What a weird ass place.  I mean,  yesterday when I blogged I was feeling better about things.  Then I went on a long walk in the dark with two of the girls and I was back to feeling discouraged. It feels cliquey.  It feels like people try to create their own superiority due to seniority and walk with a little cock in their step because of it. So I went to bed brainstorming ideas on what I could do for the next month while I wait on my apartment.

But then I woke up and everything was grand again.  We had a garden meeting run by Emily, the garden manager.  I have the utmost respect for her, by the way.  Just a solid woman and a solid leader - says it like it is without offending anyone.  And she just aired out all the dirty laundry, so to speak.  Even though I was new I could feel that other girls were feeling some of the same frustrations that I was with disorganization, cliques, and lack of defined tasks. So she made us a list of responsibilities that we can each embrace. I adopted the brassicas. They call me the "brassica babe" :)  I'm super excited about that - I really want to dive in and research and nurture those little plants to be happy and healthy.

This was also a weird time day.  I mentioned before how elastic time is here and I really fell into the vortex today.  I was helping clean today and so I took a bowl of leftover oats to Mouna's house to put in her fridge.  Well, she saw me and said "oh well I guess we better make a cake.  Wanna see how fast you can make a cake?"  And 2 hours later, after baking a cake, basting some chicken, steaming some greens, and doing her dishes I finally walked out of there not realizing it was 1:30. She then sucked me back in to watch part of Democracy Now with her.  She DVRs it and pauses it to discuss the hot topics with me.  She knows her shit, that's for sure.

We had class again today.  She spoke on the beginnings of hot/cold/damp/dry which is still way over my head, but interesting none-the-less. Today I finally realized why everyone loves Mouna so much.  She is such a sweet soul with so much on her plate and yet her door is literally always open.

In the evening I was juggling getting trained on the front desk and hanging out because I was having a great time.  I wandered over to the garden at one point to dig up and replant some of the cabbages only to get pulled into Mouna's vortex on the way to watch her make a parasite herbal mixture. Amu's wife, Botan is from Thailand and apparently every Friday and Saturday night she makes delicious Thai noodle soup for $5 - it was amazing.  Best $5 I've spent in a while. Tons of people from town came in for the soup too, so the place was hopping.  We ate our soup over conversation about prairie dog fishin' (laying a lasso around a prairie dog hole and grabbing them as they come up) and stories from Ramone's stunt double days.  He has done stunts for everyone, apparently.  Worked for Quentin Tarantino and doubled for Leonardo DiCaprio and Robert Duvall and all kinds of people.  Super interesting guy with great stories.  Also, a side note, I guess a few weeks ago J.C. Chavez's (from NSync back in the 90s) mom stayed here. This place attracts some of the strangest, coolest people.

It was another beautiful sunset tonight so I went on a walk with Teagan down the road to try our best to capture it with our cameras. I think I'd like to make it a thing to go on a walk every night at sunset- New Mexico has amazing sunsets...

After a long chat with my mom trying to explain the strangeness of the place and why I had a defeated tone of voice last time we spoke I met back up with the girls who were headed out for the night.  Grace is house sitting for some guy down the road who has ice cream in his freezer and a pet lamb so we decided to have an ultimate girls night/slumber party!  It took forever to find the place because the directions were clear as mud. We drove up and down this dark dirt road 5 times, looking like total creepers as we roll slowly pass windows trying to decipher if Grace was inside. We even went as far as to tip toe up to a house that we assumed was it only to get freaked out when we read the word "patrol" on the front door and ran away giggling. What girls. Turns out that was the right house and it was a decorative sign for a ski patrol. We drank beer and talked until really late and it was a ton of fun.  Really great group of girls - smart, interesting, funny.  I'm really glad I went.

The icing on the cake was waking up in the morning and taking a long hot shower in his spacious tub and shaving my legs - ah, the simple pleasures in life.