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just took the most beautiful hike up to 5944 ft., a path i've never explored bc i thought it too remote, but it was not at all. at that elevation, there was snow & an expansive view of the canyon that contains our town. the ground also was muddy & the sun was lowering. the path had crested & i could see ahead was going to descend for a while before heading back up to a summit that was somewhere out of sight. it was time to head back, so sled dog & i slid all the way back down along switchbacks & slopes.
another gem discovered! so nice to walk out the front door, trek a mile, & find a new place to labor up into the big trees!
other than that, been fighting a sinus infection all week, but nothing like what james, then my friend corey got. what each of them went through was super-frightening!!! so grateful both are back on the path to wellness... so grateful for james's sister for having been there to help when he was struck suddenly very ill in so-cal...
in a different vein, just discovered you can slow the speed of youtube videos, so i've been practicing amos's boogie by amos milburn, learning a new left hand boogie pattern using the gene taylor method: practice the left hand while reading, while eating, while talking on the phone... it's very effective, as you'd guess, since gene taylor's the best boogie-woogie piano player of this age!
it's the weekend, but i gotta do saturday school tomorrow. i prefer never to do extra duties unless it's my idea but was kind a put in a can't-say-no-or-look-like-jerk spot. sister angie (who came up here & got her 1st degree black belt tuesday!! she is a bada*s!!!) sent me some art lesson plans, so i think the kids will be happy tomorrow with what we do. thank you, angie!!!
today a kid was careless & knocked me hard onto the classroom floor when she shoved the legs of her chair out as i walked by. her little eyes bugged & she clasped her mouth & the class gave a collective shudder as i slammed into the ground: and i couldn't get up, having landed full-weight on my kneecaps!!
sh*t!! thought i, i just got over the hip injury!! it was one of those hurts that knock the breath out of you tho it was no place near my breathing organs, so i crouched there til i could get up without crying or cussing... my student's lesson was to be more careful; mine was to be more cautious when near a hyper child, or when around children in general. as i hiked & sometimes broke into a jog & felt stabs in my knees, i thought of all the teachers i've known who've been injured over the years just being around kids...
well, it's foggy out & i hope i can go run behind the high school tomorrow... and maybe james will go, too. that is another really beautiful trail that is really close by! can't wait to get to wind wolves, too: that nature preserve, located just below us in the southern san joaquin valley off the 166 headed for taft, is supposed to be quite gorgeous!!
time for some peanut butter dinner. my favorite food! so happy that nuts, tho fat bombs, are nutritious. remember the words of hippocrates: "let food be thy medicine & medicine be they food."