Moonshine Junkyard

on sunday evening i got a bee in my bonnet to go to apple hill and do a little photo shoot. now usually on a sunday in september, i would never brave the teeming crowds at apple hill, but this time it was after hours. all the farmstands had closed up shop, the craft stands were covered in canvas, the sun was going down over the western vineyards sloping down into the canyon, and i had the orchards all to myself! i wanted to do a little modeling for my etsy shop but i am soooo very awkward about solo photo shoots for so many reasons including but not limited to:  1. if a car drives by and i think there is a chance anyone will see me photographing myself i get super flustered and embarrassed and fight the urge to run and hide and instead stand there trying to look natural and looking like a total dumbstruck moron instead  2. i feel like i am trespassing (cause i am) and glance sneakily and guiltily around all the time ...

...of our august utah rambles....including but not limited to footage from the Extra Terrestrial Highway in Nevada, hikes in Bryce Canyon , the hike to Lower Calf Creek Falls in Grand Esclante , the campground at Kodachrome Basin , Grosvenor Arch , and a little bit of footage at a park in Beaver, Utah. which we were excited to recognize from this amazing film that we all got glued to one night last year. if you're interested to check it out, here ye go: <p><p><p><p><p><br&amp...

in september i feel the long, dry summer in my skin and bones. roaming around town, visiting my old haunts, ... i feel like dry chaff, blowing in a hot breeze. it feels like it should be fall now, kids are back in school, Apple Hill is open: orchards full of pink ladies and galas and golden apples, fat pears falling to the ground, hay rides and scarecrows. but the days are still long and dusty and hot; the grass is dying; the hills are yellow; i pick wicked stickers out of my cats' fur incessantly.  am i complaining? i am a summer girl and i swore i would never complain about the heat, and i am not. and it never even got that hot anyway.  i am just ready to be refreshed. thirsty for rain. i remember this feeling from the first fall after i graduated high school. i was seventeen and taking a couple classes at the community college. i was driving around in my big old rusty station wagon with fake wood side paneling. up to apple hill and do...

in honor of last night's beautiful bountiful harvest moon, i will tell you a story. it's not an easy one, so if you are sensitive, you can skip this one. for my loved ones and i, it turned out to be an extremely moving and heart-expanding experience of a lifetime. it is a kitten story. three years ago, on the day of the harvest moon in early september, i was driving along a back road in placerville when i saw something strange that made me turn around in my car. the something-strange turned out to be just a rock, but out of the corner of my eye i had thought it was a giant tortoise. (?!) silly me, i thought, turning back around at the edge of another secluded road. just then, i heard a small, loud, insistent meowing. the teensiest little bundle of fur with big green eyes was coming toward me from a shrubby hillside. it was a tiny kitten with the most beautiful face i'd ever seen. she looked matted and filthy, but she came right up to my car door with my motor runnin...