View from the bottom and the top

Sunday I woke up with a mountain to climb.  The smell of coffee always fills the house in the morning and Nancy is there to greet me. The dogs and cat have taken to piling around me, in the wee hours of the morning. It is home.

We all go about our business and have comical interludes while doing so. The night before we went to the community outdoor film festival. O Brother was showing, by the Coen Brothers.  We scoot around town together, as they own the scooter shop. They also let me test drive scoots and mopeds. It is fun to imagine owning all these other bikes, but time and time again I get back on Audre and know she is the lady for me. Her one year birthday was on July 6.

She understood that I needed a break from sitting on my butt, so off to the mountain I went. Last year Daphne and I went to climb the “M” trail. Daphne was in flip flops last year, so we retreated. It’s base starts at the University of Mountain. It is not the best trail, it is winding, skinny and full of rocks. The views are the best however.

Missoula is the most active community I’ve ever seen in America. They pool their resources into numerous programs and they actively contribute to maintaing a progressive town. Everyone is super friendly, none of this “look how cool and weird I am,” crap that you find in many “cool” cities. And they decorate their mountains with Peace signs.

All along the trail people said “good morning” and “hi.” I reached the top and soaked in the panorama. It took 40 minutes to climb 700 feet. On the way down I met Karen ( I think, but I’m bad with names). I was halfway down when she yelled, “Look, an osprey above you.”

I filmed it and on her way back down she stopped to ask if I was a film student. I told her about P.E.A.C.E Scooter and it led to a fantastic conversation. Part humor and part straight forward honesty-about Peace of course. We shook hands but she said, “I think I need to give you a hug, actually.” Thanks, that was needed.

I woke up also thinking there was some work to do. The ride of my lifetime will end soon. I never started off with a measurement of success. I just had to scoot. As the months have gone on, slowly turning into a year, expectations developed. Why? Hmm.

Well, I realized that I’ve dedicated my time, safety, life, and money into a demonstration for Peace. And I saw that last year’s March for Peace had a ton of press and supporters. That groups jumped on board to promote them. Sadly, not a single Peace group has made an at large announcement or offered their public support. NUMEROUS INDIVIDUALS have come forward to offer support, and some are affiliated with larger groups. So yesterday I comprised a letter to send out to my contacts.

You can read it here.

Compiling the letter and email list took awhile. I also finalized the calendar dates. Sadly, it seems my arrival in Chicago coincides with AmeriVespa, so I’m staying a week there in hopes I can catch up with certain people. There will be plenty of work to do there though. At the end of this admin work, I was cranky and hungry.

Off to Good Foods, which beats Whole Foods aka Whole Paycheck, hands down. Back at the homestead I took down my laundry, which on a whim I had earlier hung up to dry and save energy. They smelled sunkissed. Nancy kindly sewed up my pants for me and I put patches on my new Goodwill $2.00 shorts. They are completely utilitarian shorts and so ugly they are cool.

Monday I woke up with a huge must do list before leaving Missoula.Rockin Rudy’s bought some keychains from me. I went to see the mechanic and he was really helpful. He made a quarter turn on the fuel screw in hopes that getting more gas to the engine will help my speed. He showed me exactly how to look at the sparkplug and let me put it back in. It was fun getting my hands dirty. I took off the air filter, discovering it was FILTHY. Perhaps this will help with speed also. I put on the new one. The scoot already feels faster.

I took it on a long fast ride to see if adjustments needed to be made. None. After running errands I had time to go volunteer at the local shelter. I wish there were more Poverello Center’s around the country. They provide shelter to women and men. Many shelters around our country DO NOT have space for women. They also provide three meals a day, AA meetings, business classes, clothing and a community room. It is funded almost entirely on community donations. It is the nicest shelter I have seen. It was nice to know that just two hours was helpful to them. I would rather do this work than watch TV, and most Americans watch at least 2 hours a day.

The food was actually edible, no, it was good. I have served food at other shelters that my dog would not eat. It was fun, I served with Shannon. He asked if I liked chess and then showed me his prototype for a round chess board. It is genius. He is looking for investors. China offered but he only wants to develop it here in the U.S. and use solar power at his warehouse.
I wish I could say I played a game on it, but I had to scoot off.

He’s staying at the shelter. Totally wants to making a living off his invention, but hopes that artists will contribute by designing their own unique pieces-he will provide specs for the rest of the frame. And give them 90% for the sale.

So awesome! How many milleniums has it taken to reinvent the chess board?
He says, “Flat board chess was developed when the world was flat, this is a chess board for the 3rdmillenium.”

OH, you can play BOTH forward and backward at the same time.

He also said, “It’s a game of war. But in the end, no one dies. They just get smarter.”

That I liked. A lot.  It’s a game of strategy that teaches you critical thinking. I put in an order for Christmas time.

When I wake up Tuesday, there will still be a lot to do. There is a Peace center here that I want to visit and I have one of those god awful post office trips planned. The bags are getting to heavy.

The ride isn’t too long though, so leaving late afternoon should be fine.

OH, and I JUST heard news that Shaun has made it home safely to Tucson. He covered 1,000 miles by himself! Congratulations to him!