Recharging: An Erstwhile Break from the City

A walk through the back fields...

 I don't get out of the city very much. Truth be told, I'm fine with that. I love my job, I have great friends, I don't lack for things to do, and I'm getting more work done than I have in ages. Truth be told, I'm in a really good place right now, as good a place as I've been since first embarking on the next step in my life back in December 2011.

Having said that, I needed to get out of the city.

The grind wears me down. Being surrounded by concrete day in and day out wears me down. The constant noise, the hustle and bustle, the having to be three different places a day just to get things done, the monotony of it all, everything combines to wear me down. There's a bunch of different stresses in my life that come from various places - taken all together, they really don't add up to a lot, and are completely manageable. (Like I said, I'm in a good place) But people take vacations for a reason, and I needed a vacation.

Cows in the rain...No fucks given.

Luckily, a free weekend isn't so hard to come by, now that I'm no longer beholden to a restaurant schedule (Work all the time or be broke forever!!!). Megabus is still not my bag, baby, but it gets the job done, and can be got on the fly for cheap. One $25 round trip ticket later, I'm set for a weekend.

Zorro and Evey Cat - pre-pounce.

I knew things were bad when I couldn't get to sleep the night before. The resulting fever-dream trip through public transit to the Megabus stop in the middle of a sudden snowstorm right out of the finale of It's a Wonderful Life didn't exactly set me off on the right foot either. Nor did the bus being half an hour late. Once it arrived, though, I slept nearly the entire trip home, which was fantastic. My brother picked me up, we got Chipotle, and it was home to see Zorro, my beloved akita.

I don't want to brag, but Jason and I won our first game 10-0.

Friday night was spent in the company of friends downtown, on a pub crawl with the Dayton Ballet, fresh off a performance of Peter Pan. Much fun was had, and the night ended at Trolley Stop, my favorite bar in Dayton, playing euchre upstairs with my friends Jason, Jessica, and Sara. It's my sincere wish that more of my friends played euchre in Chicago, though it remains a highlight of my trips home.

Saturday was spent with a semi-surprise lunch with my friend Bethy and her son Michael. It's great seeing friends whom I don't see regularly - even more so when there's kids involved, because I can watch them growing up in short installments. It's almost like an mini-segment from Boyhood (this blog isn't that deep, just a refresher on life being a heck of a lot more relaxing when lunch is a highlight of my day). That fulfilled one of my other necessities of a trip home - a Skyline Chili fix.

This picture was sent to me by an offensive party. Those responsible should know...vengeance shall be mine.

The evening was spent with a family dinner - my dad, my brother, and I grilled burgers on the porch and fixed up leftovers. Following that, my brother and I went to the Greene for a beer before seeing Kingsman: The Secret Service, a belated birthday gift for my twenty-five year old brother. It was a great time, made all the better by our getting to watch that killer Kentucky-Notre Dame basketball game right next to the Minnesota WILD beating up on the Kings. Oh, and the movie was fun, too.

Sunday was Quaker meeting, probably the best occasion I get to recharge and refresh my senses. While I enjoy getting to go to Quaker meeting and find it spiritually fulfilling, I do want to point out that I don't consider myself a spiritual person. As an agnostic, I believe more in centering the self through silent reflection and meditation than I do in communing with whatever deity you believe in. (Coincidentally, one of my biggest pet peeves is when someone tells me to have a 'blessed day' or that I am 'blessed'. The only time that it's okay to say the word "bless" to me is if I just sneezed.) Having said that, Meeting today was a good time to just sit and reflect upon a lot of things on my mind. It's not the highlight of my trip, nor the most relaxing, but it helped add to the overall condition of relaxation.

Sheer bliss.

The rest of the day was spent on a family lunch with my grandmother and a long truck ride with Zorro to pick up milk and eggs from a farmer friend of my dad. Zorro loves truck/car rides, and I look forward to that Sunday trip like few other trips in my life. The look of joy on his face when I pick up empty milk jugs to take with us is palpable, and the grin on his face the entire trip fills my heart with utter joy. At that moment, there is nothing on earth that can make Zorro happier than simply riding in the truck - that is literally as good as it can possibly get for him, and it is an absolute high. That kind of high is contagious, and is one of the best reasons I can think of to own a dog.

Waterfall at Fossil Creek

I also took several long walks through the countryside of the farm, including a venture down to the creek I've called "Fossil Creek" since I was five years old. I kid you not, I've been collecting fossils from down there for my entire life, and there's still nothing like discovering something new. Today, for example, I found just the third trilobite fossil I've ever found down there - they're the state fossil, but not at all plentiful in our creek. So, finding one was pretty cool.

I just finished doing some work for NCSA at home, and I feel ready for the next few months. I think I know more about what I need to pace myself in the city - looking into a nearby Quaker meeting might be a start. But there's really nothing like getting away from the urban jungle for a minute, even if it is just going home for a weekend. Here's hoping that the next two or three months will have infinitely less winter and infinitely more spring (i.e.baseball).