Surprised by Beauty

Hello from a coffee shop in Bozeman, MT.  So far this rough and tumble crew of the two of us couldn't be loving life more than right now. This is how we have a good time: 

. Arrive at one place we planned on seeing. Stay for about 17 minutes, decide it's boring and we can take a few more hours in the car. Abandon campsite and, onward. 

. Speed past Mount Rushmore in the car a few times to adequately see it, rather than pay $11 to park and look longer. 

. Pull over at a lake to make dinner. Camp stove for the win.

. Hammock along a lake with a killer mountain view, try to read but can't stop staring at nature.

. Buy a bottle of wine and talk about feelings loudly, because there's nobody to hear us but the birds and the bears. 

. Wake up one morning and decide, let's go to Yellowstone.

. Deal with the sore and stiff back, because sleeping on the ground is worth the nature we get to see. 

. Feel accomplished because we managed 3 nights in a row with below freezing temperatures. 

. Get really excited each night to sleep in the sleeping bag because ITS SO FLUFFY.

. Stop at every flippin' information center in each park. Are the campgrounds closed? Is this a good one? Where are the best hikes? Are you sure??

. Snag the very last campsite in Yellowstone FOR THE WIN. 

. Chat with old ladies in the campground bathroom. Will the bears smell my lotion? Well, you'll know in the middle of the night if you hear screams. 

. Attend the campfire circle at the campground, where Ranger Bill told us about pikas and wolverines. 

. Hike that straight-uphill trail to Lava Lake outside of Bozeman. Cry internally the whole time, its hard. 

. Cry for real when we reach the top, because that view just made us forget the whole hike. 

. Loudly declare that I'm peeing in this lake, dangit, despite the fisherman lingering nearby staring. 

. Say hello to some guys on horses going up the trail. What? We have to walk this sucker on our own.

. Arrive at an AirBnB in Bozeman, expecting rip-roarin' fun. Maybe a game night? Beer? 

. Shower for the first time in 4 days, dress up fancy (jeans and a tshirt), go out to dinner in Bozeman. 

. Have our AirBnB host tell us that yes, you really do need bear spray if you're going on a long hike this time of year. You idiots. 

. Wander around Bozeman, pretending to be locals. Wonder if we should move here? But first, we need ice cream. 

. Be surprised by beauty. 

. Come to a coffee shop the next morning to write the whole thing down.  

Itinerary

On Saturday, I left for a two and a half weeks of road tripping and camping. Here is our itinerary:

Minneapolis --> Badlands, South Dakota --> Beartooth Highway and Campground, Montana --> Bozeman, Montana --> Flathead Lake, Montana --> Glacier National Park, Montana --> Lake Coeur D'Alene, Idaho --> Seattle, Washington --> San Juan Islands, Washington --> somehow we'll drive back ..??

We've booked a couple AirBNBs, reserved some campgrounds, and have a rough outline of where we're going. But there are some days in there that we decided to "just wing it," or "see how we feel when we get there," or say "if we want to stay longer, we can. If not, we can leave."

This flexibility. My whole life so far hasn't allowed for this kind of flexibility. School, break, school, work, school.. etc. This is the first September in 16 years where I haven't had to be anywhere specific at any time.

But there's a trade-off. Here's my itinerary for when I return:

Live with my parents? Work at the same restaurant? Maybe freelance write a little? Eventually go to Europe? --> . . .

For this portion, I don't have a plan. Not in the slightest. There is flexibility, but within no boundaries. When people ask, "So.. what's the PLAN??" The only thing I can say for sure is: "I have no clue." Which, as it turns out, is a really good way to kill a conversation. It's kinda fun.

I feel like this should be freaking me out a little more? But somehow it's not. For now, I'm off to enjoy my first adventure within the boundaries of having no plan. Don't even try to bother me with what comes next, I'm not thinking nearly that far ahead.

This is summer.

Freezing cold 6 a.m. runs around lakes, before the melting heat starts.

Juggling phone calls and emails, all trying to contact me to be in a story.

Kayaking from Calhoun to Isles to Cedar Lake and back again.

Getting restless in the office and walking down the alley to the coffee shop to work.

Biking eight miles into Downtown, and changing for work in the office bathroom while wiping sweat from.. everywhere.

Working all day at two different jobs, only to go home and do some freelance work.

Having a few days off (finally) and using them all up driving far distances to be in weddings or relax at cabins.

Working on my summer Chaco tan, and getting instead a nice shorts tan.

Not having the money, or the time, to go shopping for clothes, despite needing some upgrades.

Putting off hobbies like reading or painting, because, who has time?

Writing, constantly. Stories for the magazines, blogging, freelancing online. Always writing.

Making to-do lists, losing them, and forgetting everything.

Using my bike as my car; from Northeast to Uptown to Downtown and everywhere in between. Seriously considering biking distances vastly too far, just to avoid using gas.

Saving every penny from waitressing in a big mug, counting down the days and the dollars until my next adventure.

Writing it all down here.

On hammocking in the city

Today I had the most wonderful day.

I woke up bright and early, which normally wouldn't have me super jazzed, but it's actually pretty nice to be up and at em before most of the world.

I got ready this morning at my friend's apartment (where I slept the night before) and took the bus into the city. The entire time I just kept thinking to myself we're ADULTS, dangit. We are on the bus and there are other people here and look there's a tall building! And here's our stop! Okay, meet you when work's over. Like a true grown up.

I had a meeting with my editor today where we talked about grown-up things, like freelance writing and potential job openings and would you like to keep working here the rest of this year? To which the answer was, sadly, no unless you pay me more than nothing. I mean. I went to college.

After my long and grueling day of work ended at noon, I went for a run along the river, across the Stone Arch bridge and along St. Anthony main, which, as it turns out, is really cute. How many commas can I fit into one sentence?

I then promptly decided that I love city life. It was always a wavering thought, but now it has been solidified. I love living and working in the midst of crowds of people bustling, trains, busses, tall buildings, construction workers eating sandwiches on the curb, people biking and running and brunching, or simply soaking it all in like me. I love the busyness of it all. It makes me feel like I'm a part of something, the living breathing city has an energy to it, and I contribute to that energy.

By now this blog post has gone on long enough without a mention whatsoever of the title. Which, you would suppose, would be the subject of the post. But here it comes!

Within my extreme heart-swelling happiness of belonging to a living breathing city, I realized I was pooped from my run and wanted to take a nap. Well. Where ever can I take a nap in the middle of the city?

So I have this thing called a hammock, from ENO (found here) that I adore. Best gift I've ever received. I strung up my hammock right along the river, downtown next to the Guthrie. There were tons of people around. Lots of noise and chatter, you know. But I was in a completely different world once I slipped inside that thing.

Despite dogs barking, construction drills and the bustle of city life that I love, it all seems to go away once you're in a hammock. You sink in and the sides go up around you and its like you're down in a quiet countryside all of a sudden. Nothing gets in or out. No noise, no obligations, no noisy city people.

My obsession with city life has often left me burnt out, in need of rest. I forget to take breaks, to slow down and take a nap for the love of God. Rest is an integral part of life, necessary to get anything done and be productive, and completely worth it. Rest is incredibly spiritual too, rejuvenating and refilling us in more ways that one.

The majority of American culture is anti-rest. Obviously we all know this. Fill every day with stuff, do things always, make something, complete something, or else you're worthless.

This is why I love that hammocking is breaking onto the scene among people my age. Its a very counter-cultural cultural movement, this hammocking thing. It's telling you to stop, take a nap, hang out, get nothing done, learn nothing except what the birds and water sound like.

This non-activity is so necessary. Take a break. Take a nap. Lose track of time. Learn what the birds and the wind and other people sound like. Learn what your own breathing sounds like. Learn what your thoughts are without crowding them with other things.

That's what I learned today on my most wonderful day. You'll find me taking naps in hammocks in the middle of cities wherever I go, from now on.

Hole in the Wall: A History

I wish I could say this post commemorated some kind of blogiversary of mine, but it doesn't. Just been thinking a log about what my future looks like, and looking back for some answers. This is the story of my (short-lived) adult life as a blogger.

So far, I have been blogging since 2010. I started a blog in high school and wrote things sporadically. They were mostly for me. I didn't ever share the link, and hardly anyone knew I even had one. Which was probably a good thing.

The summer before freshman year of college I tried to maintain my blog a little more often. I shared the link with people on social media and some people started to follow it. Why they would read it, I have no clue. It's cringe worthy, which is why I will never again share the link and will let it die slowly.

This blog you're reading now was created in 2013, and started out as a class project in multimedia news writing. I would visit local small restaurants and coffee shops and write things about them. Hence, the name Hole in the Wall.

Once that class ended, I decided to keep writing here over the summer since my big goals for my old blog had since died out. I wrote things sometimes, and shared my thoughts but never very consistently or seriously. Again, it was mostly for me.

The spring of 2014 brought an opportunity to actually document something consistently. I was in a class that demanded a hefty project: create art daily for an hour and a half. Since this took up a significant part of my life that semester, I decided to blog my process each day.

After that, it was senior year. This year was unique because 1. I was thinking a lot about career goals, what kind of job I wanted, how seriously blogging could be considered as a job and the fact that potential employers wanted to read my blog (?) so I wanted to post more consistently and 2. simultaneously, I was living with freshman, who were on the other end of the career/jobs/hire me/help me spectrum.

I blogged about being an art major and what it had taught me, I blogged about being an RA and living in a small room among freshman, and I blogged about life in college and searching for my passions.

What's next? I hope to blog much more consistently, redesign my site, add some more regular series posts, and maybe even turn this into a real gig. Wishful thinking.

What I learned from 6 months off Instagram

Back in January I made some new years resolutions, as you do.

One of those resolutions was to delete all kinds of social media off my phone, and reduce my social media use drastically. For me, this particular goal meant deleting Instagram and Snapchat completely and only going on Facebook once or twice a week.

I had noticed the ridiculous amount of time I spent on social media, and it was getting out of hand. You know when you're doing something that you're so engrossed in that you forget where you are and what time it is? That would happen to me when I was on social media... and that scared me.

Instagram was a particular vice for me. I haven't used Instagram for 6 months now, and after paying attention to my changing habits, I have some thoughts.

I'm actually not that interesting 

Maybe it's just me.. but me sitting outside reading with lemonade isn't that interesting. Why is it worth a picture? And why would you take five extra minutes to arrange the things on your desk for a particular aerial shot?

It's so time consuming

It's like a part time job! Here's another thing.. how do you know what to hashtag? How are we supposed to keep up with all these trending tags? It's so overwhelming. And it takes so much time to go back and look at people who have liked your picture, to scroll through everyone else's pictures and like them and to watch videos. Then it just sucks you in, ya know? Before you know it you're Insta-stalking someone's sister's boyfriend's dad and you're like, who even is this?

It all just seems so fake

Maybe this is just the kind of people I follow. But I can't tell you how many of the exact same kind of picture I see:

Someone's feet, their hand holding a drink peaking in the side, with an interesting or tropical background. #weekend.

An aerial shot of a surface or a desk, with a Mac computer, iPhone, notebooks and pencils, and a plant. #Mondayview.

A selfie in a car, with a seatbelt on, big lips, sunglasses. #SelfieSunday.

etc etc. You've all seen them before.

Even still, I compare myself 

It's so easy to fall into that trap. Even though she completely posed that picture, even though that was the only good shot from the whole weekend, even though she forced that person to pose with her... her life is so much more interesting than mine! Well, not true. It's easier to convince yourself of that when there aren't any photos to look at.

I'm better at words than pictures

In general, I always have been. Give me any old subject and I could write a thousand words about it. But ask me to take a picture that sums up my day, and it gets much harder.

Maybe I'm just out of practice after the 6 month break, but maybe I like it that way.

Biking to work

Today I biked to work.

This is not the first time this has happened. In fact, the past three years I've been biking to work. I work at a restaurant in Minneapolis, and parking in the city is ridiculous and never available and expensive when it is available. So therefore, bike to work, get some exercise, don't pay for gas or parking, save the environment!! etc. etc.

This job (unpaid internship) I currently have is Downtown, and is 5 miles further away then my other job, but I decided on biking there too (for all the same reasons). Obviously, I discovered several benefits to biking to work.

Most recently, I have discovered how awesome Minneapolis is. Didn't I know this already? Apparently not.

There is a bike trail that goes all the way from Hopkins straight through St. Louis Park, across Highway 55 along the light rail line and into the city like the string of a balloon. The bike path itself is nestled down beneath the city, unnoticed by the cars and busses crossing bridges overhead. There is a whole other community down there.

Along the trail there are murals, gardens, and little biker-friendly pit stops, even a bike shop with an entrance right along the trail. There are stop signs, little street signs and lane markers, benches and graffiti, groups of people playing guitars or smoking, picking up trash, waiting for the train. This whole little atmosphere I didn't even know about until I became a trail biker.

Biking this trail from the south side of Lake Calhoun into Downtown Minneapolis is like getting the grand tour of the city, from the poorer parts to the richest. Every few minutes, I feel myself entering a new part of town as I cruise by on wheels.

Uptown: hipster, coffee-shops, clothing stores, bars.

Lynn-Lake and Phillips: eat street, foreign foods/businesses, rich culture and rich smells.

Cedar-Riverside: Apartments, murals on every wall, warehouses emitting smoke, lots of people walking in work clothes.

Mill District and Downtown: where I get off the path. Construction, Metrodome, business suits, fast walkers, food trucks, etc etc

This city plays host to all types. This small but powerful cultural hub is bursting at the seams with uniqueness, I feel lucky to get to see it all from the "tourbus" I ride to work every day.