My Life's Ultimate Passion

Contra dancing is the thing in life that I am most passionate about. I don't know if I have ever loved a thing so much. Last night Brandon and I drove up to Montpelier for their regular contra dance. The caller was Nils Fredlund (who is possibly one of the best callers ever and sometimes plays his trombone with the band) and the band was Atlantic Crossing (who played phenomenally). Apparently Atlantic Crossing got their name because one of the fiddle players lived in New England, and one of the fiddle players lived in England, so when they played together one of them had to cross the Atlantic. Then they got married, and he moved here, so the name is not quite so accurate anymore.

In comparison to the Norwich contra dances, the Montpelier dance is in a smaller hall and has more people show up. Also, I think the average age is much younger, and they are more lively and energetic and not as much about traditional New England folk dance, like Norwich can tend to be. Don't get me wrong, I love my local Norwich dance, but I just love the Montpelier dance in a different way. It is fun to see a lot of the same faces in both places too. And despite the fact that I have not been sleeping enough lately, my tiredness will never keep me from dancing every dance. Contra makes me feel alive to the point of keeping me awake for hours after the dance has ended. Perhaps it has something to do with the sense of community established in a contra dance.

Plus the other highlight of the Montpelier dance was seeing some of my old favorites who I hadn't yet run into since my return from the North. One is Miss Bailey, who is my 5 year old little contra buddy. At the break we sat on the floor and talked about Pirate Booty and this pirate movie she really likes. When we were sitting there chatting this other little girl came up and started chatting with us too. Her name was Maya and she is 9, but she will be turning 10 soon. We share the same birthday. Also her skirt was from Bangladesh, where her stepfather has built homes for poor children where they can get food, shelter, clothing, and education. He has built homes in Nepal and two other places also, and Maya has visited each of the places once, except for Bangladesh where she went twice. Also, she is home schooled, so missing school to travel to these places is not even an issue. Even the kids I meet at contra are some of the most fascinating people around.

Then I danced a dance with Bailey, which was a little challenging, but tons of fun. She has been contra dancing for longer than I have, so she knows what all the moves mean, but she just needs you to remind her what to do and when, and to make sure she is in the right place. The great thing about contra is that it just repeats, so by the end of it I would say, "it's your turn to do a star!" and she would come back and say "now its YOUR turn to do a star!" which was really cute. Plus most people get a kick out of dancing with her, so she inspires a lot of smiles. Unfortunately, I think some people thought she was my daughter because she usually only dances with her dad (who is one of the men who prefers dancing in a skirt). It was worth it though, because I just never see any kids these days, so it was good to get my kid-fix and my contra-fix all at the same time.

All-in-all it was a spectacular time, and I don't know why but I always manage to have way more fun than I ever thought was possible. Plus on the way home I learned about the musical highway which I think is amazing.

Paradise for Two

So I thought it would be a good idea to invent a blog to keep track of my month long work trip in Virginia. Then I realized I already had a blog, which makes things so much easier.

Yesterday I left the barn promptly at 7:30 am, which was no easy task, since I did manage to get to the halloween party and I also managed to have a pretty good time and probably stay up too late. I had to stop by Hanover for my fish and coffee, and then I was off. The drive was long and uneventful. I have this sweet rental car. It's an Impala. It has leather seats, seat heaters, xm radio, and a huge trunk, which is much needed for all of the stuff I have with me.

I have with me:
13 boxes of lab/research stuff
2 suitcases
1 backpack
~4 bags of other stuff
6 seasons of Gilmore Girls
8 books
my fish
1 sewing machine
and a slackline.

The trip was nicely uneventful. Once I thought I was going in completely the wrong direction, but it turned out that I wasn't, which is good because I wouldn't have had the opportunity to fix it for about 20 miles. I drove over two huge bridges. The first one had signs posted saying something to the effect of:
Life is worth living
and then there was a phone number to call if you were struggling with life. It made me really sad to realize there was a purpose for them being placed where they were.

Anyhow. I arrived at my Paradise for Two earlier than I had expected. I got here right around 6pm. The place I am staying is this little apartment flat which is connected to the house of Jim and Jean, who are lovely people. I've only actually met Jim so far, but I had been emailing back and forth with both of them before I arrived. The place is really great, even though I am here alone and it was advertised as "Paradise for Two" (but at least I've got my fish with me). I have my own little deck that looks out over the water even.



I took this picture this morning after getting 11 hours of sleep last night.

And here I am, in the afternoon of day 2. This morning I went to church with the locals and then did a little grocery shopping. Jim gave me some coffee beans yesterday so I could make coffee this morning and everything! I got back and went for a 2.5 mile run which was my longest ever with no walking. I feel pretty good about that.

Also, I did not find any Pirate Booty in the grocery store. I really want to buy some of this stuff, so if anyone knows where I can find it let me know. I might just be looking in the wrong section of the Food Lion.