Cliche as it is, life is beautiful.

Wednesday morning ramble:

Getting up in the dark is almost as bad as arriving at work and finding you forgot your lunch. However, a good nights sleep goes a long way in combating the inevitable bad mood that follows.

A few weeks ago I got three Guppy fish from Walmart. Usually I just have one or maybe two fish, but I've never had three; and because I had three it was decided that Will, Audrey and I would each claim and name one. Wills is grey with a spotted tail and now has a name that ends with "Fiasco" but the first part of which I don't remember. The other grey fish, with an orange dot over his stomach is Audreys; his name is Cush. My fish is rainbowy orange and his name is DR. Yes--DR. It actually has nothing to do with the Doctor type DR, but rather stands for "Double Rainbow", because he looks like he has a rainbow on either side of his belly. And for some strange reason when I thought of "double rainbow" the acronym was the second thing that came to my head and thus he was dubbed "DR". Poor fish--what odd names they have. Guess it's better then calling them Spotty, Orangy and Grey...y.

Right about now I'm ready to start school back up. It's been a long summer--a good one, don't get me wrong, but a long one. I've really enjoyed my work; got to hike trails, get involved with incidents within the park, talk with visitors and explore the incredible wilderness I've lived by my whole life. Not a bad gig. But now it's time for Portland, bubble tea, my own little room at Ty and Kelse's and a bit of homework to keep my brain busy.

This school year will be good. Not only is the living situation better (didn't mind having a roommate, but dorm life isn't my fav), but my weekends can now be used for going out and doing things with people on their time off instead of needing the weekend to recover from socializing.

Just a few minutes ago a man came into Canfield and started talking about what this building looked like in 1956-57 when he worked here on the roads crew. He said they had dances in the maintenance building once every other week and that his sister played swing piano for them to jive to. There were bunks and bathrooms upstairs where our offices are now. Where I work used to be a cafeteria. He said one time a couple of his friends created a volcano shaped thing out of moss with a hole in the middle. They made it in the middle of the creek and then told the rangers that they had found something. An uproar (of some variety) was caused, news papers were printing things about this strange formation that an unknown animal made, and a man from Washington DC came all the way out to view it. The boys who made the fake animal formation never told anyone it had been them. Most likely the phenomenon faded away and people eventually forgot. But some didn't. Some like this guy.

As I watched him talk about how he was a senior in high school the first time he came up here and how his grandfather helped build the road around the lake, his father helped create trails and how every year he would clear the trails of snow and rocks, I was smiling. Things mean so much more when there's history behind all of it. Something in me wanted to cry too. So many lives; so many beautiful hearts, wandering souls, all come to places like this to find peace; they find solace in quiet space and an National Park brotherhood.

Cliche as it is, life (the actual breathing, feeling, living thing inside everyone) is beautiful.