I've been walking home from work the last couple of days.
It's lovely out of course; winter Portland weather. Dark, so I can admire the downtown cityscape and then, the reflections above the shiny river. I house-shop, picking one and then another house to be my ultimate residence. Vanity, or comfort? I grin at my flip-flops. There's just enough variety in the drizzle to make me picture the variations in the clouds above. I love this climate. I love the smells of the soil, cuddled in its new blanket of leaves, a solstice gift from the trees above. The smell of bark and cedar, juniper and holly. Perfect.
The bus was taking me through this route, too fast. The drivers at night are philosophers, given to commentary on the world that whirls past our fishbowl view, in a way the daytime drivers seem uninterested in. (In LA, the busses have signs saying Don't Talk to the Driver.) As charmed and warmed by these encounters as I've been, I still like the speed that Home comes to me when I walk.
It's infinitely preferable to being alone in my car, at least for commuting. In LA, I'd informally polled people on whether they would take mass transit or not. Most would reply that it's impractical for their route, hours, etc. I could tell most had not even considered it. The more honest ones would say, "I need my alone time."
For me, that "alone time" had a large percentage of literal screaming and sobbing. Funny how the "need" to do that diminishes on mass transit and disappears when I walk. Coincidence?
I loathe commuting. It's boring, wasteful and bourgeois. It teaches people to not care about the problems that pass by one's gaze. Whereas, if one's "commute" is one's own neighborhood, one stays engaged. Why is that garbage sitting there? Why is that building being neglected? Why are their so many homeless people gathering in that area? It's different when it's your neighborhood. And oddly, I noticed that the longer a person's commute was, the more limited a conversationalist they seemed to be. Coincidence?
People tell me that I'll really enjoy the days getting longer and the fantastic spring bloom that overtakes Portland. I respond that it's pretty great now.
Saturday, December 29, 2007
The Walk Home Teaches Me
End of the Year Omelette
Whilst cooking what turned out to be a perfect omelette for my dinner, I had a thought
The omelette was magnificent- free range eggs, spinach, brown rice with toasted sesame seeds, fresh-ground black pepper and cinnamon, with slivers of pepper jack and sharp cheddar. Photogenic in the pan. I paused to admire it, and thought of the journey the ingredients had each taken to reach this point. The benevolence of strangers in wanting me to have these gorgeous things to eat. How blessed I was to have them.
Life took on a glow at that point.
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It feels good to finally "get it."
PS the photo I've used is owned by this New Zealand website
Wednesday, December 26, 2007
Tuesday, December 25, 2007
Santa Loves Portland
All the Best children live in Portland. With the possible exception of the little boy who pulled Santa's beard, right before this little girl came up.
See? It was real, because Santa is real.
And you better not have made Santa mad, or we won't get any presents.
A White Christmas in Camelot
This enchanting town doesn't miss a trick.
I was writing away on my resident slice of Mac magic, and got up for more coffee to see- SNOW! Fat snowflakes falling, a white Christmas. I haven't been in a place with snow in years. I love that it snowed on Christmas. I also love that it didn't stick! : >
Here's a pic I took of my little Rudolph. I was going to write a whole story about "Giant Rudolph Takes Over City, Vows Revenge for Childhood Bullying" or some such. But I saw some other things like that, notably a dub of the "Scrubs" people to the Charlie Brown Christmas Special" and it made me sad, And angry. I'd thought it was going to be a homage. So, I'll put this on here to confess that yeah, I thought I was real clever, too. But I'm not writing the rest of what I was going to write. Besides, I watched all my Christmas Specials again this year. That Rudolph is already got some bizarre subtext to it! But I love it (the restored version with the extra songs) and enjoyed it.
Hope you had a happy and joyous day.
