Back from a quick day-hike up Mt. Si with my girls and as always I return breathing a little deeper. It was clear and hot in the open but cool under the canopy of doug firs and big-leaf maple, which are already starting to turn colors. A good day, and a much-needed pullout from the mental and emotional gridlock that I've been trapped in the last couple weeks.

When you're feeling swinish the easiest thing to do is just keep feeling worse. The downward fucking spiral. Thought processes tend to degrade into "if only." If only we were somewhere else. If only we had more money. If only we could be traveling. If only we could travel and then come back, somewhere else, with money. This always precludes your living in the present tense, even when the moments you're living are special--say your daughter's 1st birthday. A curious holographic feeling takes over as if you're watching yourself acting a certain way instead of just being there. On a different level, this can also be how it feels when you're covering something as a writer or journalist.

The panacea for me has always been the woods where, blessedly, nothing meets at a right angle or runs on time. Today we sweated up a dozen switchbacks, stopping below a giant red cedar for lunch--slicing up cheese and avocados, feeding fat orange wedges to Layla--who I've found to be the eating partner I've missed all these years, unashamedly messy, not one for small portions, and fully aware that throwing food is some of the most fun you can have.

After lunch we put Layla in the baby sling and started up towards the Big Mt. Si cutoff. As the terrain steepened the dense understory of sword ferns and Oregon grape opened up and you could see down into the Snoqualmie river valley, and the sun glinting off the windows of the houses in North Bend. The river running very low but was still audible, its sound amplified in the giant valley and reflected up the mountainside.

Layla slept for the next hour of steep climbing, and then woke up when we stopped above an exposed crag. I often wonder what it's like falling asleep in one place like she does and then waking up somewhere else. When this happens I usually explain to her where we are even if she doesn't really understand yet. The words, the tone, just being there in that way--it still counts for something.