The chess match of small towns

Poker faces (and reputations) are harder to hold when the stares never break.

Living in a small town is like living in a world of only older brothers and sisters, where everyone is listening and watching and reporting to mom (mom being whomever stands before you).

As the quiet one in the room, it’s unsettling to always be seen. Eyes aren’t necessarily bad, but the sense of being on constant display grows tiring. Us wallflowers drift to corners for the sake of getting lost in the background, to take a breath away from the spotlight.

Unfortunately, when stock gets low and the public demands news, the world can’t help but keep you stuck in rotation.

In games of social hierarchy, some paths are chosen for you simply by association. All generations have a web of complexly woven relationships with full moons and new moons amongst each other, and sometimes the new guy gets tangled in between.

Other times we run victim to social imagination — where people assume to know “people” so well, claiming they can see right through the “mask,” only to be stuck speaking ill truths while convinced listeners carry the messages to the spotlight.

The only thing left to save us is our character,

(should we be so lucky to be seen for our light).

from my desilvering mirror

I put my mascara on in front of an old dirty mirror. Though actually it’s more romantic than that, because it’s not dirty in spirit. She’s aged and antiqued, living a severe case of de-silvering. She’s got generations of time serving reflections, in cold damp Copper Harbor, where moisture always finds her way in. These days I can run a dehumidifier, but as her spotty tarnish will show us, air control wasn’t always her story.

Looking into it feels like a 1940s movie scene, it’s all grain and blur. I often think of the other girls who stood before her in earlier years, touching up before facing the day (only to step out into the same outside world as me). The mirror provides enough visibility to see details of yourself, but it’d be trouble to count your eyelashes one by one. My routine before her is inevitably quick, for why bother straining your eyes on anything at all.

Our age is rich with quality, pixel by pixel. We’re all on micro-focused display, it’s really no wonder we’ve all grown weary of age and wrinkles. Meanwhile, who hasn’t said “I love pictures of myself in film,” because of course, it’s beautifully grainy and just right.

year after year

Ah, here we are again. I speak mostly to Northerner’s when I say: how does it feel to be half-thawed?

Year after year, around this time, I’m always so surprised to meet myself again - yet she does not come willingly. The more I talk of these things the more I hear, “me too,” or “I’m thankful I’m not alone.” The sirens of winter creep up and grab hold our roots.

Much like the trees who are only just beginning to bud, we spend early spring lifeless and bare like late November… well, they must grow and heal what can’t be seen before considering blooming. Us too.

Years ago, sometime around my junior year of college, I read an article that you likely recognize - one concluding that cold weather countries have the happiest people in the world.

Having first read this in February of my third winter, well, I was flabbergasted. Never mind the signs of my sun-starved bleakness, a deep depressive condition that we all sort of wear come February in the North.

I remember thinking “It must be Italy, Greece, or Morocco with the happiest people in the world,” Do you see the bias in my words? Sun. A different kind of north-country-dreaming.

And yet, here I am at the end of my ninth winter, and I have come to see the irony.

Anyone who lives in long, harsh winters, knows just how beautiful the world is when it melts. We relish in each and every warm spring day, to the point of feeling day drunk and hopelessly in love with spring. It’s like heartbreak and falling in love, year after year.

Winter, no matter how beautiful, freezes us alongside the rest of the world. Many things become a bother, especially winter’s chores, and each day outside feels like a grand feat. A foreign concept to our summer selves, who hardly blink after 16 hour days outside.

The closer we get to the poles, the more extreme our sense of solstices becomes. There’s something simultaneously balanced and chaotic about a pendulum with a heavy swing.

the glory of spring

I live for this moment… this moment right here. I wish I could bring you here, too. Together we would lay, nestled into the driftwood cluttering the shore. Sun kissed we would rest.

There’s no greater silence than the silence of sitting in the sun. Somewhere deep in our bones, our biology feels at home here. There are no woes that the sun can’t melt - if but for a minute.

And if it is only a minute, let us waste no time at all - silence your voice. quiet your mind. yes. you must - focus on the wind. Breathe with it. Listen to the melody of Lake Michigan. Hear the chatter from the birds. Search the landscape for the sounds of ice breaking off into the water. Let yourself break off, too. I’m not one for meditation, not really anyway, but I promise your body will take the wheel while your soul rests here. If but for a minute.

The glory of spring is this.

an ode to the little things

“IF YOU CAN ENJOY THE PRESENCE OF A CAT, A BIRD, A FLOWER… WHAT CAN I SAY, ALL THE WORLD WILL BE YOURS.”

I’ll be the first to say it: sometimes I’ve got to take the time to remind myself of the little things. Winters are never easy on my heart, and my need for little things to love start growing sometime in November. The holidays blur on by and come January, usually lost in some sort of socially exhausted form of myself, I sit in a still world of white.

My love for coffee first grew in winter. In need of something warming, my college roommate said, “want a cappucino?” At the time I didn’t know lattes from espresso from cappucino, and neither did they, really. A microwaved cup of milk and a little single-serve packet of instant later, we were looking out the snowy window with steam emanating from our cupped hands.

Like all things that are good, short and sweet, it became a little ritual the two of us shared. Something we offered when we noticed the other was in a dark corner.

There are times in life when we need to collect all the little things we possibly can. It is these same times, be it transition, hardship, loss, or the blues, where we cannot allow ourselves to cut any corners. No shortcuts. Because we deserve to treat ourselves good, and we deserve the help we can offer ourselves. While something like a cup of instant-”latte”-in-the-middle-of-winter might not seem like a lot, what is the ocean but a multitude of drops?

It takes some figuring to identify what little things matter to you. More than figuring, it takes observation. To live life as usual, but recognize when your eyes open a little wider and maybe your heart skips a quarter beat because of-course-i-love-croissants, or breakfast-for-dinner?! these are the minutiae that suffice as little things.

In honor of little things, should you be too unsure or too lost in the sea of blue, I have my own set to recommend in the meantime.

• a cup of something warm: in order to follow the rule of “no shortcuts,” whenever you do come to pour your cup of tea/coffee/hot toddy/etc, you must truly sit to enjoy it. In all reality, to enjoy a full cup, even in the slowest of forms, we’re only budgeting ten minutes at the most. So I will hear nothing of cup-on-the-way-to-work or guzzled-down stories. No shortcuts. Find your chair, your window, favorite cafe, etc - and savor it. Set your phone down while you’re at it, because warm-somethings tend to whisper secrets to life that we are hungry to hear anyway.

• sunlight. yes. this is the problem, right? where in the world did the sun go? agreed. gray days on repeat are the single soul-sucking reality of winter. but she does break through the clouds sometimes, and we mustn’t let her pass on by. much like a spring flower, whether it’s indoors or outside, let yourself sit in the sun, face forward. Sun can heal all woes, if but for a minute.

• meal prep. did I just say evil words? Look, you’d never catch me dead doing the type of meal prep gym-monkeys do. I respect that too, but after two days I’m over any meal. What I mean by meal prep is this: if you happen to be cooking, cook extra. Wait for it to cool, and label a container and throw it in the fridge. It’s like having a backup frozen pizza, but instead it’s homemade chili, soup, pancakes, or bolognese sauce - if you’ve seen it in a TV dinner, it can freeze. Who needs an eggo waffle when it can be your own homemade buttermilk waffles?

  • Keep your future self in mind when you package - perhaps three individual servings is better than one giant Tupperware that forces you to eat it for three days straight. Or perhaps you prefer that, too. If you want to invest, do yourself a favor and buy the stand-up stasher bags. I’ve tried what feels like a million silicone bag brands, stasher is king. and the stand ups are what makes having reusable bags not feel like a drag. No weird corners. If you’re on a budget, any container will do - yogurt, salsa, talenti ice creams (actually a fav of mine to be honest, I love those jars) - take a sharpie and black out the branding so you don’t think you’ve got an extra jar of yogurt when it comes to thawing in the fridge.

  • The art of reheating: you will like leftovers A LOT better if you take the time to reheat on the stove or in the oven. I am not trying to smash the usefulness of a microwave, especially when I want melted butter for popcorn, but it takes a leftover meal from being a bit of a drag to instead feeling like a fresh frozen pizza hot out the oven. Pancakes or waffles - straight on the rack in the oven. Takes 5 minutes at the most. We aren’t cooking them, just crisping the edges. A slightly pale pancake is particularly prime for reheating, but even a frozen-crispy waffle turns into waffle sticks no problem. Soup/bolognese/chili - on the stove. Thanksgiving dinner all smashed together in one Tupperware quite literally like a TV dinner - in the oven in a casserole dish. EVEN BREAD CAN BE FROZEN AND TOASTED IN THE OVEN.

• lemons: buy a bag of lemons. Always zest lemons first to avoid hurt feelings (and stinging hands.) If you haven’t an idea on what to use lemon zest for anyway, here’s my best martha-stewart secret: buy a tiny Tupperware (I know you’ve always wanted a reason for it anyway), pour in some white sugar, and add your zest to this. Stir it up a bit, and throw in your fridge. Lemon sugar is the tiny treat for kings and queens alike, and we too are kings and queens today. We can add it to oatmeal, cakes, waffles, pancakes, even ice cream should you feel a little decadent. As for the lemon juice, we’ve got salad dressings, lemon rice soup, and my least-favorite-but-favorite health tip: a lil shot. Yes. If you can party with your pals and take shots of god knows what bottom-shelf liquor of hell, then stomaching a shot of straight lemon juice is a walk in the park. Truly. Because while it will indeed be sour, your body will not shiver in disgust like it does after a shot of tequila. Your tongue will, but your body will take it like a champ. Because lemons are like vitamins and our bodies deserve love too.

• wash your face. the beautiful post-shower feeling condensed into a small ritual. A fresh face feels like a perfect breeze on a summer day. I don’t care to assume, and I won’t here either: if you do not have a skincare routine, adopt mine: Alaffia Neem Tumeric cleanser, and a bottle of Nourish Organic Argan Oil. Are you disturbed by the price? No shortcuts. And really, if you know anything about the beauty market, you know this is just the surface on what an individual could budget. Both will last many months, especially the oil, so think of it as buying in bulk. It’s only for your face, after all, and a face does not take up much surface area. Wash up, pat dry, and a little dime of oil. If you are into skincare, follow up with a gua sha massage… and please, don’t try to teach yourself - find a YouTube video that is not sped up, and follow along. After a week of that, you’ll know the routine all by yourself.

This is just the tip of the iceberg, but every bit counts. What is the ocean but a multitude of drops?

“I heard a bird sing
In the dark of December
A magical thing
And sweet to remember
We are nearer to Spring
Than we were in September
I heard a bird sing
In the dark of December.”

— oliver herford [ 1863 - 1935 ]

a life of crossroads

When you haven’t a direction to go… any road will take you there.

But humans are inquisitive, and brains like to fill empty space - and this is where standing at a crossroads goes from being a world of opportunity to feeling fearful of choosing the wrong road.

I think I’ll always be the kind of gal who can pick up the concept of home and carry it wherever I find my own two feet… but I say that while still knowing that even those places won’t really feel like home… maybe because home is a concept I learned too late. Home is everywhere I find myself…. while simultaneously being nowhere at all.

Perhaps this is why I’ve always been fascinated by nomadism… From my etic perspective, nomadism calls a stretch of land as home, whilst knowing it may be forever fluid. Hopefully one day… I’ll be able to share what nomadism means from an emic perspective.

[etic meaning outsider - as someone not born into this type of existence, I can only know this concept to a undefined extent, because as someone not raised this way, I may never fully understand. emic meaning insider - someone born into this lifestyle who knows it like their own person. can this be bridged? can an outsider become an insider? this is forever debatable and entirely based on circumstance - but with the right mix of attitude, openness, and most importantly an acceptance by those who show you the way… I’d personally say almost yes]

I’ve been chasing freedom and trying to find my way. I’ve always known what I “want to be” when I “grow up,” but have always doubted myself - the older I get, the less likely my dream seems it could ever fruit. But I continue watering the roots because there’s nothing more beautiful to me than my own chase of art and freedom.

And this is where it gets fuzzy - while I could chase this for my entire lifetime - will there ever be a moment I look back and say, “why?”

Normally I don’t fret on these things, and while I’m only a ripe 26, each year past 20 feels like a clock counting down to when I can be doing “fun things” like chasing dreams while itching closer to a point when I start to disappoint my family. The irony in admitting that is half of my family will eternally be disappointed in me for what feels like a million reasons. But there’s the other half who I’ve always wanted to “make it” for.

The anthropologist is quick to say my American is showing - because cultures always have a “shared” “dream,” mostly meaning there’s a classic story of how life “should” go - for Americans it looks like going to college, working hard until you’ve landed a “good” job, buying a home, and raising a family.

The reality of shared cultural expectations is that there will always be outliers.

And if I’m personally not interested (or at the very minimum not eager to start) carrying on with that route, what exactly is there to lose? Does the age I do this or that really matter if my life goal is to create, to explore, to be and see? I’ve wanted this more than I’ve ever wanted a beautiful plot of land to raise a family on.

People always say, “what’s meant to be will be,” and even I feel tempted to lean on that. The issue is that when I try to break it down, like I always do, a statement like that relies on a plan that is laid in stone by some sort of in-control omnipotent being… and… well, I am unguided by that realm too. In which case… saying something like that quickly falls in line of “opiate of the masses.”

A quick apology to my religious friends - though you’ve probably already known this about me - and yes I will always support you in your own endeavors, and never would I fight you on something I know is uniquely important to you and those who stand in your corner… but these are my crossroads we’re exploring, and if you want to understand you have to be fully stepped into my world… and there’s just no god here.

All this to say, if all you want is to go, is a year too long to stay? Or is a year just right?

Is it wrong to settle for a time and clear out the mist of what’s next? Or do you leap into the fog and hope there’s a bridge to land on?

All roads are right when you haven’t a direction to go… but some roads require groundwork, which may require pause… but if you do, -sort of- have a direction… can a road be wrong even if it’s still not the mundane world of the American dream? Is pausing the enemy or never going?

on renting dirt

The hum of the campground is never the same.

Despite the occasional few who would stay longer than 1-2 days, the sites to our left changed over like a laundromat of tourists. Some were quiet, mousey, read books or slept in their hammocks. There were people with elaborate cookouts and others who lived off of snacks or restaurant food. Some groups held roaring fires with shared drinks and menageries of conversation till the wee hours of the morning. Some had babies or young children, sometimes one and sometimes a small school, others had grumpy teens upset over lack of internet and signal (and some had adventurer spirits).

Each day would bring new voices, new smells, new ways of living, ways of relaxing, ways of being in Copper Harbor. Even the bathrooms would ebb and flow with general hygiene (made evident by guests only, for the bathrooms were regularly cleaned pristine), types of perfumes, and even just general behavior.

As a full season resident, the public shower house was also my personal bathroom. I took a minimum of a hundred showers there, brushed my teeth twice a day there, etc. Naturally, considering the meaning of campground life, I did come to expect strangers with each visit into the bathrooms. Often there would be no one… sometimes for an entire shower. On those days, even I could feel the deeper relaxation of a truly private experience… even if I did still wear sandals to shower every time.

What made campground life especially spectacular had nothing to do with the people at all. The thing I miss even now, as I sit in a place with four real walls, is the experience of living in the wildness.

Some campers are particularly glorious. While ours (loaned by our boss, thank the lord) was certainly nice, I wouldn’t call it glorious. It was everything we needed, but still quirky and irregular. I imagine even the big wheeled machines I’d watch roll into camp still felt the burden of rainstorms.

Living this way means narrowing down all the fluff of daily life and enjoying some shortened version of what you had before. It means watching your things with a close eye… because each day outside in the dampness of a northern summer means a day more of flirting with mold. It’s about hauling water for drinking, washing, anything - and heating it should you want warm dish water in your buckets.

It felt a bit like “off the grid” living but not because it was anything close to that. Its because I’m someone who has lived in true homes all her life, in a city of some kind (2,000+ residents), and whether I had enough of anything was more a question of budgeting or choice. But in this town, living on the edge of the deep-woods, daily life required more daily prep work than any home before this. And prep work was limited by resources and space, because there was no true storage for anything. It meant grocery trips couldn’t be a time of “stocking up” because no matter what I bring home I still only have one rubber-sealed tote box and a camper fridge (smaller than a standard mini).

Should the windows of the camper fog up, we had to fix ventilation in order to protect the camper itself (mold).

Should the camper be off balance, everything would earthquake and fall off the two mini-counters and we’d have to fix it in order to protect the camper (mold).

If it rained too many days in a row and we couldn’t open the windows we’d have to run a dehumidifier and check on the tent’s belongings (mold).

Sunny days were days for laying blankets out to bake in the sun (anti-mold).

For the most part, things were managed with ease. But it did require a bit of thinking, observing, and being aware of things because boiling water (as mentioned for doing dishes) would always fog the windows and on rainy days it was a burden to do the dishes - and yes - we did more or less only have two of everything. It involved looking at the forecast (which meant walking to the shower building in order to have a bar of wifi) and planning ahead.

The beauty of it all is that my living room was the picnic table outside. So was the kitchen, the mess sinks, the craft table… and this meant always listening and being against the deep woods. I knew of all the little creatures sneaking by who may or may not have known I was there, and watched all the birds bounce from tree to tree. I noticed the songs change by the season and time of day, I noticed the far-off visitors of wolves, coyotes, grey foxes… I heard them if they were there.

This was the most beautiful thing of living this way.

I watched all the trees, bushes, wild grasses and flowers grow up or get sick. I knew exactly when to pick a berry because they were always on display. And since I too was dependent on the variability of the weather, I too would change or adjust with the season.

I was surrounded by the wildness of pines, cedars, spruces. Woodpeckers, blue jays, crows. Chipmunks, fox, wolves.

And I’d do it again. Again and again.

on learning home

I first moved to Marquette in 2013. Nervous, anxious, ready for college while simultaneously being completely not ready… my dad says, “It’s a gift to feel scared. You only get to feel this a handful of times in your life.”

This holds true.

Marquette taught me many things - it taught me the definition of a home, the humble nature of feeling small in a forest, that all dark winters have beautiful springs, and the ever important art of how to love the little things. It taught me friendship, community, and togetherness.

Marquette brought me my closest friends. It blossomed my art. Taught me that anyone can be proud of you, not just family.

Marquette brought me love. And heartbreak. And opened the door on how to fall in love with your best friends.

Prior to high school, I had already moved twenty something times.My normal was changing schools and homes many times a year, never becoming a person with a name. Marquette taught me the beauty of stability. After seven years of enjoying the slow and steady nature of my little port town of the north, all in my own time and speed, I taught myself that there’s a time for settling and a time for going.

So we packed up. Left our darling little historic apartment along the ridge and headed to a different part of the north shore: Copper Harbor.

Copper Harbor has always been dear to my heart, but in a way that runs in my blood. Back in the 80s, my dad had many seasons in this little town. Ever since babyhood, he brought me here, too. My dad has been my lifelong best friend, and Copper Harbor has always been our shared special place.

Even with my multitude of visits, I didn’t know Copper Harbor like he knew Copper Harbor until this very summer. It’s put a lot of my own expectations upside down but in a way that is very beautiful and mystifying.

I thought I understood the art of small towns, as Chelsea (my high school town), and Marquette both are considered “small.” What Copper Harbor has that those two don’t is a braided community of locals. No cell signal. Hardly any internet… to be honest, smoke signals and carrier pigeons work better than text messages or video chats.

Your word is stronger than anything because there won’t be an easy way to confirm the details of a plan later… so if you last talked about 6pm on a Sunday, even if it -was- days before, well, you better be there.