Things I did:
1. Visited Blue Moon Ranch in Woodland which is a REAL LIVE ALPACA RANCH. I learned all about alpacas for an hour an a half. Then I bought some yearn, spun from Minnie.
2. Hiked up to Hidden Peak (in under three hours, with my dad), topped the ridge, saw the view to the east–nothing but more mountains and blue air–and thought of the first two lines from “Praise to the End!”, one of my favorite Roethke poems. I looked up the other two lines this morning.
Arch of air, my heart’s original knock,
I’m awake all over:
I’ve crawled from the mire, alert as a saint or a dog;
I know the back-stream’s joy, and the stone’s eternal pulseless longing.
Of course, I forgot my camera for both trips (the picture of Minnie is from the Blue Moon Ranch website). And there were baby alpacas.