Red Rover Moves To Washington

I had thought I would either like or need to write more about leaving Alaska than I have so far written.  After all, I spent two wonder-packed years traveling all over the state, encountering people, places, perspectives and situations I would never have been able to foretell.  Some things I managed to write about, more I didn't, but it's probably not over yet.  The telling, I mean.

 When I was younger, I used to think about those people who could live remotely and off the grid in Alaska.  I wondered if I would indeed be able to manage something like that, keep my sanity in the least, and for the most, love and need to do it at the cost of whatever sacrifice might be required.  I usually like the part of life about testing my mettle.  By the time I was lifted to Alaska, however, I had long since grown out of that youthful daydreaming about cabins and snowshoes and long periods of solitude.  I lost interest, except for a few small forays into wondering if Alaska was indeed as grand and marvelous and strangely alluring as people had claimed.  I never entertained the possibility of living there...until...well, we know pretty much the most of the rest of that story.



Part of an Alaska story to come later becaue I just realized I haven't told this one yet and it's a doozy!

For now, I have begun a brand new story, another that came quite unexpectedly. It starts, I'm going to say, in Olympia, Washington.  Now here is a place I can say I have never had the remotest interest in visiting, let alone living in, until the opportunity knocked me off my haunches. (Although I do remember spending about 3 weeks in Stanwood and on Camano Island way back in the early 80's--another tale for another time, except to say I loved those wild blackberries and fresh-caught salmon in people's back yards.)  Not that I had anything in particular against Washington State.  I just had so many other fish to fry, as they so cleverly say, but honestly, it seems like all the places where I end up are places I didn't really think of in the beginning on my own--they were just means or by-products to other ends--so why belabor this point any longer!

Well.  I am so happy here I could burst.  Just like I was in Alaska, and San Francisco, and Korea, and New Mexico and Colorado and yes, even in Utah.  Well, maaayybee not to the thrilled bursting point in Utah.  There was a time I did not want to be there, but in the end--the last end, which isn't to say the final end, necessarily--I was quite content with my life there.  It was a comfortable home with avenues for some adventure and loving relationships and not a few heartbreakenly poignant miracles.

I love my work but I can't really write a whole lot about it due to the confidential nature of most of what I do, which is kind of too bad because I know some very courageous, funny, inspiring, off-the-wall, giving, dogged and tenacious people associated with this work.   I have to resort mostly to show and tell about the area and more public events or people. 

So, here goes the first part:

I live at the end of Steamboat Island Rd. in a place called Carlyon Beach Community.

That's a heron perched upon the piling.

Night of the Supermoon

The Beginning.  Again.