Camping and hike equipment GUIDE

One Saturday morning while staying with my sister-in-law in Houston, Hubby and I played glimpse-a-boo with our nephew on the couch.  We would say…where’d Kendall go?  Then….There he is!  and make known him under his blankie.  We, of course, tired of the game much more quickly than he did.  Being the canny three year old that he was, he covered himself with his blankie and shouted out…Where me go?  That sent us into another plain of peek-a-boo with a whole new twist.   The little quote has become a house applicable question for hubby and I…never failing to send us into a quite, shared cackle. 

This morning, sitting infront of the computer screen, with my big faux fur blankie next to me and the unbearable sense of settling down, after a long two weeks of running out early in the morning and only coming impress upon after the moon is high in the dark night’s sky, I feel like Kendall.  I playfully decorticate out from behind the keyboard to say… Where Me Go?  Hoping to hear the familiar voices of not-so-want-lost buddies in reply and waiting in anticipation of those new voices I have yet to receive. 

Hey Buddies.  Today is glorious in South Texas.  I don’t recognize what the temp in terms of numbers is, but I can tell you what it is in terms of sensation….which is what matters anyway in a position as humid as Corpus Christi.  The house still has boards on the windows from storm season which adds to the feeling of burrowing away in a cool, foggy cave with my bearskin fur (yeah the symbolic one…not a real one). 

The aroma of cabbage and turkey bacon fills the air.  It is waiting in the oven for my roommate to gain from shopping.  We are gunna settle into my little cottage and bake today (the pong of freshly ground cinnimon wafts in from down the hall…..ahhhh).  Tonight we will shape a fire in my husbands great grandmothers cast iron cauldron.  She used it to make soap in…back in the day.  But we build fires in it and be watchful for the embers glow like stars in its belly.  Friends gag that it is a witch’s cauldron.  I don’t mind, it does have a funny feeling magical.

The season’s favorite sweater hangs on me by the skin of one's teeth big enough to feel comfy but not so big as to lose its coziness.  My legs are hugged in yoga pants fit for affecting from a big nesty bed to the cafe where I will inevitably find myself with a latte later in the day.  No makeup, lately the blush of relaxation and cool air. 

Then the big question for a South Texas Winter…you recognize how cold it is according to what kind of shoes cover your feet.  Well?  Sandles.  That is the dreamboat of Texas.  Sure my toes are nippy but not uncomfortable.  I fall forget in and out of my platform-esque slip on’s to walk the fresh clay revealed after 49 years of hiding beneath the surface of a walk that leads to the front door (the city is giving us a new road, replacing some of the driveway, all the sidewalks and drainage systems).  That dross…cold and old, but freshly revealed.  It’s pleasurable.  And my toes happy.

I have about ten days ahead of me with only minimal obligations to others.  What will I do with all that measure?  This is the time I think of as Illuminata Days.  It is the nevertheless when the days grow shorter and darker in anticipation for that time when a new jolly comes into the world.  And whether that light comes in the way of stories of the Christ babe, in the honoring of that time when the oil kept burning after the desecration of the temple, or totally in the recognition of natures turn from darkness to light…. (confirm out this list of winter festivals   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catalogue_of_winter_festivals  for a more complete idea of all the many, beautiful ways the people of our planet celebrate at this time of year) ….my Illuminata Days lend a hand to focus me on what is important to me during this hustle-bustle season. 

I get quiet.  Sit with a crowd of magazines.  Buy a Saint candle….strip it of all its allusion…and begin adding images, phrases, bits and bobbles that cause to remember me of what is important to me.  That candle gets lit occasionally during the season, but takes a set of honor everyday until January 21st (my mother’s birthday and the anniversary of the evening when my Hubby proposed).  It keeps me on trail.  Helps to settle me when things get crazy or I feel the chaff of commercialism and obligation take over.  It’s my pre-Thanksgiving “ceremonious”.  Join in if you’d like.  ANd pass on a pic of your candle if you do one.  You may find a way that works even happier for you. 

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