First Snow
After a happy youth spent bumper-car-ing between snowbanks in Colorado, I have fallen out of touch with driving in the snow. Won't do it. Don't really have to. Sometimes, though, it sneaks up on you.
What happened was, Trish and Cairo lured me off the couch to hike up Larch Mountain. It was your average astronomically rainy Sunday. We thought we were prepared. We had an umbrella, a carload of people, and a carload snacks, along with a plus-sized dog to eat if things got really bad. What we couldn't predict was that on the way up the access road, the temperature would dive 15 degrees in as many minutes. No one saw the big fluffy flakes coming. No one thought they'd do anything more than harmlessly melt against the wet, dark road.
Now, snow is very beautiful. It makes the branches hang heavy. It collects the light. Everything is well defined, except for the treetops, which are buried in cloud ...
But eventually my tires stopped doing that thing they're supposed to do—making the car go. We peeled out a little, we floated around a corner on prayer alone, and when the road tilted slightly in the direction of a ditch, that's exactly where we went.
Getting stuck can be fun when you're only stuck for a little while and don't have to call a tow truck. It reminded me to buy new tires. It reminded me that the future is unwritten. It reminded me to always have at least one bad ass in the crew who will just fucking take charge and handle it—whatever "it" may be (thanks Mark!).
This is what the Columbia River Gorge looks like in November, and I ain't mad at it.
We found a new hike at a reasonable elevation. The fall colors were just fine.
Another day, another boring waterfall.
The Halloween Report
In honor of an important holiday, dressed up like a jedi princess and went to a legit costume party. Short Round from The Temple Of Doom was there, along with several bearded ladies and a contingent of potted cacti. Keg beer was guzzled, and everyone danced to Drake.
Frantically bailed water off my back patio to keep the basement from flooding. It's good exercise!
Floated down to Burnside on a river of rainwater and watched approximately 4 and half minutes of the 25 Year Anniversary. A metal band riffed. A guy destroyed his knee. A mortar exploded. Then we wandered off into the deluge.
Spent most of Sunday moving very little and eating whenever possible, including a biscuits and gravy brunch on Belmont Street with Trish and Cairo. It's motherfuckin' November!
That time Leia and Short Round kicked it.
Burnside 25 Year tarp city.
Office partyin' on Friday afternoon—a very Nemo Halloween!
Joyful reunions.
Positively October
The first week of October, already gone. And I turned 30 something last week. It was the loveliest day, I barely did a thing. Worked a little, skated a little, laid on the deck in the sun with the cat.
As I got to reminiscing on the past year, I realized something: this summer was the very best summer of my life. At least in recent memory. In non little kid memory. It came on hot and fast. We went swimming every weekend. I skated a ton and went out a ton—on warm Saturday nights, always pedaling my bike down Alameda Street, headed toward Alberta, toward friends, toward tacos. Brooding was near non existent, and wasted angst was kept to a minimum. It was great, I did what I wanted ... which is all you could ever really ask for in a summer.
Anyway, it should make all y'all 20 somethings glad to know. Things never dry up. There's always more. Nope, no shortage of bounty as the years go on. Trying to say the good times will be over at such and such an age—hey that's just a myth we keep telling ourselves.
September 25th
It's September 25th. It's officially fall. Most of which you already knew. Work has been wild, I've been chained to the desk. That's okay—good, even, because mortgages must be paid and brainpower must not go unused, lest it be lost for good under a pile of dust somewhere.
Seasons-wise, I'm down for fall. Then again, I'm down for all the seasons (excepting the month of February, which you can have cuz I just don't want it).
I've been trying hard to adjust to the fall stuff this year, though. The rain and the darkness. Calibration has been a little bumpy. I feel blah. Like I'm not getting out. The darkness comes swiftly and catches me unawares. "I was gonna go skate tonight!" I think. "I was gonna go wander!" I've got to reset the schedule, retune the frequency. Plug into the dark fall vibrations and start feeling the tremulous energy that they bring...
Hey California
I didn't like living in California and never wanted to be a "Californian." It was nothing personal. I just felt super strangled by the huge population and all that SoCal showmanship. Also, get this—I didn't like the fucking weather!
When I first moved to Portland, it was scummy—scummy with a heart of gold. Regular-ass people lived here! And hippies. And some rockers. I'm okay with all of these things.
Anyway, this is just a long-winded way of saying that I saw 2 things recently that made me stop and take note, made me really comprehend what we've all been thinking: Portland is becoming California.
1. The ABOVE photo of the Palmer glacier (or lack thereof) via KGW reporter Rod Hill's Facebook page. I guess it doesn't rain here anymore? And dang, remember when we used to snowboard on Mt. Hood in the summertime?!
2. THIS article reporting that a Bay Area investment company bought the Towne Storage building and kicked out all the renters. Later, Burnside! I mean it's only a matter of time ...
Complaining is whatever, and I try not to do it. "I miss the old blah blah blah ..." Also, memory lane can be tricky. I'm sure there were plenty of hate-able things about Portland a decade ago. However, I think it's okay to allow some room for nostalgia and to note that, despite there being no real inherent badness to change, if the things you moved here for aren't here anymore, then maybe it's time to make a change of your own?
Like, where's that next-next spot? I'm gonna be doing some thinking about this ...