Day 2 - Friday, July 2

The rain finally stopped at around 5 a.m. I got up around 6, cold and wet.  My feet were prunes from laying in a puddle all night. Got up and around, poked my head out of the tent. Bear Creek had risen fairly high, high enough for Mom to have been up half the night worrying that we were too close.  I rummaged around in the food, and got a handful of my homemade breakfast bars. Yummy!  (The recipe was in the Marlboro outdoors cookbook, which I got free because I'm a fiendish smoker. Our camping gear looks like an ad for the tobacco industry, but hey, at least I got all this useful stuff.  I know I should quit, so don't even bother with the lectures. ) Anyways, this is the coolest recipe I ever tried. Brown sugar, molasses, oats, raisins, chocolate chips.....mmm, good.  If you can't tell, I don't cook from scratch very often, so to have something turn out this good is quite an event for me.

By the time I finished my second breakfast bar, everybody in camp was up and around, so we all decided to hike down the trail to see what we could see.  We headed across the bridge, which was high enough to not be underwater (thank Goddess!)  and up the hill towards Bliss, where we ran into Gary, stirring for his morning coffee. He said that Dragonfly had just gone to bed.  That woman is a workaholic!  Love ya, sis!  We stood around and chatted with Gary for a few minutes, and then headed down the trail towards OM Valley (see Kitchen Map). We got as far as the next bridge, which consisted of stones placed across the creek.  They were underwater, and the water was about thigh deep and moving pretty quick.  Someone had strung a line across the creek to keep balance with, and a few hardy souls were trekking across.  I had small scrapes and cuts on my legs, and open scrapes, soon to be blisters, forming on my feet, so decided not to chance going into the water. None of the rest wanted to cross, so we headed back to camp.  The trail was somewhat muddy, but not impassable.  That's as far into the gathering in that direction I got during our stay.

We had some quick lunch after hanging out for a while. While I was sitting, a red salamander (newt?) crawled across my foot and Cindy saw it.  I never felt the thing touch me.  Cindy has a fascination with creepy crawly things, especially small fuzzy rodents, so she picked the salamander up and played with it for a bit.  It was pretty cool.

After lunch, Cindy and I hiked up to Silvergate, heading for Owl's Nest, where we hoped to meet our sister Heather and her boyfriend Bob.  They had planned on leaving for Home Friday morning around 10, so we figured we'd wait up at Owl's Nest and guide them into camp.  On the hike up, Cindy got off the trail for a minute (nature calls), and found another salamander, this time black.  I didn't see it, but she was excited about so much crawling wildlife being around.  Me, I prefer animals that don't slither, but hey, that's just me.

We got up to Silvergate, and a pickup truck came along headed towards Owl's Nest. We climbed in back, along with a sister and a brother from Graceland Tea Mansion. He kept shouting "Elvis loves you" to everyone we passed.  Must be a Memphis thing.  Cindy shared some sunflower seeds, which they ate on the way.  It was a very pleasant ride in.

We got to Owl's Nest, went to the car for a bit more gear (can anybody say TOO MUCH GEAR), and a Pepsi that Mom had in her car (yum, warm Pepsi).  We took the big green tote that had most of my kitchen and bath gear in it, and stumbled over to Owl's Nest.  The same beautiful sister who had been there when we came in Thursday was there, directing folks, making sure that kids got sent in shuttles down towards Chicos, to head to Kiddy Village.  There was a group of brothers with drums having an impromptu drum circle, which was nice in a way, but sure made it hard for everyone to hear.  This time instead of one map being passed around, there were maps printed up and in a bucket for all and one.  We grabbed one up, and realized that we'd only seen about 1/8 of the gathering.  We really were in the "suburbs."

We met a really wonderful brother named Ian who was from South Africa.  His accent was so beautiful.  Cindy helped his friend put some sunscreen on his back, and wiped the excess on my arms.  Lucky me, I didn't put any sunscreen on the whole gathering, only some on my face Thursday morning, and I never got burnt.  I did get a bit of a tan, which is unusual for me.

We sat at Owl's Nest for about an hour, and by about 3:30, I was ready to head back.  I was just getting ready to tell Cindy that we should take the next shuttle back, when Heather and Bob showed up out of nowhere.  We'd been watching for their car to come past us to the parking lot, but minutes before they showed up, unheard in the din of drumming, Owl's Nest was closed for parking.  Full, I guess.  They started advising people how to park off the side of the road, all 4 wheels off the pavement (or dirt).  So many hugs were exchanged, and then we sat, after doing a happy dance, and waited for a shuttle.  One had come and gone while we were talking, and then another came and was filled by folks who had just arrived.  Darn, we were really ready to head back, but then....a VW bus came along, room for 4.  That's the ticket!  We climbed on board, me sitting on top of a stack of fresh off the presses AllWays Free.  We found room for 2 more, turned out to be the same brother and sister that Cindy and I had just rode up with.  Merry meet, again, and Elvis loves you.

A bit of chatting in the van, and suddenly we found out that the brother driving the shuttle was a concert whistler, ranked 3rd in the world by his own admission.  We were the awestruck audience of an amazing concert which consisted of classical music (Brahms, Dvorak {sp?}). It was the most brilliant thing, so simple and beautiful. The VW bus turned into a symphony hall, and I was whisked away by beautiful music that didn't sound anything like what happens when I purse my lips and blow.  Ah, the joys of gathering.  This is when I started to realize how very talented some members of our Family are.

We got to Silvergate, and there was applause all around for the lively concert.  We managed to score an AllWaysFree, gave the brother a big hug, and with some small dread at having to lug this unwieldy tote down the trail between us, we set off.  Bob was loaded down like a mule, but he had military experience with long hikes with a full pack.  Heather seemed to be ok, not too loaded down.  Just as we headed down towards the trail, a beautiful brother came up with an empty dolly. The dolly had "Bliss" marked down the side.  He asked if he could give us a hand.  Turns out he was supposed to meet some folks, and they never showed up.  Serendipity.  Roscoe, as the brother turned out to be named, loaded our tote onto his dolly, and we had a quick hike in, no worries.  If everything had gone wrong yesterday, it was turning out pretty good today.

We got back to camp, John and Mom had strung up the green dining canopy so that we could have some shade.  Heather and Bob set up their tent.  I was under the mistaken impression that the agr get-together at Bliss was Friday, so Mom and I headed up to Bliss to see who was there.  Walked over to Bliss First Aid with Mom, since that's where she wanted to plug in. We met Laurie Starfire.  I went back over to Bliss to plug in.  Dragonfly gave me a tour of the kitchen, explaining some of the "rules" as we went.  I washed my hands, and got to work chopping veggies for Living Soup.  Onions, cabbage, carrots, potatoes, corn.  I also was in a position to serve water while I was chopping.  Chop veggies, serve water.  Close enough to Zen for me.  I managed to chop up all those veggies without slicing myself in the process, quite a feat for me (I've got several scars on my hands from misplaced chops).  Wish I had brought my handy-dandy veggie chopper from home, could've done twice the veggies in half the time, but hey, I had fun and met so many great people while I was there.  I finally got to meet Rob, Hawker and Karen, Claw and Vicky, Sunlion, and many other folks.  All in all, a wonderful experience, and I'm so glad I plugged in at Bliss.  I got to help feed lots of folks, and thought of Strider the whole time, how much he enjoys feeding people.  A few bittersweet moments missing him and wishing he could share in my first gathering, but I'm sending him a copy of this, and he was there in spirit and in my heart.  We'll do National together someday!

Dragonfly was working on chili while I was chopping veggies, and when I got done with the veggies for soup, I helped her out getting the chili ready.  She added many things to the pot, but was not quite satisfied.  During this time, many hungry folks were hovering *in* the kitchen, getting underfoot.  I understand waiting for the food to get done, but when we were children, Mom would always shoo us out of the kitchen.  "I'll tell you when dinner is ready."  So many people in the way, not offering to help, but nearly demanding that they be served.  Guess what, I got to see the OGRE for the first time!  Not nearly as scary as I thought she'd be, but firm and polite.  Finally, the chili was pronounced done, and serving got underway.  I went back up front and served water to those who wanted it.  Enjoyed the sight (and near silence) of so many people gobbling up a fine dinner.

I went over to the dishwash station to clean up some dishes, and noticed that the water was cold.  Dragonfly mentioned that she needed a fire troll, so I yelled for Cindy.  She's the best fire troll I know (in my limited experience).  Cindy and Dragonfly got the pot of water over the fire to heat up, and with a few pokes of her stick, Cindy soon had a blazing fire going.  We were both admonished to NOT touch the pot that had the drop coffee in it.  I'm not a coffee drinker, but I know how it can be, so I steered clear of the area.  Apparently, someone else noticed Cindy tending the fire, and moved the coffee pot.  I then got to witness Gary being an ogre, which was perfectly understandable.  1/3 of a can of coffee and a whole pot of water, ruined in a moment.  My lesson was to never touch anything without first knowing what it is!  (And next time, bring my percolator to offer to Bliss.)

After dinner was served, I hung out in the Bliss pit, enjoying Roscoe's awesome guitar playing.  Again I was struck by the talent in the Family.  Ran into Ian (from South Africa) again, he was looking for the Rave that had been announced.  I didn't know where it was, turned out to be at Bus Village.  Cindy and I talked to him for a while.  He showed us a pack of cigarettes that he bought before he came, the warning label said "WARNING - Cigarettes can kill you".  I thought that was pretty blunt and to the point.  He said that he only pays about $11 (after exchange rate) for a carton of cigarettes.  He was very surprised that he couldn't find his brand (Peter Stuyvesant, I believe) in the States, since they're American made.  He left, off to try to find the Rave.

I headed back down to camp to get some sleep.  I could hear the music from the Rave, pounding and pulsating dance music until after dawn.  Since I love that beat, I had no trouble falling asleep.