Electrolicious

It’s no secret that I’ve been a total distaster-face lately. I decided that what might be best for my state of mind would be to get the hell out of dodge this weekend and go camping by myself. Unplug, unwind, hang out with the dog and sit quietly for a bit. But then, gah: camping. Where can I bring Sassafras that’s not an RV park? I’m too lazy to hike. How many hours will I have to drive? Do I need to make reservations at some lame car camping site? Hmm.

Then of course I realized oh, duh: my mother runs an eco-retreat less than an hour from my house. Maybe I could just go there? Hi, way to ignore the obvious answer, Ariel.

And so Friday afternoon I packed up my little dog, a couple books, my journal, almost three pounds of cherries, some Lindt chocolate, a few other key supplies and caught the ferry over to Bainbridge Island. My mother was out of town (she’d headed down to the Bay Area to visit my auntie Andrea, who’s recovering from an aneurysm — hi, family crisis time!) and so it was just me and Tere, my mom’s partner, on the property.

Tere made it clear that while she was around if I needed her (say, for glass of wine or whatnot) she would be leaving me to my own devices for the time I was there. And thus, it was just me. After wandering the trails for a bit, I settled into the moonlodge, which is a little yurt on my mom’s property.

The moonlodge’s most awesome feature is a wood-fired soaking tub on the deck, and I got started early with making a fire. I sat on the deck wrapped up in blankets with my little dog, alternately enjoying the view (trees! sky! lots of green!) and sniveling to myself.

When it got dark, I went inside and wrote for several hours, fueled by cherries, chocolate, and green tea. When the hot tub got hot enough, I soaked in it until it got too hot (oops: I overstoked the stove) and then laid out naked under the stars listening to frogs. Then I wrote some more. The hot tub was too hot to get back into, so eventually I fell asleep in a pile of blankets.

I woke up at dawn, and found the hot tub had cooled down to the perfect temperature, so I had a little drowsy dawn soak and listened to the birds before falling back asleep in the pile of blankets. I spent Saturday having breakfast with my father, playing with Sassafras in the forest (omg, she looooves the woods! who knew?), and then headed home on the 4:35 ferry.

Now, here’s the only challenge with going to my mom’s eco-retreat: I am an apathetic agnostic, sorta of the “don’t know/don’t care” mentality. I’m comfortable with this. By going to Sacred Groves I was somewhat expecting to be immersed in my mother’s spiritual practices — which I totally respect, but which aren’t my own. (Imagine being the pastor’s kid, but with more goddess statues, drums, and sweatlodges.) To my surprise, I found my little personal retreat out at Sacred Groves to be totally in sync with my own agnosticism. Sure, there was a li’l altar in the moonlodge, but there was also tea and blankets and pillows and candles and a nice place to sit and write where the only interruptions were particularly loud frogs. Pretty much perfect for me.

Seattle lady-friends, you should totally go and hang out with yourself for a night at the Groves. It’s like Olympus Spa, only you get to make a wood-fired hot tub, be by yourself, and sleep there. In other words, totally different, but really awesome. Just ask Vera — she’s been!

PS: If you want to see pictures of the property, check out my mom’s flickr stream.

PPS: Thanks to everyone who’s emailed me this last week. I’m super hermity these days and am being teh suck on replying, but I appreciate each message more than I can fully say.