a pair of shorts and flips to grab something from the car in your driveway. Perhaps there are 4 and a half days during Salem's typical winter where it would seem ridiculous to do such a thing.

In this weeks forecast the high is not rising above 27 degrees. Tomorrow the high is 15. (I might be less dramatic about this temperature if I wasn't walking 3 miles every day back and forth to school.)

Some funny things that happen during winter in less temperate climates like the Northeast:
-people have to think about climbing snowbanks.
-the roads and sidewalks are a chalky white from the de-icing material - adding to the winter wonderland look. just don't get this chalky white on your clothes from climbing snowbanks.
-there are people who are employed to plow roads rather than the city just relying on volunteers.

Let me just leave you with this last picture. I wanted to be warm today. So I dressed in two pair of sweatpants, three sweatshirts, a knit hat, and mittens. This seemed to suffice until the wind picked up. No amount of clothing can combat this wind. So I began to jog home. I think I looked a little like Rocky. I'm going in true Philly fashion I suppose.

stateside again

I'm feeling a bit rummy from the travels and the drastic change in weather but wanted to at least share a few pictures.

dubai and uganda album

the river nile and kampala