In which I find mangosteens and fireflies

I didn't fall off the edge of the continent. I haven't been eaten by the internship (yet). Time Warner and I just had different interpretations of what was meant by "The installer will be there between 1:00 and 5:00 on Saturday."

I now have 'net and all's right with the world.

Major events of the past two weeks are as follows:

The housing search ended with a one-bedroom apartment four minutes away from work. There was a brief period where I was in love with a three-bedroom house-with-yard in West Uptown; the landlord described the neighborhood as "a little rough." Which I was totally okay with. I was also okay with the fact that I seemed to be the only white person there, and sort-of okay with the fact that half the houses on the block had plywood over the windows and signs that said "Danger - Unsafe Property." Neighborhood in transition, right? What I was NOT okay with was walking Kadin around the neighborhood (to get a feel for it, y'know?) and having a nice middle-aged guy, sitting on his porch, ask me "Honey, what are you DOIN' here?" and immediately thereafter tell me (in the most surreal "fatherly advice" moment of my life) that I would get my house broken into or shot at (or worse) if I moved in to the neighborhood. Oh-kaaaayyy. Back to the drawing board. (That event sparked a whole lot of thought about race relations and socioeconomics and the Mason Dixon line and any number of other things that I simply don't have the energy to go into it here and now.)

So here I am in a generic plastic apartment complex. The commute is fantastic. It's within shouting distance of my budget. They allowed (with unholy sums of non-refundable pet fees) all three critters. Yes, every water-related fixture in the apartment needed repair or replacement when I moved in, and potty trips out with the dogs have suddenly become a major scheduling element in my life, but it's now home, and it will TOTALLY work for a year. Besides, my neighbors are awesome (Dawn brought me radishes from her deck-garden yesterday), my balcony kicks ass, and I found a fantastic dog-walker who comes to play with the boys twice a day.


I am now officially an intern, but totally don't feel like one. I'm supposed to be overworked and sleep-deprived, right? Apparently no one told the oncology department. I left the clinic at five today, and only stayed that long because I didn't think I should violate the "Thou Shalt Be In Clinic From 7-5" commandment on the second day. I start emergency overnights in three weeks, which should make up for this. I'm pretty much betting it's going to feel like being thrown into the deep end of an icy pool, sans life jacket. In the meantime, though, I love the clinic, and I'm looking forward to someday having (1) more responsibility, and (2) some experience and confidence to go along with it.

Sunday was a TOTAL victory day. I left the boys alone for four hours and they didn't bark once, per my neighbor. Xavier's stress colitis finally resolved (thank heavens). I found a natural food market. I finally found a place I was willing to trust with a haircut ('course, they were booked three weeks out, but I hear the shaggy look is coming back). I used Melissa's gift card to get some totally awesome jewel-toned drinking glasses (now I just need to throw a party). AND -- I found a hole-in-the-wall grocery store that sold Thai chilis and Kaffir lime leaves and effing FRESH MANGOSTEENS! My second time in two weeks making an idiot of myself in a grocery store. I jumped up and down. I gibbered. I all but shook the poor clerk by the collar asking where she'd gotten them. I said that last I heard, they weren't legal for import into the States. She smirked and said nothing. Great -- I've got black market fruit now. Homeland security's probably on its way as I type... [Found out later that the import ban was lifted last year. Apparently Asian fruit flies are no longer the threat they once were.]

I have fallen in love with North Carolina. Sure, I'm expecting a year of sleep deprivation and never seeing my dogs, and there are mosquitoes that need their own zip code, and if one more person warns me to lock my doors and windows I will scream, but the weather alone makes up for this. It's hot and humid, and call me crazy, but I love the feel of walking out my door and into a sauna. (I have central air. I can say this, and retreat to it, with impunity.) Plants actually grow here. (Try putting a ficus on your deck in Seattle and see how many milliseconds it lasts before flipping you off with a leafy middle finger and dying.) The tree frogs are deafening and the crepe myrtle next to my balcony is a riot of hot pink flowers; I think it's channeling Moroccan bougainvillea. The heat lightning cuts through night like flashes of angry instant dawn. Fireflies -- fireflies alone are enough to justify my having moved my life across the country.

New city scavenger hunt

I'm exploring home. Literally, this time, not some sort of metaphorical nonsense.

We arrived in Charlotte early yesterday morning; we'd made it as far as Asheville the night before. We came through the Smoky Mountains, which was a beautiful drive. I followed a car that I'm sure was Lola's cousin; it had bumper stickers for Obama '08 and some little indie bookstore, and I felt like maybe I was going to do okay here...

Home base for the house hunt was going to be a campground just across the border in S. Carolina. It was 100 degrees; we had just gotten the animals unloaded when the camp manager came over and clarified the pet policy: oh, yes, they allow animals, but the animals must stay IN THE VEHICLES. I suppose this is not a problem if you have an RV with air conditioning. It is a major problem if your two vehicles are a RAV4 and an old Ford conversion van, both of which are running Death Valley temperatures inside. Needless to say, we relocated to a different campground, one with a dog-friendly air-conditioned primitive cabin.

The housing search is going to be...interesting. ("Interesting." I think that's the right euphemism for difficult and full of compromise and feelings of why the hell didn't I get this taken care of earlier?) That was my chosen trade-off, though, for my unofficial 3-week internship at WSU, and some extra time in Seattle.

But the good news is, Charlotte seems to be someplace I'll be happy to call home for the coming year... on the rare occasions that I get to have a life, anyway. There are neighborhoods with hip little restaurants and shops. I found at least three promising taco carts.

I wandered, completely randomly, across an Indian grocery. I went in to check it out and literally started clapping my hands and squeaking with joy. Everything smelled so good. (This is what happens to me after four years in a place where I can't buy masoor dal.) I tried to explain to the man behind the counter why I was jumping up and down like an idiot in the middle of his store (just came from small town, love to cook, haven't been able to find the right ingredients, overjoyed to have the right resources again...). I'm not sure he understood a word I said, he just nodded, smiled, and looked bemused.

Next items: someplace that sells long beans and fresh bird chilis; a Goodwill; some decent live music venues.

The traveling side-show rolls on

I am no longer Taya. I have become my road-trip alter-ego, Stinky Girl. I put on my last clean traveling outfit two days ago, and have been sweating into it ever since. My shirt seems to be trying to return to its primordial soup-y roots; I think new life forms are developing somewhere in my vicinity. I'm fairly sure my skirt crawled away from me in the tent this morning.

I make a mental note not to stand too close to anyone until I can find a shower, and an industrial size container of laundry detergent.

We stop traffic now. It's like a little side-show. We pull up with my car and the dented van, smeared with deer blood and fur. My dad applies a new layer of duct tape around the plexiglass that doubles for a window. One by one, five large hairy dogs pile out of the vehicles, and mom and I set them up in a series of pens. (You try managing 250 pounds of dog going in five directions at once.) When I bring out the cat on a leash, the sidelong glances turn into outright stares. Today, one of the patrolmen at the rest stop watched us unload for a duct-tape-and-lunch session, his eyes getting bigger and bigger as the dogs and the duct tape and the pens and the cat all materialized. He strolled over, keeping a safe distance. "We've got a two hour limit on visits here. Just so you know." We'd been there twenty minutes. We nodded, smiled brightly, promised not to exceed our allotted time. I was sooo tempted to pitch the tent for the remaining hour and thirty-five minutes, though.

Lunch today was rice cakes, peanut butter, and tomato chutney. It is officially time to get off the road.

Missouri fails to play nice

I'm sitting in the parking lot of WalMart, which means the trip has sunk to a new low.

Also, I hate Missouri.

The last time I was here, I was meeting the family of my then-fiancé. Granted, the trip itself was fine, but everything that followed in the relationship left a bad taste in my mouth, and I've been viewing the Missouri leg of this trip with some trepidation. It's some sort of karmic superstition thing.

Strike one: we stop for gas outside Kansas City. A woman in a banged-up car and a loud tank top accuses my mom of backing into, and denting, her car. (Mom didn't.) Loud tank top won't take no for an answer, and I'm pretty sure she'd come out the better in a fight. I wander over... for what, I'm not sure. Emotional support, maybe. We extricate ourselves and beat a hasty retreat, wondering what happened to basic civility.

Strike two: Kansas City gridlock and interstate construction slow us down for hours. Hours of hot, horn-honking, exhaust-sucking madness. There's no way we're going to make St. Louis in time to pitch camp before dark. We opt for a state park just off I-70, only to find "road closed - no detour." We get friendly alternate directions from the friendly man at the friendly gas station... and wind up on a gravel road in the middle of a corn field. At this point, we're busting out laughing, because what else are you gonna do? We finally find the park, and it turns out to be quite nice, although filled with large and alarmingly friendly bugs. I consider giving Missouri a second chance.

We've been on the road an hour or so the next morning when my phone rings. Strike three has occurred. A deer who is either suicidal or in possession of a very poor sense of timing has launched itself at the van, obliterating the left side mirror and shattering the driver's side window all over my mom. We pull into the next truck stop to re-group. Once we assess that mom is shaken but not seriously injured, I think of the deer, and wonder if I need to do anything. It's like a Dr. Leathers exam question gone terribly, terribly wrong.

You're on a summer road trip in Missouri when your car hits a deer. You are traveling with standard camping gear, but no firearms, and you have left your captive bolt gun at home. The deer is thrashing and in pain, and the State Patrol is busy protecting us from terrorists. What are your options? Please cite the 2000 AVMA Panel Report on Euthanasia in your answer.

We lose three hours picking glass out of the van, transplanting the other side mirror, and hunting down some duct tape and clear plastic. (This is where the WalMart comes in.)

My animals are overheating, my mom has glass in her eye, and I'm 60 miles from my ex-future-in-laws. It's time to get the fuck out of this state.

Monsoon season in South Dakota

Someone forgot to check the forecast.

My folks are following me in their van, and I've got a tent; we have planned on camping all the way to North Carolina. It's June; I figure there's no problem. Even if we hit a summer storm, I'm a Pacific Northwest chick. A little moisture doesn't bother me.

The weather we get in South Dakota, though, is different. This is not rain. This is not cloudbursts. This... this is black-sky weather. This is semi trucks jack-knifed on the median. This is cows huddled on high ground in what's left of the fields. Cars are parked under overpasses. Lightning is in the air. Visibility is zero. This is weather that says "You have pissed off a major deity and if you know what's good for you, you will damn well start building an ark NOW."

A motel seems prudent. We're not the only ones who think so, and the first is full. As I walk up to the desk at the next flea-bag joint on the Sioux Falls strip, I pray for a vacancy. "You got a reservation, ma'am?" My heart sinks, and I shake my head. "Ah, that's alright, whattaya need?" "Two non-smoking rooms, one night." "Sure, no problem." Thank you thank you. But... "We've got dogs..." I say, my voice trailing off. "How many?" "Five..." Five big hairy fifty-pound dogs. I hold my breath, waiting for a debate on restrictions, number, size of animals. Please please pleaseplease sir, we really need a room, they're good dogs, I swear, and the weather's getting positively Biblical out there. He looks at me askance, but shrugs. "Okay. 131 and 135, down the hall on your left."

I could kiss him.

The menagerie departs

I have not done a test drive with all the stuff in the car. If I cannot get across the country with two dogs, one cat, and six houseplants, I do not want to know in advance. There is no Plan B. I have 45 CDs, a new power steering belt, and an unholy gasoline budget. I hope this works.

I start with Alicia's Up and Out mix, which (with apologies to Adam) is the single best mix CD I have ever received. It was a "come to Philly" bribe, and was intended for dancing around the house prior to a night on the town. Off-label, though, it's a kick-ass road trip collection. Playing it, I have the odd sense that Alicia's in the car with me. When I talk to her a few days later, I complain about not having time to write. I am afraid I will miss all this. She suggests writing while driving, but "just notes, and you have to promise not to look at the paper. DON'T LOOK AT THE PAPER!" She reminds me that she was raised in a guilt-ridden household, and will never forgive herself if her suggestion is responsible for my crashing. I promise to write, and I promise not to die.

This blind chronicling, with later transcription, makes perfect sense to me, and I'm reminded again of why she and I get along so well. We're the same kind of crazy.

The dogs pant in the back seat. The cat, amazingly, settles in on the center console and sleeps. The houseplants, for all I know, are planning a rebellion, but at least they are riding quietly. We make it to someplace east of Missoula before drawing the curtains on Road Trip, Day One.

Cherry trees, country music

Next stop: Margaret, my boss from my Primate Center research days. She is slightly eccentric, and very British, and neither one of these things captures her fully or explains the delight and frustration of conversation with her. Margaret is the only person I know who can cover, in one breath, something fascinating about rotaviruses, her husband's propensity for ruining tea kettles, and the intricacies of dealing with zebras in the front yard at midnight. (Her son lives in Kenya, which makes this less absurd than it first seems.) On this visit, I get an hour's monologue on the latest activities of the Native Plant Society, the most recent recipient of her considerable energy, which needs an outlet now that she's retired. This lecture comes complete with a field trip to the project site on the Burke Gilman trail; I learn which cherry trees aren't native, and have therefore been tagged with the Orange Construction Tape of Imminent Death. There is also, somehow, a seamless transition into a 20 minute conversational detour regarding the most recent academico-political developments in the UW's School of Public Health. I am grateful to be reminded why I got out of research.

I think Alicia is the only one who can appreciate the full magnitude of an afternoon with Margaret. Back at the lab, we had a "rescue me" code to extricate each other from conversations like this. One blink meant come back in five minutes. Two blinks meant "I'm about to crawl out of my own skin - please invent a PCR catastrophe for me to attend to..." I love Margaret, though, I really do. There's absolutely no one like her, and if I ever lose touch with her I'll miss her tremendously.

I finish off the night at St. Clouds. Four years away from Seattle, and I still get a hug from the owner when I walk through the door. In the 18 months before I left Seattle for vet school, there were probably only a handful of Monday nights that didn't find me on the last stool at the bar, doing considerable damage to the local liquor supply, and listening to yet a few more of Seattle's brilliant unheard-of musicians. It seems only fitting to spend my last night here. Besides, I have to explain to the boys why I'm not married now. They were going to play the wedding, after all.

The first set is a little rough; everyone's mind is somewhere else. By the second set, they've settled in, and the audience is down to me and about six other regulars. We sit in the candlelight and sing Townes Van Zandt songs at full volume. It's a perfect, comfortable moment, and the reason I came back week after week after week. It's like being in a friend's living room, but with more amps, and full bar service.

Tom (Tom B., as opposed to Tom G. of the boat and the Ballard condo) asks what I want to hear; I ask for a moving-across-country, not-getting-married song. I get Greyhound Therapy:

"I never said you tried to contain me
But I don't think I'll ever settle down
I ain't comfortable getting comfortable here with you
I need the sound of the wheels rolling on the ground"

We both smile when he gets to the line about "Busting out of here tomorrow morning..."

He buys me one last Chopin martini and I reluctantly head out. Six hours later I've gotta be on the road, seriously eastbound.

[PS - Tom's website here]