October was a rich month for me: the exciting and profound experience of traveling with Peggy, a lovely week with my parents in the land of my birth, an impromptu trip with my Tim to go visit College Boy Reeve in southern NM (then road-tripping with Reeve and his girlfriend for a couple of days.)
I didn’t get around to blogging much during October, but now that I’ve left it behind, a few blog-appropriate reflections have surfaced:
For optimal sense of adventure and exhilaration of discovery: predawn runs with a camera are highly recommended when one is visiting a new place—whether it’s the city sidewalks and pavement of Los Angeles (it was) or the quiet rural roads of southeastern North Carolina (which also was. Though since I ran with my dad, talking philosophy and solving the world’s problems as we ate up the miles, the roads were not so quiet).
For connection to one’s roots and a revitalization of the body’s sense memory: when you have the opportunity, be sure to swim (er, stand? Water was way low this year.) in the lake where you were born, even though the temperature might be a little more invigorating than you remember it being when you were young.
Ibid. Take at least one nap in the very same bed you slept in as a child. (While resting, sneakily snap a photo with your phone to send from bed to your sister in Ohio, whose matching twin bed is right next to you and who you really wish were napping in it right now.)
For future fortification: No one should be expected to deal with the impending onset of winter in the mountains without first having had the chance to dig her toes into the still warm sand of a North Carolina beach in October. (This particular beach is Ocean Isle, these particular feet having just run in the 30th annual Oyster Festival 10K run with those of her father, laughing and chatting—us, not the feet—all the way.)
For a sense of belonging: Lie in the sun and thaw out with your beloved fellow travelers after a few hours spent deep within the earth, exploring the 56-degrees-year-round Carlsbad Caverns—all sprawled out on picnic tables overlooking a desert plateau, before heading to the mouth of the cave at sunset to watch hundreds of thousands of bats head out into the evening.
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P.S. OK, goofy concept, I admit—but what else does one do with so many photographs from all over the country of one’s feet?
No,
you’re right. That doesn’t look like Santa Fe. And right now this doesn’t look like my usual day-to-day life. Peggy (Mothering Editor and Publisher 
It’s toy time at the Mothering house! Product Review Editor 
Photos, from top: 1) my favorite so far of the toys Bram has put together (dolls artfully arranged by Bram); 2) the UPS guy makes a delivery at Candace’s desk; 3) Candace at her desk, last week, surrounded by boxes; 4) Bram, stopping by several afternoons this week to do assembly, thereby proving that he got his dad’s toy-building genes, for sure.
dash away on their latest assignment.
Weekly Circulation meeting today. I don’t usually attend these, but since we’re discussing where we want to go with 
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