09.29.09
Exit
Overheard at 12:30 pm, bus 74
Guy in mid-20’s or so (suddenly very loud): What’s 4 plus 6?
Girl also in mid-20’s (matching him in volume): I dunno! 23?
Guy: Nah, girl. Four plus six.
Girl: 11?
Guy: No! It’s 10.
Me (looking out window in increasing despair): ?? Performance art? Two hapless souls navigating life with less than a full deck? I step over a used condom and exit the bus at Pioneer Square. The gusts have whipped themselves into a storm during my ride, and I button my coat as I walk north.
09.25.09
Ordway jogathon
A beautiful sunny day on the BHS track, lots of energetic kids, fresh white jogathon t-shirts, and an orange Sharpie in my hand = smiling for hours. Here I’m telling S. “Good job, kiddo!”
When we drew bright orange slashes down the kindergarteners’ shirts to mark their first lap, they stopped completely and stared in horror and confusion. Grownups writing on me with marker?! It took them a couple of laps around to get used to it.
S’s new blue Chucks.
And A’s hand-me-down Keens. Those things last forevah.
4th, 3rd, 2nd, 1st, and kindergarteners, you ran so well!
09.20.09
Kayaking to Illahee
On Friday morning, B. and I paddled from Point White Pier to Illahee State Park and spent some time in the sunshine, reading this and taking in all the beauty:
Illahee Pier. Illahee apparently has various meanings, all having to do with the land. Place of rest, heavenly world, earth, or country. Section 1.2 here has an interesting history of Illahee.
We even had a visit from an otter, who swam under the pier to crack his shells and munch noisily beneath our feet.
09.14.09
Look what my tree gave me
The pride and joy of our crop this year: a picture-perfect Comice pear.
Old roses and warm blackberries
Yesterday we hiked the trail around Indian Island. The water is very clear and clean, the blackberries very ripe and ready. There are even some old woodpeckered apple trees with windfall skirts and lots more little apples. We picked some (astringent, tart) and sauced them later (with sugar and cinnamon, mmm).
09.13.09
Autumn vignette
Making applesauce on a Sunday afternoon with my husband, multi-tasking and teaching my daughter to use the hand-cranked food mill while crisping up some corn tortilla strips for tortilla soup, I find that olive oil has a surprisingly low flash point. Clap on the lid, out goes the smoking pan, with screams of horror and glee behind me. Open all the doors and windows. Abandon applesauce, abandon dinner.
Retreat, retreat!
Why did I just feel compelled to smell my arm? Varnished smoked arm hair.
09.07.09
Tillicum village
We visited Blake Island’s Tillicum Village tonight–a fantastic experience with a traditional salmon-bake dinner, a performance of native dances, and time to stroll around outside in the rain-fresh air afterwards.
The salmon are baked around an alderwood fire for about an hour.
The dancer told me the headdress he wears weighs 40 lbs.
Outside, there’s a totem garden, deer grazing nonchalantly, and a little girl trying to give her mama a maori princess chin tattoo.
Soccer son
A’s first soccer game was this last Saturday, and he rocked! Unabashedly proud parent here–he sprinted up and down the pint-sized field, making the team’s only goal of the game. More importantly, he passed the ball to teammates and got up again when he tripped over the tangle of kicking legs.
09.04.09
Beachcombing
We decamped to Fay Bainbridge at high tide this evening for a little sea air and beach combing. I was looking for smooth, round, flat, thin rocks (I kept the best and B. skipped the rest–he’s a champion rock skipper, making them jump 4 and 5 times across rolling waves).
Some of them are as delicate as mermaid coins.
And my favorite image ever of my S. girl:
