Ew, seriously, so gross!

There are times when you're just so proud of your kid.

Like when she first stands to walk, or speaks her first subject-verb sentence, or pedals her bike up the sidewalk all by herself.

And then there are other times when you just stand in awe.  Like when she belts out her first real solo audition for a role in the cast of the local community theater's upcoming production, or recites an entirely memorized long poem or Bible passage by heart with palpable expression, or stands up on her pedals and maneuvers her bike through a tricky rock-garden with natural finesse.

Or when, while out on an evening walk together, she chomps down on the last bite of her store-bought peach and observes, "Look, my pit has a hole in it."

Red Tank Draw

We hiked into Red Tank Draw east of I-17 at exit 298 today.

We'd set out with the intent to hike a few miles up the Bell Trail beside Beaver Creek this morning, but it was slammed, both the main parking lot and the overflow lot up the hill from the trailhead were full.  So we backtracked about a half-mile and parked the car in a turn-out near the one-lane bridge that passes over Red Tank Draw, which looked quite inviting beneath an ample canopy of cottonwoods and sycamores and was flowing a bit with monsoon runoff.

Slow ride with flowers

This morning I reattached the Surly Nice Rear rack to the Pugsley and loaded up one of our big JANDD trunk-bags with my tools and tubes so I could wear my Cotton Carrier camera vest and carry my D40 on my ride today instead of my Camelback hydration pack.

These days I always have my iPhone with me when I'm out.  And, because it takes such nice pictures, I hardly ever take my Nikon on rides any more.  The iPhone is undeniably a fine lightweight camera, especially with an Olloclip lens attached, but it will never compare to a DSLR with a 50mm f/1.8 lens.

Be not afraid

Yesterday, as we pulled the tandem off the trail at one of our well-established top-of-the-ride snack-stops, my daughter noticed a young horned lizard darting through the duff and detritus nearby.

"Look, daddy!  A lizard!" she shouted.

"Catch it!" I proposed.  And, after a brief chase, she did, cupping her hands gently over the tiny beast and bringing it back for me to admire.  I was pleased to see how confidently she pursued and caught it, and also with how tenderly she handled it while it was in her grasp.

Run What Ya Brung

Way back when, when I was just a kid, we did lots of cool stuff with my dad.

Before we were old enough to ride our own motorcycles, my dad would take all of us, me, my two little brothers and himself, all over the Prescott National Forest riding four-abreast on his putt-putt 1960-something Honda Trail 90, to see extinguished forest fires, explore abandoned rail-beds, count ladybugs at the Potato Patch, drop rocks down deep-dark mine-shafts, crawl cautiously into abandoned adits, and swim in lakes or secret deep pockets only we knew of along the Rich Gulch creek.  We didn't wear helmets in those days, heck no!  But the Honda wasn't geared to go over about 20 miles an hour.  

First Tracks

Saw not a soul on my ride today

Schicksalslied

Wie Wasser von Klippe Zu Klippe geworfen 

Jahrlang in's Ungewisse hinab.

Though I always envied them and their well-coordinated ways, I was never a sports-kid growing up. I never played Little League or Pop Warner, and the truth is I really didn't want to.  I knew from the school playground that I lacked the innate abilities my friends possessed to catch and run and tackle and all else that was required to play ball-sports with finesse.  

But I've always loved to sing.  And it's my good fortune that many of my teachers recognized my passion for singing from an early age.  Despite the fact that my voice is neither golden nor unique, in lieu of membership on seasonal sports teams I have always felt at home as a member of a choir or an ensemble of singers.  I've been able to find interesting groups with which to sing pretty consistently throughout my life.