I managed to do everything on the list, yesterday and today, except paper organizing. The "writing" I did was actually editing, but until the short-short stories are finished, that's probably the way it has to be.
Getting back to the piano felt great. So did (to a lesser extent) studying Japanese and French. I devoted a large portion of my life to those three activities...pursuing them now feels like exercising three very underused and flabby muscles; but, with any luck, in four or five years, I might be able to get them close to the level they were at when I pushed them aside for everything else--caregiving, video production, writing.
We went to Montara State Beach today (since we were visiting someone in San Francisco and we all felt like taking a hike); it was high tide, and about ten minutes into our walk in Gray Whale Cove, my son was "attacked" by a rogue wave--he only got his pants and socks and shoes wet, so it wasn't a complete disaster, and I had stuffed (just a few minutes before our departure) an extra pair of pants for him, and two pairs of socks, into the backpack I took along for the trip. After changing him while he balanced on a log above the sand (supported from behind by my husband), I suggested we hike the Gray Whale Cove trail, which skirts the edge of the cliffs above the beach. The trail only lasted about a quarter mile; we walked past a restaurant (La Costanera, it's called), then found another trail on the other side of Highway 1 and off 2nd Street. We soon found ourselves walking through some of the only surviving wetlands marshes in all of San Mateo County, through a working horse farm, and beyond that, partway up Montara Mountain. My son's energy flagged pretty quickly, though we did manage to get a pretty good view of the entire cove before he had to turn around and go back to the car. My husband and I would like to hike to the top of the mountain the next time we return (probably without the little guy, for the time being).
Both my husband and I were cheered by the discovery of this set of trails--new to us--that meander through the parcels of land east of Montara and its beaches--once privately held, now (since the 1980s) open to the public. We were also discouraged to see how short a distance our son is capable of hiking these days (we only hiked for thirty minutes and he was already complaining of fatigue)...though it's true that he's had a very decent cough since a few days before Christmas, which has undoubtedly affected his stamina to some degree.
At any rate, it's the beginning of a new year, he's six years old, and I told him we're going to go hiking at least twice a week...increasing the distance little by little, until, hopefully, he can manage a five-mile hike with very few problems.
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