Mary Bellamy

Sigh. Being sick is never fun, especially when you're traveling long distances for workshops that cost a lot of money. And yet on New Year's Day I faced the inevitable fact that I was getting sick. But Texas awaited me!

Before I could get to Texas, I had to spend a night enjoying all that Boise has to offer. Insert obligatory potato joke here. For some reason, I've always thought that Boise wouldn't be a bad place to live. Turns out I was quite right.


They get really excited about the library here. The public transportation system was pretty easy, AND it goes from the airport right past Motel 6. For a mere $2 I got a day pass which afforded me numerous trips around the city. I even managed to squeeze in a visit to the Idaho State Historical Museum.

I didn't necessarily have to paddle upstream to get there. And no, I'm not breaking the rules by climbing in the display.

Ouch!

Of course, the ultimate goal of my trip was Texas. For some reason, I've always thought that Texas would be a bad place to live. Turns out I was quite right. There were lots of pavement and Republicans.


There were lots of bellydancers, too. On the left is the one and only Sharon Kihara, my main reason for going to Texas. On the right is Zymirrah, one of the organizers of the event.

Hooray for Bollywood! And for Reetu, who taught a classical Indian dance class that quickly morphed into Bollywood and dandi raas.

In time, I learned to tamp down my giddy schoolgirl crush on Sharon and play it cool around her. This was not that time. You can almost see me thinking "OHMIGOD!!!!! Sharon totally has her arm around me!!!"

When the final workshops were over, we headed out to whoop it up in the Historic Ft. Worth Stockyards. The natives were not prepared.

From left Kyla of Phoenix, Mary of Alaska and Zuza of Minneapolis. We were strangers, until I put a posting on the Internet looking for people to share a hotel room. Now we're just strange.

After four days and 11 workshops, I was tired. I was, ironically, just starting to get healthier. Zuza and I stopped and got a classy alcoholic beverage to drink out of a paper bag at our motel room at DFW.

I arrived home to weather 100 degrees colder and a boyfriend who had kept himself busy cleaning, building stuff and playing with our Lite Brite coffee table.