Yesterday, in a frothy need to get the hell away from working on the house and job hunting, I went over to Tiff's place and we spent the day exploring the river from the Gurthrie to the Mill Ruins excavation to the Stone Arch Bridge and back around Harriet Island to Hennepin. It was a lovely day for it, steeped in history and tragedy and a feeling of connection to the past both good and bad.

There is a particular feeling being down by the river. St Anthony Falls is the only waterfall on the Mississippi, and it only exists now because of the man-made structure that keeps it from eroding the sandstone bed. The history of the Mill District is one in the throes of unbridled capitalism, which has both monumental industrial successes (the Stone Arch Bridge is a marvel of precision engineering) and horrible devastation of humanity and nature in its wake (worker safety took a far back seat to productivity and there were many injuries and deaths because of it).

We sent somewhere around three hours walking. It was glorious, though a bit foot-hurty by the end. And there were a few happy dogs along the way that got petted.

Later in the evening, we went to a friend's impromptu Halloween/birthday party and had a nice time watching horror movies and making fun as well as just general socialness. For being unplanned, it worked out really well.

And I realized that I'm self-confident again. Not egotistical or insufferable, but comfortable in my own skin and with my abilities. It's like I'm a whole being again, and I had forgotten what it was like.

It's about damn time. :)