day twenty-three: artsy+crafty

I like living in Seattle, even though lot of artsy crafty young people are departing towards Portland or Austin, Buenos Aires even. But really, I can use the leg room, and D and I are pretty good at joining revivals. So I'm anxious to see where the city goes, and when things turn around again will I, then firmly in my thirties, choose to care?

Speaking of artists, here's my birthday present from D for my thirtieth. I didn't know what I wanted, nice sheets with a high thread count, or a thick, 80's digital watch with a velcro band, or feather on a roach clip for my hair (like the ones carnies wear!) were all the gift ideas I could think of. But then I saw this painting by Aaron Tucker, an old acquaintance from Indiana, and took the plunge. I love how it's just bright enough, but all quivery.

day twenty-two: changing what you eat

A gross sketch of the contents of my kitchen, a decade ago versus now.

day twenty-one: sukr kava limonada

In Europe, everyone is so quiet when they eat. We found this place in Prague, Sukr Kava Limonada, that already was so away from all the tourist stuff, but inside it was like each table was set endlessly away from the next, and each chair was a silent plant, so imagine what happens when you sit down!

day twenty: moving closer

The closer I come to my 30th birthday, the more excited I'm starting to feel. Which is totally surprising me. I can't think of anything I'm leaving behind, expect maybe good intentions, incomplete projects, and lots of slept in beds. Sometimes, when I can't sleep, I imagine every bed I've slept in for more than two week's time. You should try making your own list--no matter how old you are, it makes you feel like your life has already lasted for miles and miles and miles.

Slept-in-Beds (two weeks or more)
Childhood bedroom Indiana
Basement guestroom (with termites!) in aunt's rowhouse Bridgeport, Chicago
Mint in the backyard, oatmeal in the mornings grandparent's house Indiana
Sun tea on the porch, watermelon in the creek lakehouse Sturgis, Michigan
Dorm rooms, various Indiana
Haight-Ashbury Victorian, summer internship San Francisco
10th and Waverly walk-up, across from Nine Lives Bookshop Greenwich Village
NYU dorm, by the farmer's market Union Square
Loft above the Civic Theater with a huge vintage vault, Green House with slugs in the garden, blue house by the river Indiana
House by the arboretum, house with rats in the basement, co-op by the doughnut shop, Seattle

day nineteen: L'chaim

I'm pleased to report that women I've seen in Germany and the Czech Republic eat food, don't seem to exercise but walk everywhere, and are healthy, average sizes! I haven't been to Europe since an August in Spain five years ago, and I'd assumed before coming to Prague that--to hell with early Spring snow showers--women here would surely be walking around in white spandex tights, heals, and terry tube tops, just like the women I'd seen in Seville.

Could I live here? Yes! The Frye boots, the sweaters, colorful Israeli scarfs, and women with real asses trotting down the little streets. L'chaim, to life!

day eighteen: towels and clouds

When you're flying to Prague and Stevie Wonder comes on one of those looping airline radio channels, close you eyes and bam. You're a kid, sit-and-spinning, pogo-ball-jumping on the shag rug in your living room. There's piles of unfolded laundry all around, and you pop off whatever you're bouncing on and dive into a mound of warm towels, just out of the dryer.

After you stay under for a little while, you lift a towel from your eyes, and you're somehow below the clouds. The whole of Europe is land-locking you in, which is surprisingly the safest feeling ever.

day seventeen: feeling swoony

Eating the end of a very crunchy peanut butter cookie, about to start on my mint tea in the window seat of Bakeshop in our Prague neighborhood. There's a big bowl of sugar lumps in front of me that look like tiny, snowy meatballs. A man next to me, a tourist, hides his camera low in his lap, picks it up when he thinks no one is looking and snaps photos in irregular heartbeats.

I used to collect sugar packets with my friend Amanda, who lived a few hours away from my hometown, in Detroit. We used to mail letters back and forth often. Each time I'd go to Big Boy, or Denny's, IHOP, whatever diner or restaurant, I'd grab a sugar packet and write where I was, with who, what time of day it was, on what occasion, that sort of thing. She did the same, and we ended up sending dozens of packets back and forth in letters. On a trip to my house a couple of years later, we brought all of our sugar packets together, read the notes we wrote on each one, and tore enough open until we had what we needed to make a cake.

So if you can imagine a sugar packet in your mind, let's say Sugar in the Raw with that nice brown color, here's what I'm going to send you:

Bakeshop, Prague
29 years, 357 days
All alone
Feeling swoony