Reader: Welcome to Latvia!

I was in the airport last week for six hours. And while I was there, I had a moment of pure ______________. It occurred to me that I had my passport and enough funds on my person to get out of the country. Options: Casablanca, Lima, Sydney, Riga, Hong Kong, Ulan Bator.

Seriously. I could have been gone. Just gone. Deferring problems so great and terrible that the very wizard himself would have fled the curtain and run screaming from the set. I could have been drinking fermented horse milk (and stuff like that). In Ulan Bator. (Latvia, I hear, is also an excellent option. Someday I will go).

I did not board a flight for some foreign land. I exited the airport and took my passport and my small accumulation of cash (some of which isn't even mine) and went... home.

Instead I am going to try to make my life work. Fix up the broken pieces and toss out that which cannot be fixed. All from right here: New York City.

Latvia will have to wait, but when I do make it there, I sincerely hope that I am wearing a set of raggedy overalls.

And how are you?

Love,

Nina

PS Photo from some recent decade when overalls were fashionable (at least among us Target dwellers). I still wear those sometimes...)

Who are these people?

Bibi - God bless the guy who gets Bee. I can't even think of anything obnoxious to say about her. She can eat pasta without gaining weight, she can run the ridges at Gertrude's Nose with no fear, and she is by miles the best climber of all of us. She's going to Kili with us. Hell, she'll be leading.
Buzz Elder Brother. Cross me at your peril.
Jib computer wizard, entrepreneur, stand-up comedian, stand-up guy I can count on to catch a movie and hold hands in the dark without it having any meaning whatosever. Every woman needs a man like Jib.
Joe - locquacious, flirtatious, 40-something hiking buddy - also, ex-manfriend of Pax.
Larry, WPITW - climber, hiker, badass (not in the good way, either). At a given moment, at least half of us are not speaking to him.
Liam - My nephew, whose favorite words are "noing," "Bobby," "dumptruck," "job-site" and "Daddy." He also says "obstreperous" "pulchritudinous" and "Nina" upon request.
Merry - Australian BFF spends the summers on a yacht, nannying for a celebrity couple with two children. She lives in a brownstone and she has a chauffeur. And we have no idea who she works for.
Newsy has been my friend for about 22,000 hours. Or more. I don't have a calculator. She has about 3423% more professional and personal commitments than I do, and yet she still finds time to think about me. I find this astonishing. If you knew her, you'd be astonished, too.
Pax - climber, hiker, corporate warrior, used to date Joe. Sticks by Larry in spite of his horribleness. None of us understands this.
Skatey- he rides a skateboard. He can dance. He can throw a frisbee and he's not bad at karaoke, either.
Sri - Bengali princess who, aside from kicking my ass at climbing, and aside from being a smokin' hiker, brought down the evil empire of Larry and also once told me that "even girls' are turned on my breasts." Also never turns down "one more round."
Supajewie - Long distance drinking buddy, just about the only person I know who "gets it". And no, she's not Jewish. It's a long story.
Tex - is what happens when you take a normal man, add alcohol, subtract common sense and tact, and then buy him another drink.

English Teacher Disclaimer

I teach English, and I sometimes get a emotional about grammar, punctuation, and usage. I sometimes write posts about other people's grammar - or mine. This does not mean, however, that my blog is without errors. I constantly go back and edit for typos and sometimes even... misspelled words *clutching skull and gagging*. If you find a mistake feel free to call me out on it. I will persist in making mistakes whether I attempt to catch them or not, and I will continue to be my bitchy English teacher self despite my capacity to screw up just as often as the next person... and maybe more.