Recently on a hot summer afternoon I padded around barefoot in the backyard doing my chores, reveling in the warm pavement/cool grass contrast, and letting the hose water dribble on my toes when I filled Geronimo’s drinking dish. Later that night I was in the bathroom standing on one foot and then the other, using soap and a washcloth to render my feet sheet-worthy, and suddenly I was nine years old again, sitting in a tent at Hat Creek, taking my evening bath.

From the time I was very young, my parents took my brother and sister and me camping at Hat Creek, situated near Mt. Lassen. That was before Interstate 5 up to Redding was built, so traveling meant a long, hot dusty ride up Highway 99, the smell of alfalfa blowing in through the opened windows (out which, occasionally, my sister’s and my feet were sticking — this was before seat belts). The names of the towns charmed me, even as a child — Corning (Olive Town!), Richfield, Maxwell, Arbuckle — as did my parents’ vacation rituals, such as my Mom’s warning that “It’s going to be hot going up through that Valley!” and my Dad’s vacation morning, “Let’s get this show on the road!”

My Dad was responsible for fishing-related duties and packing the car, my Mom was responsible for cooking, cleaning up, and taking care of the three kids, which included our nightly “sponge baths” in the tent, usually by flashlight — the lantern turned off to maintain our modesty lest our silhouettes be broadcast against the canvas. It always felt so good to climb into my sleeping bag at night after a hard day’s play, the sweet smell of Ivory soap filling my flannel cocoon as I drifted off to sleep in my sleeping bag, the grown-ups’ voices outside at the camping table lulling me to dreamland.

But the memory which flashed back to me as I stood in my bathroom washing my feet was the concept of “traveling clothes.” My mother took pristine care of her kids, even while camping, making two hot meals a day on her Coleman stove (lunches were sandwiches and cream soda) and, as mentioned, seeing to our ongoing hygiene. And one of her cleanliness rituals was making sure that, tucked at the very bottom of the suitcase, was a fresh set of traveling clothes for her children.

The traveling clothes were the shorts and shirts we weren’t allowed to wear for all the weeks of camping, because on the last morning, after our final wash-up, on would go the clean socks and fresh shorts outfits, usually smelling of cool canvas from being at the bottom of the stack. And getting into these outfits would be the last thing we did before clambering into the Mercury to make the long sad trip from the mountains down to the flat, treeless East Bay. I guess my Mom’s thinking was that when we stopped at gas stations or rest stops (I don’t recall ever eating at restaurants), her children were going to be scrubbed and well-dressed. When I think about the effort she put in to making that happen, my heart does something funny inside my chest.

I loved childhood camping with my parents more than any other thing. So, many decades later, I was shocked to overhear my mother say that she never enjoyed those trips — too much work. Well, yeah! Of course, why didn’t I think of that? We were all playing and “vacating” while Mom was doing the same work she did back home, except without hot and cold running water, bathtubs, refrigeration or a washing machine. But not once, not ever, did I hear her complain about it at the time.

I don’t know if our everlasting gratitude could ever make it up to her. It sounds a lot more romantic to say, “My Dad taught me how to catch and clean a trout” than it does to say, “My Mom taught me how to give myself a sponge bath in a pitch dark tent in the middle of the wilderness.” But to me, the latter is no less a skill.

These are some of the things I think about, when I’m in the bathroom, washing my feet.

I’m worried for us. This morning I was thinking about the many distractions which surround us on a moment-to-moment basis — no longer does television alone vie for our time and attention, we have available to us a variety of screens and gadgets. You know them; I need not name them.

And I began to wonder how many inventions and discoveries have been made across the ages by people who were…merely sitting. Thinking, pondering, reflecting. Have you heard of the German chemist Friedrich von Stradonitz? Apparently he was daydreaming about a snake forming a circle, and that led to “his solution of the closed chemical structure of cyclic compounds, such as benzene.” This story, by the way, hails from a Wikipedia entry on the concept of serendipity.

Another well-known story is that of Archimedes getting into his bathtub and noticing that the water level rose; by contemplating this he suddenly understood that “the volume of water displaced must be equal to the volume of the part of his body he had submerged. This meant that the volume of irregular objects could be calculated with precision, a previously intractable problem” [Wikipedia]. I don’t know how many of these stories are apocryphal but the question is still valid: Are we not doing enough sitting, thinking, staring, daydreaming? What do we know today because someone was perched on a hillside, looking up at the stars, noticing?

I’m no technophobe; I’m not suggesting a bonfire of iPhones — I just think it would behoove us to set aside a bit more porch-sitting, navel-contemplating time. Otherwise, I worry that our attention spans will narrow so perilously that we will become a culture without great thinkers, inventors, composers. And perhaps I’m worried for nothing; it could be that because these communications devices are relatively new and novel, we are like a child on Christmas Day, wild-eyed and grabbing for our toys and unwilling to put them down even to eat Aunt Edna’s turkey frittata brunch. Perhaps eventually we’ll get bored, discard our devices, and wander outside again, looking up and around us. There’s so much yet to discover — if only about ourselves. The inspiring poet Mary Oliver understood the importance of connecting to soul through the universe, and I’ll close with her perfect commentary, entitled “Sleeping in the Forest.” It makes me think that, when we are ready to put down our gadgets and walk outside, we will be welcomed back. At least, that is my great hope.

“I thought the earth remembered me,
she took me back so tenderly,
arranging her dark skirts, her pockets
full of lichens and seeds.
I slept as never before, a stone on the river bed,
nothing between me and the white fire of the stars
but my thoughts, and they floated light as moths
among the branches of the perfect trees.
All night I heard the small kingdoms
breathing around me, the insects,
and the birds who do their work in the darkness.
All night I rose and fell, as if in water,
grappling with a luminous doom. By morning
I had vanished at least a dozen times
into something better.”

I am insatiably curious about human nature and human nurture. My idea of a good time is noticing how people act and react, choose and decline, give and receive. It’s a good pastime for one who has chosen psychology as her field of study.

And it’s also convenient for one who’s employed by a psychologist. I can bring to him my questions about my planet-mates’ behaviors; he’s exceedingly educated and experienced and, in the year I’ve been there, I’ve learned quite a bit. Which brings me to my reason for writing.

Today he and I were discussing the possibility of ‘private parking’ signs for the office lot, and I told him my experience of living so close to the Sonoma Plaza that on holiday or event weekends, some people park in our private driveway, or block it. I launched my favorite question: “Why would someone do that?”

His explanation may seem obvious to some, but for me it opened up an entirely new way of understanding. He explained that there move among us “binary thinkers,” whose sole consideration when it comes to decision-making is “Does this serve my needs?” And if the answer is yes — no matter what the consequences or how it might hurt other people — the binary thinker will choose that self-serving action. Because I and most everyone know are sensitive to the cultural and legal restraints which order our behavior, I am now fascinated by the Binaries, and intend to watch for signs that I am in their presence.

As we finished our conversation, I asked the doctor, “Now, how common is this type of thinking? Because, maybe it’s just me, but it feels rather–” he interrupted me with a smile and asked, “Rampant?” I was quick to reply, “No. But common.” He said it’s primarily the reasoning of narcissists and other self-absorbed individuals. So I guess much depends on how common narcissism is in 2010 America — or at least in my little corner of it.

Thankfully, my day-to-day experience still confirms that most people are thoughtful, giving and kind. And I love to study them as well. When my husband, Neal, was going through the worst of his illness, one of my friends kept supplying us with rolls of quarters to do our laundry. If I hadn’t been so caught up in gratitude and could have put on my psych-student’s hat in that moment, I would have grilled her: What made you think of such a perfect way to help out someone in need? How did you get to be so heart-brilliant?

Answers to these and many other questions about who we are await me in the psychology courses I’ll be starting next month. And, who knows, with enough education and training, I may even come to fully understand the Binaries. And how to keep them from parking in my driveway.

Since I was a very young girl, my primary creative outlet has been with words. I had friends who could draw fabulous horses and cats; some who were talented in stitchery; still others who were the mini Paula Deens of the Easy-Bake Oven world. But I relied on my journals and poetry to express myself and into which I could pour my imagination and my artist’s soul.

That’s why it surprised me when, after my parents gave me my first-ever digital camera for my birthday last October, I found myself using it as a creative tool. I know how to reach out to people through my words; it had never occurred to me that I could speak to others through images.

I’m very much the beginner. I’ve not studied photography, nor am I familiar with the specifics of color, composition, et al. I may pursue those finer points as time and opportunity allow. But when I shared my spider-web photo on Facebook this morning, and a friend encouraged me to post it on my website, I realized that, perfect photos or not, I could use this blog to speak to readers not only through verbal observations, but through visual observations as well.

Therefore, I present here my very first photo gallery. I wouldn’t exactly call it Fine Art — but I can promise you it was Fun Art.

Spun Silk

Desert Shades

Psychedelic Bloom

Stark Beauty

Crossed by Light

Mirror Image