#readandbreathe

[yeahiwasintheshit]

[bbabushkajusofonii]

Buenos Dias Beautifuls! A little #WednesdayWisdom to help with your #MidweekMadness. #ReadAndBreathe 😚 https://www.instagram.com/p/CGUyO5qhpGz/?igshid=19zamgz8s2dm5

[sarahvsalcedo]

Another List in a Great, Long Line of Lists

Vasant and I are tumbling about, trying to get a myriad of grants in for our film. This is one of a thousand reasons I haven't been online as much as normal, but a memorial for my grandma, filming, family medical crises and more are also on the list of reasons why I still think we're closing out the first week of January instead of the last. I am trying to change that, though, so I thought I'd start with a list post:

I developed a neat foodie/bookstore tour when my friend Michele (@readandbreathe) was in town last week. I urge any of you who come to visit to take me up on this next time you're through, although I'm really sad there wasn't time to take her to do Twin Peaks-y things up in the mountains. Not many people point out that the Salish Lodge, the site of Lynch's The Great Northern, has a gift shop full of OWLS. If you're a fan of the show, you understand why this is amazing and super creepy. This is also on the docket for any of you who want to come trek to the great Middle Earthy Pacific Northwest. 

Vasant and I are leaving for a mini-vacation in fifteen days. It's been over two years since our last real vacation and the elapsed time has been full of our growing business, several deaths, two jobs elsewhere, launching our company fulltime, our new documentary production, and a ton of other huge events. It feels like it's been a decade since our last vacation. In two weeks (and a day,) however, we will be resting and relaxing. In the middle of a project. We're putting our feet down and saying "Enough!" We're not going to wait until we get a lull in the work, because hopefully, there won't be one anytime soon. But we have a mini-lull, a dimple if you will, in our schedule after the next three grants are due, but before AWP begins and the bulk of our film traveling begins. 

While sifting through the stacks at Elliot Bay Book Company last week, I happened upon the greatest discovery: John Steinbeck wrote a King Arthur novel! I thought I'd read all of Steinbeck's stuff. Growing up in California, we'd go to Monterey and I'd read Steinbeck on the way down, wander Cannery Row, see the house he grew up in, and connect what I was reading with the town I was in. Vasant loves all things King Arthur. He has about ten copies of Malory's Le Morte D'Arthur, a copy of Tennyson's Idylls of the King, and T.H. White's The Once and Future King, along with a dozen more editions, including obscure Welsh texts. But neither of us knew of this. So when I found this, I had to get it for Vasant. He's been freaking out about it all this last week. If you like Steinbeck or King Arthur, check this book out.

Speaking of books, I've read Fangirl, Ready Player One, NW and The Round House so far this year. Considering this is on top of all the academic books I have to read for the film, I'm feeling pretty on pace with my reading list for the year. 

I met my second cousin Cathi at my grandmother's memorial last weekend. I'd met her before, but not as an adult, and I have to say, my siblings and I fell in love with her. She is hilarious, writes, organizes a bluegrass festival every year in Yosemite National Park, quotes cartoons, and is just utterly wonderful. There was a lot of reconnecting done at the memorial this weekend, not just with her but with many of my cousins, first tier, second tier, in-laws, etc. I think it would've made Grandma really happy, to see people drawing together like that. I still can't believe that she's gone. I miss her so much, but my great-uncle Tom, whom she practically raised, said that there was no better way to honor her than to reaffirm how important we all are to each other.

Januarys always pass by in a blur for me. Something about the thin, pale light glowing on the horizon through the fog obscures the dates on the calendar for me. I have to set extra alarms, keep stricter to-do lists, but February always rolls around, and I bounce back. Even with all this January entailed. 

I hope you've all had a good, non-blurry month, and if it has been blurry, February's only a couple days away.