Journeys End

When I was a kid, I always drew pictures of houses as having two windows set on either side of a door. I thought living in a house like Timmy's in the show Lassie, or Gidget, with windows that were not blocked by screens would be so cool. I could stick my head all the way out the window.

My new home is like that. The front of the house is a door and two windows. There are no screens on any door or window in the house. Surprisingly I find that most disturbing. While the area isn't overrun with flying roaches, there are bees, flies and mosquitos that are abundant, as well as many varieties of moths. Also, our four cats wander in and out of any open passage way that they find. They can and do scare me awake if my windows are left open enough to allow them passage. I thought the no screen thing was a lot cooler when I was a kid.

The house is a bungalow type style. It is located at the end of the street next to the rail tracks and interstate. In a weird way, it gives us a lot of privacy. Not many people come down this way. And when they do, the are either coming to see us, or they don't belong here and we know to keep an eye on them. The house across the street and the house next door actually face to a cross street. We are bordered by their back and side yards. Our front garden is the only one that faces the street on this block.

The rail road is noisy. But I have found that I do not mind the noise so much, nor the noise from the highway. I can only guess that comes from spending my earliest years living on Army bases. They aren't known for being places of peace and solitude. Besides, I slip my hearing aids out of my ears and I only hear a rumble of the actual noise.

The town is almost out of a screenplay. It is quaint and has the ability to be travelled by bike and by foot. It's charming. But most of the store fronts are taken up by business which aren't all that interesting to me, gyms, physical training, nail salons and coffee shops. There are also an abundance of physical therapist, chiropractors, herbalist, acupuncturist and psychics of all manner. Quirky, your name is Auburn.

In the vein of quirky, there is a disproportionate amount of the population walking around with "service dogs".  They get the quotation marks because as far as I can tell, most of these people when questioned, "Is that a service dog?" will answer yes. But when asked "What task does it preform for you?" don't seem to know that is an acceptable question and don't know how to answer it. "Service Animals" can be seen everywhere. In Georgia I may have seen one a month, if that. Here they are a regular part of any outing.

I was told that it always rains here. While it may be cloudy for parts of any day, in the past three months I can't claim to have felt rain-bound.  Most days seem to be sunny for parts of every day also. I have been able to get out and about almost every day.

At first, getting up and getting myself out on that fancy bike I bought last spring was a near impossibility. I did not feel stable on it. I feared that it wouldn't stop when I needed it too. I feared looking ridiculous if I toppled it over like at two year old. I can say that I have completely overcome those fears. I have gotten stronger while riding and I am a lot more bold in venturing out, even to roads where I might not totally feel are bike friendly. There are a lot of bikers here. There are a lot of pedestrians here. In the very least, I'm not the only one they will be gunning for. But everything is so close by here. With-in easy walking and biking distance is every kind of convenience that I could want, parks, libraries, museums, theaters, shops, bars and restaurants. Even casinos! Though I do not have any plans of visiting them. There is a hospital here, and all the doctors to run it. I still need to get on it, but have enjoyed my medical free summer.

Nature here is breath taking. I asked my niece, who grew up here if she still sees the overwhelming beauty of this place or is she so used to it, that her brain doesn't register it. She said that she thinks that sadly the latter is true. But I am not like that yet. when I round a corner and Mt. Rainer is in the distance, it grabs my attention. It is incredible. Last week we were on a road that I'd not been on before and I glanced over the side of a bridge. I was so amazed by the sight that I saw I gasped and said "Oh my" out loud.  Unfortunately, we were on a narrow bridge and there was no room to pull over, or even to stop beyond the bridge and be safe walking back. The view looked down into a mountain gorge and there was a waterfall to the side. How unfortunate that there was not a scenic view pull over on the bridge, but you can't make the whole state a scenic view stop.

Then we go around the corner and come face to face with this. Again, I gasped and warned my sister that there was a deer near the road. But this one was magnificent. Clearly it was the largest deer that I've ever seen. I even asked my sister if it might be a kind of moose or elk. It was at least that big. That brush that it was in was chest level for me. I'd say his head level, sans the antlers was seven and a half feet tall. I wasn't the only one in awe of him. My sister pulled the car over and several other cars pulled over too. He posed nicely for those of us who wanted pictures. He didn't even spook when a police car turned on lights and sirens to be official when investigating what had so much attention. He politely stayed in the culvert, chomping on brush.

This place is incredible.