Return to the Medicine Bow
I missed the garden. I missed my animals. I missed Eric. But oh - it was such a treat to escape the heat and chaos and drive up into the mountains with Emily for our second annual artist’s retreat.
June has been QUITE the month in the world as a whole - but it’s been off-kilter here at home, too. On the 1st, we got up early. We moved all our furniture and belongings to the middle of every room and moved our whole family in with Eric’s parents (and then, later, mine) as our house received some much needed upgrades.
First, we had the place completely re-wired. The electricity has been…funky since we moved in. And we knew it would be, even before we bought it, because it’s an old house and the inspection revealed that things weren’t up to code. But there’s just something unsettling about having lights not work for months and months and then suddenly come back to life like nothing happened. So, electrical was step one.
Step two was having insulation blown into the walls. When we added a ventilation system to my studio last summer, all we found was air space between the drywall and the outer plywood and siding. And we suddenly understood why it gets SO HOT in the summer and SO COLD in the winter. Why joints in our carefully painted wood paneling continue to move and crack. Why, in some seasons, doors won’t close. We figured if everything was going to get ripped apart to replace our electrical, now would be the perfect time to tackle this job too.
So between every two studs in every outer wall, at both the top and bottom, holes were drilled. The empty space filled and a little wooden plugs re-inserted to give us a base for repairs. Since moving back in, I’ve been slowly patching - but I’ve still got quite a ways to go before it looks like it did.
As someone who finds such comfort and safety in my home, it was interesting to be away while also beginning the journey of looking more deeply at my own constructions of self. We were with loved ones of course - but I didn’t have the ability to retreat into my work or into the studio. I’ve thought a lot about that discomfort, about how fragile I am that simply having to be away from my house made examining my own privilege seem more intense.
I’ve also been thinking a lot about the post I wrote on Instagram a few weeks ago, about how anti-racism work is akin to tending a garden. And I think it’ll get there, to that methodical and dedicated place someday. But I’d like to amend that line of thinking a little and say that, initially, it’s been a lot more like doing this work on our house. It was a loud, ugly, process that involved committing to ripping out the old so it could be replaced with new. And after all that, apart from the cosmetic repairs I still need to make, if someone walked in here they wouldn’t even know it happened. I mean, when was the last time someone came into your house and said “Wow, nice electrical! And, might I add, this place seems SO well insulated!”
Despite all that, though - despite it being work no one will ever see, it’s made such a huge difference. I can FEEL it - the way the walls stay cool to the touch, the way I’ve already stopped wondering if certain switches and sockets will work. Now we’ve got a foundation we can build on, knowing that the things that lie underneath are finally solid. I’m continuing to work on and extend these ideas to myself, too.
But now, back to the mountains and that much-needed time spent de-stressing and refilling my creative wells before leaping back into jewelry work.
Emily and I rented the same yurt as last year - and found our whole experience to be much the same while completely different, too. I think it’s mostly that we just knew what to expect and so getting there and getting settled felt like the most natural thing in the world. We had just the right amount of food. The clothing layers we needed (and not the ones we didn’t). A few choice art-making implements but not enough to leave us overwhelmed. Within an hour of arriving, we were out on the deck singing ballads to the local fauna.
A particular delight was coming across the remnants of a little environmental art piece we created last year (that I, of course, forgot to post when I wrote about that trip). We had carefully collected curved branches in the forest and layered them up to create a beehive form balanced on an old stump. Finding it this year as nothing more than a pile of branches was so exciting - both from the sense that it confirmed that WE HAD BEEN THERE but also because it left us wondering. How long did it stand? How did it fall? Someone’s kid or a dog, wind or the winter snow, a particularly gangly moose?
Our first morning, we took ourselves on a challenging hike up to an alpine lake. The altitude and the grade made the journey up pretty brutal - but the wildflowers were absolutely popping and the views in every direction were stunning. AKA, whenever we needed a break we had ample excuses. Indian Paintbrush and Glacial Lily were favorite finds as we made our way up the trail.
We forded icy creaks, hopped our way through boulder fields, sank up to our knees in snowbanks (wearing sandals, no less), and finally found ourselves in a rocky bowl that hadn’t yet fully thawed out after winter. And there we rested a spell, the sun soothing our aching legs and cutting through the chill in the air.
I will maintain that food prepared and/or eaten in the mountains is the most wonderful food there is. This was our mid-afternoon post-hike lunch : ham and cheese on Eric’s sourdough, cassava tortilla chips, and a giant handful of cherries. So simple, SO satisfying. We were also able to eat it while (sort of) looking at the place we’d hiked to. Straight up from that glorious sandwich, there’s a flat spot between two peak - just behind that ridge was the little lake where we’d been just hours before.
The rest of our time was spent lounging in hammocks, with our noses tucked in books, talking about things old and new, or (of course) making. And while I’m not going to say yet exactly WHAT I spend my time creating, here’s a little peak of something fun to come.
And so time slipped. The sun rose, laid it’s rays gently across the mountains, set. We even saw some stormy weather, too. In truth, I’d like to spend a week or two just sitting still and letting my eyes chase the shadows across this vista.
I missed the garden. I missed my animals. I missed Eric. But I hope Emily and I will get to head west again next summer and soak up a little more of this magical place.
