Spring Precipice

Guys, I'm always and forever in search of experiences with fun and meaning. Lately, they've been hard to find, though.

Where is all that joy we used to know?

For me, it both is and isn't the weather. It's the weather and the other stuff, like death, and like almost dying, and like being stuck in town—both literally (with snow and mudslides closing the passes) and figuratively (with a new puppy we must care-take instead of hopping a plane to Hawaii)—that have made this winter a winter to hibernate.

However, in a rare act of magnanimity this weekend, the sky got sunny over Beaverton skatepark on a Saturday who's forecast had preambled rain showers, allowing me to do what I like, which is skateboarding, outside, in the sun, with friends. No small miracle.

Then, on Sunday, we got up early and drove into the Gorge to skate more and climb a mountain, where we walked through glowy green fields, sun dappled, flower dappled, with silver river waters off in the distance.

It wasn't the nicest weekend, as weekends go. But it was nicer than any in recent memory, juicing with enough of that second-tier happiness I needed to pull me back from the precipice—out there where I was teetering, close to becoming so grumpy, I'd be forever lost to the lands of Curmudgeon.