I'm up at 2:30 a.m. — way, way later than I've stayed up in front of my computer since finishing school.  Anxious.  Because I'm jobless.  The handful of job applications I've submitted since being back in the states have turned up not rejections, but worse: a response-less void.  Every time I open my email I cross my unconscious fingers that there will at least be something.  The aether into which they've apparently disappeared disheartens. It's not even a question of money, per se, and I'm thankful for that.  There's a little cash flowing from taking care of two boys a few days a week and subbing at my old post behind the pastry counter at the Farmers' Market.  But not having a "job" — you know, like a like job job — leaves me feeling aimless.

Luckily I have a kick-ass community of friends and fellow artists.  In two days a performance I helped create goes up: ORE.  The process has left me reverent for the river arroyo where we've been working, for the echoes of weather and geology that sound there every day.  I can't wait to have eyes on the movement and theater we've put together.

When that's over I'm headed to Indian Creek, hallowed ground for the practice of delicate vertical play we call crack climbing.  How to ascend these featureless fissures?  A climbing wandered once advices me with the koan, "Find the void, and fill it."  The purity of red rock, blue skies, camp cooking, and old friend Eric.  I'm already savoring the memories I haven't even made yet.

So you see, as we get deep into the month culminating in gluttony and gratitude, I have much to be thankful for.  Regardless of employment.

Besides, I've got two fail-proof businesses in the works: granola bars and wool hats.  More soon.

Nesting

I've been back in Santa Fe for two weeks now, and once Á and I set up the apartment the next step was clear: stock the larders.  So now there's Kombucha brewing in the cupboard, chicked stock simmering on the stove, beans and rice and popcorn and other bulk goodies overflowing a drawer, and a pot of black bean stew ready for slurping in the fridge.

The freezer is a study in opportunism.  Fire sale on overripe bananas = frozen baggies of banana puree.  Jesse overestimates how many bulk garlic cloves she needs to make prosciutto = trays of frozen minced garlic.  Green chile sold by the bushel = 33 serving baggies of it, skinned and cleaned and ready to serve.  Not to mention the pints of cooked black beans or the leftover pumpkin pulp awaiting some kitchen magic.

Ah, the joys of nesting.  The prepared shall inherit the earth? Nah, but they will get to eat tasty meals every single day.