Return

Andrea Blumberg

32. Return (Dec '09)

Hello Friends,

It's been over a year since I've last written. I apologize. I was kidnapped by aliens. They took me in their lollipop-shaped ship to a planet where the orange sun shines warmly from a purple sky, where it rains gumdrops and marshmallows, and where chocolate grows on trees (oh, wait...it's here that chocolate grows on trees. What a great planet).

Actually, the truth is much less ridiculous, but more ironic. I may have mentioned that I've been suffering from chronic fatigue for several years now, which has limited the amount of active outdoorsy things I'm able to do (not such a severe limitation, since by nature I'm about as active and outdoorsy as a pampered pet turtle). But, shortly after my last letter to you, I had gathered up enough steam (things still run on steam in Scotland) to go walking in the woods in gentle, picturesque Perthshire. Whilst traipsing through this agreeable, serene scenery, enjoying the tranquil idyll of this sparsely populated Highland Eden, I was bitten on the leg by a Lyme-riddled tick! How unnecessary was that?! Alas, unlike lucky Peter Parker, who gained superpowers when bitten by his radioactive spider, the only superhero title I gained was Even-More-Lethargic-Than-Usual-Woman (which I would have emblazoned on my spandex leotard had EMLTUW not already been taken by Electro-Mechanico-Lyncathropic-Thrasher-Ultra-Woman. She's the best!)

Luckily I didn't have any of the pain, fever, headaches or other symptoms associated with the disease (apparently Scottish Lymes are less sour than the Connecticut variety), and I got a course of antibiotics that has hopefully banished the buggies to oblivion...but it has meant that during the last year my status descended from torpid tortoise to near-inert newt; and explains why you haven't heard from me. Well, perhaps that's a bit hyperbolic. I wasn't completely inert, it's merely that my activities were sprinkled sparsely, like glints of gold among the gravel in a prospector's pan, and I spent lots of time resting and recovering. So here's an overview of some of the sparkly bits from the last year:

One fun thing I did was to go horseback riding with a friend. The last time I was on a horse was when I was 11, but I remember being pretty good back then. Of course I also remember having an invisible pet monkey back then too.... Anyhow, we went to a stable just outside Edinburgh, where we were greeted by a wired, wiry, three-legged Jack Russell terrier. He didn't seem to miss the extra limb, dancing and shivering around us as we met our guide, were introduced to our horses, and clambered on (mine was called Dotty; I was worried that it was a personality description, and that he was liable to wander off the path, or start rolling around in a field of daisies, but I was assured that it was a more straightforward reference to the dots on his nose). We set off, travelling single-file behind our leader, going down a path and through some trees, until we came to a knee-high-on-the-horses stream. Dotty displayed some fancy prancing on the bank -- trying to live up to his name, perhaps. Or maybe he just didn't like getting his hooves wet. But with some gentle coaxing (and a heel in the ribs) he finally splashed across. We spent a lovely half-hour walking, trotting, and cantering through the woods and fields till we came to a high bridge over a gorge from which we could see a vast vista of rolling green hills and trees. Then we looped around and traced our path back home.

I wouldn't say that Dotty and I forged a relationship or communed in some deep way (though when I was petting him goodbye he butted me with his head and wiped his nose all over my jacket; maybe that's horse for "I love you"?) But it was a peculiarly interdependent experience, moving through space on the back of a conscious being. He had his own ideas about where he wanted to go (or not go, in the case of the stream) And he was a far better judge of whether he was capable of climbing up that embankment, or walking safely across those protruding roots (or ambling nerve-wrackingly close to the edge of the path where it dropped away steeply, sheesh!) than I was; so we had to share the navigational duties. That's unusual in this age of traveling by machine, where you're the only one in control, and it's not safe to close your eyes and let your vehicle mosey down the road, picking out its own path. So I felt distinctly nervous when I experimented with doing so in this case (mind you, that might have been because my vehicle seemed to purposely mosey under the low-hanging branches....) But I got the slightest taste of what cowboys and other horsey people feel when they know they can rely on their trusty steed to carry them safely home. And I mildly lament living in the in-between time: after horses but before artificially intelligent, personailty-possessing hover scooters. Sigh.

I also did do a few small, creative things, like taking an evening class in pottery-on-the-wheel. In my hands it turned out to be more pottery-off-the-wheel...pottery-in-my-hair...pottery-sorry-about-that-overhead-light-fixture... It was a very therapeutic activity, though, and all that spattered clay was better than a day-spa mud pack for my skin (and for the skin of the people on either side of me). And I did come out with a few nice-looking pots in the end. This was one of the prettier ones.

I've also been doing a bit of knitting and sewing. It's safer for those around me. In this wintery weather I'm focusing on the conventional scarves and sweaters, but during the summer I was a bit more adventurous. I hacked up an old overly-flowery skirt and put it together with some monotonously black velvet fabric I had and made this skirt:

Oh yeah, and I cut my hair.

And finally, the big adventure of this year was a trip with my family to Israel and Jordan. First we went to Israel to visit my aunt and uncle who live on a kibbutz in the north, on the Sea of Galilee. They showed us their banana and avocado plantations (avocados grow on trees, too...I love this planet!). And they took us to see some archaelogical sites that they're helping to excavate, digging down thousands of years into settlements from Roman and Biblical times. In the museum on the kibbutz they have a fishing boat that might have been casting it nets in the same neighborhood where Jesus was out trolling for disciples! I've always felt that Scotland was ancient, with so many castles and forts slowly crumbling and hunching into themselves like wizened old trolls. But they're spry youngsters, compared to these buildings which have fully crumbled, been buried under tens of feet -- and thousands of years -- of dirt and sand, and then had their skeletal remains dug up, patched together and disputed over like bits and pieces of unrelated dinosaur bones all tumbled together in the same tar pit.

We also visited Jerusalem, bits of which are still standing on their original, petrified feet. Buried up to their knees, though. The Western Wall, which I had thought was the whole thing, extends another 43 feet underground! We went down into a tunnel to walk along the length of it and marvel at the ancient engineering. Huge stone blocks -- the largest of which is estimated to weigh around 570 tons -- were perfectly dressed and seamlessly fitted by people who worked with hand tools and ropes and pulleys. In the shadowed passageway I felt like I could almost overhear the words of those ancient stone masons: "Oy vey, all this block-schlepping is giving me a hernia. Why can't we do it like the Nabataeans did?" [segueing smoothly to the second half of our trip, centered around a visit to Petra, in south Jordan].

Petra is, of course, one of the "new seven wonders of the world": a collection of buildings and tombs carved into the rosy-red sandstone cliffs (hence no schlepping of blocks; smart folks, those Nabataeans). Not only did they carve all the buildings out of the rock, they also carved a long pipeline into the cliff wall to carry water into the canyon. In fact, you had to be careful not to stand still for too long around an ancient Nabataean; you might end up with an ornamental embellishment carved into your forehead, they were so chisel-happy.

Below is a picture of the most famous building in Petra (or "de-building," really, as it was what was left after the extra bits were carved away. I guess the Nabataeans were the first deconstructionists). It is called the Treasury, though it's presumed to have been a tomb. Either way, the fancy facade belies a boring interior; just a few big empty rooms. No secret passageways, no Leap of Faith, and no Holy Grail (for all you Indiana Jones fans).

And that's about it for my overview of noteworthy nuggets from the past year. This new year finds me back in Philadelphia, with the intention of staying here for a little while. My leave to live and work in the UK was at an end, so it's time to become an ex-ex-pat and return to my roots. I'm not sure exactly what I'll be doing. Hopefully getting back some energy and stamina, increasing my gold-to-gravel ratio, and maybe working on genetically engineering a mushrooms-olives-and-extra-cheese-thin-crust pizza tree........

Love,
Andrea

p.s. One more, interesting-by-association tidbit: This past year the puppeteers with whom I've been living created a huge 8-metre-high marionette, and walked him hither and thither throughout Scotland, creating merry mayhem wherever they went. He's going to march up the Royal Mile (the main tourist drag in Edinburgh) on New Year's Day. So if any of you are planning to be in the neighbourhood, go say hello and shake his humongous hand. If you can reach up that high. You can see some more pictures and videos of the Big Man's journey at www.bigmanwalking.com.