Fun in the Sun

It’s the end of my first vacation day in Arizona, and I must be having fun.  My shoulders are a cheery pink, my baby blue capris sport an olive green blot from a poorly aimed scoop of guac at happy hour, and I’ve just finished my second glass of pinot grigio after a rousing discussion with my father about how the slightly sweeter white compares to pinot gris.  I spent the day like a rotisserie chicken in the sun, and squeezed in a pedicure:  “vampire” was the key word on the laquer’s label.  Other than missing Tom, I am ridiculously happy.  Everyone should bail out of Washington during late March.  When I stop to think about home, I see a veil of mist.  Cold mist.  Oh how nice it is to stop steaming.

Today, Sherry, Sharon, and I planned the rest of the visit.  Tomorrow, with highs in the eighties predicted and no wind, we will do a run in the morning followed by a couple sessions at the pool.  Friday evening we’ll have happy hour and dinner at San Tan Flats, an outdoor bar and grill south of Mesa, enjoyed particularly for the circle of fire pits and live music.  We’re hoping for a dance floor extravaganza by Shea.  Saturday, Sherry, Dad and I intend to inspire awe at a local golf course–awe that Dad would be willing to be seen on the course with Sherry and me.  Sunday, we plan to do more of nothing and top that off with dinner at Tia Rose’s.  Sharon says, “If you want to go for Mexican Food, they’re the best!”  Monday we’ll latch onto anything sturdy as Dad and Sharon try to drag us into the van to head to the airport for the ride home.  Dang, the days will go fast.

The danger in planning the week is that it seems over too soon.  So to ward that off, we are paying close attention to the moments.  Like the moment today the Mexican jewelry salesman chased me down the street to point out that I’d just walked away from his table without paying for the earrings I was now wearing.  Realizing he was right, I promptly and apologetically gave them back, explaining that I hadn’t brought my purse with me to the market.  I’d need to wait for Sharon who was the only one of us with her purse, but she had disappeared into the market crowds.  Nodding at my explanation, he suggested I pay less–”How ’bout $25?” he said.  “Great!” I agreed, but I still needed Sharon’s money.  “Okay,” he said, “$20.”  “Yeah!   Sounds great!  I’ll bring you $20.”  And when Sharon showed up, I did.   The little  silver half-moons with sad faces now dangle silently beneath my ears, proof of my deft negotiation skills.

By six P.M., the sun is heading for the western edge of the Phoenix valley, and Dad is preparing steaks for the grill.  It’s been breezy this afternoon, but the weather folks have promised a calm for tomorrow.  I’m ready to return to the book I began this afternoon until dinner, and then plan to return to it again before bed.  Four more days in the sun left; I hope I can bank enough vitamin D to get me to July in Washington.

Visiting Spring

As a well-seasoned Washingtonian with a layer of moss to prove it, I know that if I’m ready for spring and it’s nowhere to be found in my neighborhood, I’d better go hunt it down.  So I’m headed to Arizona, with my sister and niece, for a week of reintroducing my post-winter, mole-like self to the sunshine.  Sharon called yesterday to gently break the news that the weather forecast for our visit  is stingy, predicting highs in the seventies only.  Sharon was concerned about Sherry’s and my plan to lay claim to the side of their pool each day and make like solar panels recharging our batteries.  Temps in the seventies seemed a tad cool to Sharon, who had to visit Hawaii recently to get away from the Arizona heat.  I reassured her that anything over forty-eight degrees and dry would be welcome. For Sherry, Shea and me, nothing short of someone planting a “Beached Beluga Whales” sign next to us at the pool would deter the great white pilgrims from the north.  In fact, the sign might just serve to save our places when we make icy drink runs. 

For the past few winters, I have managed to get my chilly, gray self down to Mesa for a shot of ’shine, good times with Dad and Sharon (They put the “happy” back into happy hour when we swill the grape on their sun-warmed patio in the late afternoon), and a daily agenda that begins and ends with nothing.  On occasion, Tom has been able to join me, and the two of us usually insert a hike or two into the visit.  Tom must sweat to relax.  Only if he has muscle soreness can he consider himself on vacation.  This year the trip is noteworthy because I’m travelling with my younger sister, Sherry, and her four-year-old daughter, Shea, who is independence personified.  While typically, I spend much of each day in AZ with a paperback wrapped around my face, I expect I’ll be playing grudge matches of Chutes and Ladders when I’m not serving as a human pool toy.

While anything I can do in Arizona I could do in Washington, there’s something about shedding the gore-tex that intensifies one’s experiences.  I plan to get a pedicure, for example.  There is no shortage of pedicure palaces in Washington, I know, but it’s titillating to think I can get my toes painted and then show them off!  In Washington, I’d have to swaddle those magenta-tipped toes in a mummy bag of smart wool to avoid suffering hypothermia on my way back to the car.  And golf.  I golf about once every three years up here in the bogs.  In Washington, golfing is an invitation to a drenching.  Imagine cocking your driver in anticipation of a power swing on the ball, and all the while knowing that from nature’s point of view, you are a handy lightening rod.  In Arizona, people get tanned on the golf course.  In Washington, I get steamed–but that’s more a commentary on my handicap…which is my golfing.

Even at its best, Washington’s spring doesn’t pack the bright heat of Arizona.  But an Arizona spring can remind me of what I love about Washington.  After a couple days of early spring rain in Mesa, the desert will explode with color.  Cacti will go suddenly green and swell to bursting, proud of their greedy slurping of all that water.  The cobalt-blue sky,  luminous sun, and unexpectedly green desert evoke Washington in summer.  My visit to Arizona is my tether to the hope of a sunny day in Washington, remembering through the long, drizzly dark season that light and color will come.

The Girl Scout Cookies of Memory

You know you’re getting old when you say things like, “Girl Scout cookies sure don’t taste like they used to.”  I found myself playing the crone this week as I worked my way through a box of the chocolate mint variety.  I could have sworn that the box used to be bigger, the cookies fatter and laced with a layer of mint filling.  I’m sure two cookies, in the past, were immensely satisfying as compared to the handful I must now eat to register I had a Girl Scout cookie moment.  The whole cookie experience seemed disappointing this year somehow.  Forget the four dollar price tag–I get that.  Hell, a pint of beer will cost you that.  No, it’s not the money, it’s the clash of present day with memory.  Girl Scout cookies used to be a delight and now they’re a disappointment.  Is it the cookies or me who’s changed?

Yes, I fear codger-dom has come.  While you wouldn’t hear me begin most commentaries with the phrase, “In my day,” I have to admit I’m often thinking it.  I’m often thinking about how turned upside down the world has become.  When I was a kid the admonitions to save your money, pay for things in full, and avoid debt seemed pretty clear; I didn’t even get a credit card of my own until I was in my early thirties.  But every morning for the past few weeks I have heard NPR reporters lament the dire state of the economy and wring their financial reporter hands over the American public’s refusal to go out there and borrow a bunch of money.  It would save the economy, the experts tell us.  But what if I lose my job, I reply; I won’t be able to pay that money back.  How is it that to be personally responsible is to imperil our collective economic well-being?  When did that conundrum come about? 

Memory is a funny thing.  It’s a view that changes over time.  The content of  my past may be fixed, but what I make of it is ever in flux, the result of accumulating experiences causing shifts in perspective.  Tom says that the Girl Scout cookies don’t do it for me anymore because my tastes have refined.  Having tasted Belgian chocolate, how could a Girl Scout cookie compare?  Yes, I get that, but that lets the cookie off the hook, suggesting its quality hasn’t degraded, rather my expectations have soared.  And while I’ve acquired a more sophisticated understanding of economics over thirty years than my own personal balance sheet, I contend that it’s not simply the limitations of my memory at work when I scratch my head over the problematic message that I should take out a loan to buy a car or a hot tub, or one more big screen T.V.  In my day, we were expected to do our best and be responsible.  Have you had a Girl Scout cookie recently?

So though I may sound like a wagging finger with an old lady attached, most of you know that I don’t even have a single gray hair yet (no, I don’t, Shelley).  I’m smack in the middle of middle age, in fact.  But I think I’m seeing the future–my future–where I am increasingly incredulous about what passes for good and true.  If my memory serves, Girl Scout cookies were once something to look forward to in early spring.  A delicious treat that doubly rewarded: they tasted great and you felt great supporting those Girl Scout girls.  Watching my savings account grow and my debt diminish used to be unmitigated pleasure, and a pleasure with an attendant sense of moral superiority to boot.  Memory at play or not, I don’t much care for a world that tolerates mediocre cookies and meretricious economics.

The Limits of Online Match-Making

Saturday afternoon Tom and I went to visit Dora and Spot.  The Humane Society of Tacoma is located in Nalley Valley among a throng of warehouses. Tom and I had immediate respect for the many volunteers who keep the place running.  They not only must tolerate the intense doggie smell but also the cacophony of yips, woofs, whimpers, and deep bass barks, which had our ears ringing by the time we left the shelter.  From the chart notes of each dog’s care to the procedures for viewing, meeting, and adopting a pet, the Humane Society was thorough in how it provided information to prospective adopters and protection for the very vulnerable adoptees. 

We toured the kennels to see who else besides the boxer mixes we’d come to see might be worth an interview.  Tom found a dog named Copper, a lab vizla mix who was charming.  But we decided to spend  the limited time we had with Dora and Spot.  Before we could meet and greet the pups, we had to fill out an adoption application, be interrogated by the hund Gestapo, and finally, having passed inspection, we were allowed ten minutes with each of the prospective adoptees in an eight by eight cinder block room.  Spot first. 

The brindle boxer mix was a happy guy, but distractable.  Tom liked him.  I think it was his gender.  I found Spot to be, well, a spot.  He didn’t have much to distinguish himself from any other run-of-the-mill dog.  He was willing to sit pretty for a biscuit, and he played nice, more or less, but I didn’t connect.  Tom, on the other hand, found spot to be enjoyably energetic and promising.  After a short visit, we returned Spot to his cell and brought Dora to the visitation room. 

Dora is sheer white with the faintest of orange spots beneath her nearly translucent surface.  The curve of her body reminds me of my mother’s whippets, though Dora is beefier.  When we invited her out of her kennel, she was quite shy, not even sure she wanted to meet us.  Then I walked her from the kennels to the visitation room, and she didn’t pull on the leash even once.  I was hooked!  A dog that walks without dragging me along like a snag that caught on her leash–what a joy!  Dora was tentative at first as we attempted to play with her.  We offered her a handful of doggie biscuits, but Dora wasn’t the least interested.  This was a new experience for us also, since Ruby will do anything for a morsel, including an impression of Groucho Marx if it would get her her an extra kibble.  Dora was clearly not motivated by food–at least for now.  In fact, she was most motivated to find cover; she was shaking and trying to crawl under the bench we were sitting on.  I was worried that Dora was too timid and fearful to be a dog we would consider.  But as we sat there and cooed her name and petted her softly, she found a tennis ball to mouth, and decided we weren’t much of a threat after all.  Before a few minutes had passed, the three of us were playing nicely with the ball, and unexpectedly, Dora looked up at the both of us with a cockeyed grin, her tongue lolling to the left out the side of her mouth.  A-Dora-ble!  By the time our visit was up, Dora had sat on command several times and finally nibbled part of biscuit, almost as if to please us. 

When we returned Dora to her kennel, a little beagle mix puppy sharing her pad launched onto Dora in welcome.  Dora shoved the puppy away with a paw, and when the little beagle persistend, Dora let out a firm barky warning to lay-off.  I was glad to see this spirit in her and rooted her on.  Tom, elsewhere in the kennels, missed Dora’s demonstration of spunk.

Before we left we discussed next steps with the adoption counselor.  She suggested we bring Ruby on Monday, and we all could go for a walk to see how the two might get along.  I asked if Dora was likely to be adopted in the meanwhile, and the counselor assured me there was little opportunity, since the shelter is closed on Sunday.  Tom could see that I had already decided that Dora would be moving in with us, so he pointed out that we’d need to take a walk with Spot, too, since he was a contender.  Later, on the drive home, Tom told me he liked Spot better than Dora and had reservations about both the boxers.  He was concerned they’d be much bigger dogs than we had in mind, and that their thin coats would preclude their sleeping outside.  The more concerns and questions Tom enumerated, the more I realized that Dora wouldn’t be coming to live with us.  Since before Snow died, we agreed that Tom would get to pick out the next pup, and I only had right of refusal.  I was glum.  I began to run through everyone I know who might need a dog, hoping to find Dora a home.  She was a doll.

So it’s the end of the weekend, and there are two little boxers sitting at the Tacoma Humane Society whose hopes we raised.  I know I’m anthropomorphizing, but still.  If you need a dog, please pick Dora.

Ruby, The Midnight Rambler

I am bleary-eyed and foggy-brained this morning.  Just like every morning for the past few weeks.  Since Snohomish died, Ruby has been sleeping in our bedroom at night–I use the word “sleeping” liberally.  It seems Ruby has the same biorhythms as Ian, my college-aged son.  She prefers to sleep until noon and party during the wee hours.  She doesn’t understand why poking me in the eye with a wet nose at three a.m. doesn’t produce as much wagging of my tail as hers.  In fact, it elicits from me a string of words so blue you’d think I’d done a tour in the navy.  But Ruby doesn’t care; any display of enthusiasm is welcome.

We are really in a quandry today.  Tom and I agree that midnight mice-hunting in the garage could be fun if neither of us worked.  But we do.  Ruby doesn’t understand this at all.  The mouse that ran across my slippers last night (in the garage, again let me emphasize;  I don’t want you to think ill of my housekeeping) hours before dawn is clear evidence to our quite logical dog that her pack ought to be up and at it until the rodent threat is dispatched.  Mice don’t scurry during daylight, Ruby argues.  Make mouse-meat while the moon shines, she says with a cock of her head and a furious whir of her amazing tail.  Fine, we thought, then stay in the garage and mouse all you like.  We’re going to bed.  But one does not a party make, and Ruby’s whines and frantic door scratching at nigh on to four a.m. propelled Tom to retrieve the pointer, who again joined us in the bedroom.  I’m guessing that in our absence, the mice may have ganged up on Ruby.  She’s a brave hunter as long as her prey doesn’t turn around and look at her.  Last summer she would stare at garter snakes in the rock wall on and off all day, beautifully frozen on point as is characteristic of the Brittany breed, and as soon as a wicked red tongue flicked in her direction, she’d spring two feet off the ground in a vertical leap enviable to basketball players everywhere.  When it comes to games of chicken with critters, Ruby’s the chief cluck.

So last night’s fun and games must be the last if Tom and I have any chance at acuity again.  As we slouched over our coffee and lemon bars this morning (breakfast of champions, thank you very much), I suggested we move up the date for finding Ruby a kennel mate.  “Must love mousing” became another line on our list of agreeable doggie qualities for the new hire.  I popped open my lap top, navigated to www.petfinder.com , and searched nearby options.  We discovered “Spot” and “Dora” at the local Humane Society shelter.  Each is a boxer mix, several  months old, and noted for being sweet, intellgent, and energetic.  I called the shelter and learned we could come on down and make their acquaintance.  We then looked up information on boxers and found some very promising bits.  Boxers are loyal, intelligent, and  fairly easy to groom.  But they need firm training, attention, and exercise–lots.  There was also a warning that they were not compatible with chickens and rodents.  The latter was good news; the former, well, we’ll have to see if a Spot or Dora might like Ruby anyway.

I’m pretty sure we’ll be heading down later today.  I’ll follow up here.  By photos alone, I’m leaning toward Dora, but Tom’s a bit more inclined toward Spot.  Click on the photos below for a better view and some information.

 

Everywhere, Quiet

When Tom suggested in early January that we take a late winter holiday to Winthrop, I turned my persona dial to “supportive,” and said sure.  It wasn’t that I was reluctant to visit the far north country of Washington at the end of  February; after all, the Methow Valley is a truly beautiful locale any time of year.  I just knew I would be craving sunshine and heat like an early waking rattle snake about that time of year, and the western-themed mountain town of Winthrop, known for its network of Nordic ski trails, wasn’t going to do it.  Nonetheless, as a seemingly longer-than-normal February drew to a close, I was pleased to be going anywhere–away. 

For the last few months, and looking toward the next couple, my work schedule has been a cup runnething over.  I am grateful though, because I have no idea what to expect next school year.  Most of my consulting is done in school contexts, K-12 through college, and with deep budget cuts anticipated for state schools, I may see far less demand for my services next fall.  Fearing that, I have been trying to say yes to nearly all requests this winter and spring, not only to squirrel away resources but to show-and-tell what I can do to anyone interested.  The result, predictable of course, is that I’m pooped.  Tom’s plan to bail outta town as winter exhaled its last cold breath was prescient.  I was packed and loaded in the truck last Friday about the time he pulled his duffles down from the shelf (Truth Squad Report:  Susan is exaggerating).

The trip over the moutains was sunny and cold.  We hit Cle Elum about noon, had lunch, and continued up the Teanaway Valley toward Blewett Pass, our skis, boots, and poles bouncing around in the back of the pick-up as we dodged winter-gouged potholes and slippery patches.  We wended our way north along Highway 97  tracking the Columbia River reflecting Mercury in the slanted winter sunlight.  At Pateros, we headed northwest up the Methow Valley, now running on the high shoulder of the wild Methow River, which was edged with ice and drifts of snow.  Gloriously, the sun kept shining, bouncing exhuberant rays off every rock face of the valley’s steep walls, which then shattered into diamonds of light across the river’s surface.  No matter the cold, no matter the persistent winter, we were wearing sunglasses and on the verge of four days of fun.

Late afternoon, Tom and I checked into the Chewuch Inn, a truly rustic platypus of a lodge.  Parts of the place dated back to the early twentieth century, and like all good projects gotten out of hand, the lodge was expanded and remodeled over the rest of the century–and now this one–including a complete move of the original structure sometime in the days of black and white photography.  For all its beams and dormers, the inn was warm, attractive,  and very, very comfortable.  The generous hot breakfasts provided to all guests were served in a spacious great room with cathedral ceilings, a river rock chimney, and just the right configuration of windows to achieve light, view and shelter–a place where it would be easy to turn a second cup of coffee into a third if it wasn’t for the collective pulsing energy of the diners.  Every morning the breakfast room was taut with lycra and muscles, skiers leaning across their plates in diagonal stride toward the trails.  There was nothing to suggest leisure about the guests of Chewuch Inn.  No, serious athletes these folks.  Tom and I did our best to set our jaws, steel our thighs, and appear natural.

Three-day passes attached to our jackets–emblems of optimism, given we’d only skied once this winter–Tom and I hit the Methow Community Trail right after breakfast, classic three-pins clamped to our feet.  The beauty of skiing the Methow Valley Sports Trails Association trail system is the impeccable grooming.  We kicked and glided our way up the valley in track laid so expertly that we appeared but a blur to the multitude of deer watching from the woods along the trail.  Early on, there were no other skiers on the trail, and it was Saturday.  Seemed very strange to us.  Then a couple kilometers out, a skier flew by us with the velocity of being in the know.  He was skating.  To make it plain, Tom and I were skiing Model T’s and the skater was on a pair of Ferraris.  Before the day was over, Tom and I racked up over twenty kilometers of skiing but were wind-burned by the dozens of skaters who whizzed by us on their speedy skis.  “Let’s do that tomorrow,” I said impulsively to Tom.  “Sure!” he agreed, equally impulsively.  And you know what they say about impulsiveness:  It makes an ass out of you and me.

The next morning, Tom and I dismissed the suggestion of a lesson from the ski rental dude and slapped our sporty and fast skate-skis on our eager feet.  We did defer to the rental clerk’s experience and agreed to ski a few revolutions of the training track nearby before we jetted up the highway to parts of the trail system as yet unexplored.  After less than an hour of windmilling our way around the track like two characters in a Warner Brothers cartoon, skis and poles moving in competing directions at all times, we let boredom with the scenery trump good sense and drove toward Mazama for new territory.  I’m pretty sure the rental guy sized us up as a threat to other skiers, because he recommended we ski an area less popular with the skating crowd.  In fact, when we arrived at Big Valley Trail, we realized that this particular 8.5 K trail was open to everyone–skiers, yes, but snowshoers, dogs, bicyclists, deer hunters, probably.  A Sasquatch or two.  The trails weren’t groomed and no one was skating.  Our first encounter on the trail, in fact, was a dog in a wheelchair (he was a lovely dog–we learned he had M.S.).  But Tom and I slopped our way through the several inches of chopped up snow, doing no damage to the corduroy nap of the well-groomed, skiers-only trails. 

By mid-afternoon of the second day, we had shed our ski gear, toques, and gloves and were getting friendly with beer and burgers at the Old School House Brewery.  Our joints were beginning to fuse and our attention spans sag.  We were exhausted.  Thank goodness the only thing left on our list for the day was hitting another pub.

Monday morning we awoke to fresh snowfall, an invitation to get a couple hours of skiing in before we left for home.  We politely declined the invitation and rolled over onto some other sore place on our bodies.  I was grateful at breakfast that most of the Nordic Gods had left for home before us.  It’s embarrassing when you groan just scooping oatmeal into your bowl.  We had had a lovely, rejuvenating interlude, and I always know when it’s time to end a good thing.  It’s usually when we’ve run out of time, money, or asperin.  That being the case, we pointed the truck toward the highway, ending our holiday–and hopefully, the winter–with sighs of satisfaction.