393: beautiful year, december

I catch mice beneath our upstairs bathroom sink, though I've since put a pause on it with our forest of snow.


I am surprised when the semester ends--didn't it just begin?--and have taken on a whole new subject in my writing, returning to The Bodies exhibit twice in order to explore this muse a bit more.


Meryl and Shawn come up for an afternoon of kale and white bean soup and hiking at Memorial, but the new medicine I'm on (I take this for five days each month) gives me pause. They're patient and the world is gorgeous.


We spend Christmas at the in-laws' with his siblings and nephews. Christmas with children is undoubtedly one of the most magical things indeed, and while we are gone, we have another snowstorm at home, and our neighbors kindly take care of our sidewalks and driveway. When we return, we take the two out to dinner with their sweet daughter Bailey and have a game night at their home afterwards.

I begin to send my chapbook out, even though it's not really truly ready. But it needs me to nudge it out the door in order to blow a little dust off. My fingers are crossed.

Ryan and I sleep through the turning to midnight, though the dogs wake me at half past, and I read for several hours in celebration.

392: beautiful year, november

I turn thirty and am surrounded by some of my absolute most favorite people in the world--so much so that it is even a little overwhelming. We go to a vegetarian restaurant I've longed to try, and a week or two later, I receive a handful of text messages, telling us we had good timing--Cafe Brenda is to close. Despite this, I enjoy my autumn pie, my cranberry juice in a wine glass, my good good company, and finally kissing the twenties good-bye, which is more of a relief than anything else.


There's more hiking up Memorial Bluff, more celebrating of the fall colors, more of Penelope and Zephyr romping through the bracken. This is the last month Penny can come home without limping, and in December, I take her to the vet for x-rays, which come back inconclusive and are sent off to Rochester for further inspection. We joke about taking her to Mayo.


I make plenty of washcloths, as usual, and begin to learn how to felt.



We actually spend a weekend preparing the garden for spring--tilling the soil, mixing in leaves and compost, emptying the worm bin save the few worms that are left. I buy a composter and Ryan assembles it in the garage. We talk about getting a CSA share in the summer.


Thanksgiving is spent in Michigan this year, where my grandmother is in a care facility recovering from a broken hip. She has since been cleared by the doctors to go home, but her physical therapist has kept her into the new year. I head up the meal execution, but find there is no possible way I could have done so without the great help of my husband and two parents. My mother worries over my medication-sickness, but I assure her it's all part of the charm of my disease, and I will be better soon. My father smashes a deer on the way to one of our nursing home visits, and I forgive him.

391: beautiful year, october

It's a big month, MFA-wise: so much so that I have to hibernate a little after. But for now, there is the MFA road trip....

... Meryl's first public reading ...



... Adam Zagajewski coming to town for the Twin Cities Book Festival, and after driving him about, dinner and lunch, an interview for our lit magazine, a manuscript conference that really elevated me ...


... Anne Carson(!) coming to town with a gorgeous performance ...

... and a hike with some of my favorite people in the program.



This month so much was about keeping up with reading, about writing so many poems, about making our way up the small slopes of Minnesota. The colors are gorgeous, striking. I bring my leaf identification book with me on my daily walk. We use birch branches for fetch.

390: beautiful year, september

To celebrate the end of summer, we invite our nearby friends to our home for our annual wine tasting party. Because of some partner's working shifts, we end up with two parties--one with a Spanish theme, and the other second group of MFA friends and partners with a local theme.


More Hay Creek, more chasing balls, more summer. I forget, sometimes, just how summer can be, how it lingers and teases.

I get an internship with the creative writing department, I get trained in teaching freshmen composition, I start the second year of my MFA.


When I get to the State Fair, I think: This is my last year, but then the animals charm me. This year, I go with Kelly, the only person I've ever gone with steadily, and we bring along our husbands and I bring my former student too. We pet pigs, eat honey ice cream,


I get a tattoo. A really big one.


And I meet Maxine Hong Kingston. I also drive Jim Shepard around, part of my internship, to MPR and lunches. I'm schmoozing with authors. I'm writing more. I'm feeling a bit more comfortable here in the program.

389: beautiful year, august

Last year, Ryan and I celebrated our one-year wedding anniversary by visiting my grandmother in Michigan, and this year, we travel to Austin, Texas, to visit my sister. We discover the joys of migas and grackels, chicken shit bingo and ostrich cowboy boots.


I attend Bread Loaf. I'm on cloud nine.

388: beautiful year, july

We keep hiking at Frontenac. The dogs keep rolling in fish carcasses.


We enjoy Colville in the summer. This year, there are gorgeous flower beds and vegetables, all in an interactive garden next to the updated playground equipment with squishy footpaths.


There is a small reunion of some of my high school girlfriends, three of whom are full-fledged mamas. Their children are charming, and it's good to spend time with families, updating one another on small accomplishments in life.


The garden is getting tangled, and we burn Ryan's father's tongue on hot peppers. I catch toads, which Zephyr and Penelope dutifully sniff and drool upon. I start a new blog, one that has actually stuck.

387: beautiful year, june

Ryan and I go on our annual end-of-school-year camping trip with or dear friends Lane + Angie + Chad. It rained the entire day on Saturday, and we kept ourselves beneath tent flaps; I read The Pillow Book of Sei Shonagon and tried to keep myself from rushing to the bathroom (that would be bout of flu #2, thankyou). Sunday the skies cleared and we were able to enjoy the falls. I love sleeping outside, and I love any time spent with this cluster. Cherries have come into season.


I spend half the month in New jersey, but the only time I leave the confines of the white house in Toms River is when we go to the shore, which is resurrected in a poem by my friend Colleen later in the year. I go out east strongly believing I will come back no longer wanting children, prepared to grow old with a series of golden retrievers, but then: look at how sweet they are.


Christian has his first birthday, which is essentially spent in the Nelson's garage, watching him smear frosting in every crevice of his face. This is followed by a rousing game of four-square while the birthday boy sleeps. I'm glad to be home, to feel the Minnesota sun and examine the Minnesota green.


We turn to Hay Creek on weekends to tire out the dogs. We pull our first strawberries from the garden. We're happy summer has finally burst into full bloom.