Boolie

Detective Samwise

I’m pleased to announce that we’ve begun production on a new TV series called Detective Samwise, a show in the long tradition of slightly silly murder mysteries. Detective Samwise is called in to investigate a string of cat burglaries, in which it turns out actual cats are being stolen. By coincidence our hero detective is himself a cat, so he goes undercover to catch the thief red-handed but finds more than he bargained for when he discovers a murder most foul! We are having some issues with the actress playing our murder victim, however, as while she’s quite good at laying still, she keeps swiveling her ears around so she can hear if craft services has started laying out snacks.

Rigsketball

I like taking pictures of interesting things in our neighborhood as Ellie and I go on our walks, like old garages, animal sculptures, outdoor art, rock ‘n roll vans with basketball hoops on top …

Mmm hmm. Wait, what?

I was hoping there was more to this van than a hipster having a laugh and indeed there is, it (and another van with different artwork) belongs to Bim Ditson and his band And And And, and in addition to being their normal transportation, is used for the Rigsketball tournament, a basketball tournament they put on each year played exclusively by Portland bands. The hoop is folded down in the picture but apparently extends to regulation height. There’s a nice video that explains the motivation behind the tournament, to me it’s the genuine part of the weird side of Portland, not an affectation but the building of a community of disparate voices.

In Memory of My Father

My father passed away earlier today.

He was diagnosed with an untreatable brain tumor months ago and had been in slow decline since. We weren’t close, I hadn’t seen him in a couple of decades, but there were parts of him I loved. I post this in his memory because many of my fondest memories of him were when we hiked in the hills of eastern Tennessee where I grew up. They weren’t grand scenes or amazing vistas, just what became my favorite hikes – through forests and past mountain streams. This picture is from Oregon, not Tennessee, taken a month ago in the Columbia River Gorge up above Horsetail Falls. It’s too chaotic to be pretty but illustrates one of the reasons I love hiking here, the explosion of green in many shades from the leaves, moss, and ferns. Behind the trees are basalt walls, as covered in moss as the trees. Large ferns grow below the trees with little ferns growing on the tree itself. Not far away are mountain streams that plunge through the canyons in beautiful waterfalls. I think of him most when I hike, wishing we could have had an emotional bond, but very thankful that he taught me to appreciate the beautiful and the quiet and the serene.

I grew up knowing I was loved, unconditionally, I never felt like I had to earn it through good grades (which I had) or being good at sports (which I wasn’t). That’s a powerful gift to give a child. He never encouraged me to seek money or power and get blinded by the rat race that I saw in some other fathers. There were plenty of happy times, like playing ping pong in the basement as I grew up. I’ll never forget the joy I felt the first time I beat him, or realizing years later that he must have let me beat him as a kindness. We camped and hiked. We spent hours in his workshop in the basement as he made things with his table saw and other tools, despite the fact that his son hadn’t inherited his mechanical skills and would be far too absent-minded to ever use dangerous power tools.

But as I grew into adulthood I came to realize that being in a close relationship with him was going to be destructive emotionally. The details aren’t important but by leaving them out I don’t want to make things sound worse than they were, he wasn’t abusive, but he had a way of seeing the world, and a tendency to take things in a negative light, that made it hard to get close to him. One incident in particular during my college years, after I spent a summer with him and thought we had set a more positive baseline for moving forward, made it clear to me that I was going to have to keep him at an emotional distance and hope for better in the future.

One of the last times I saw him was when I was in graduate school and he came to pick up his old Pontiac that he let me borrow when I needed a car to go between school and home on holiday breaks. I didn’t need it anymore as my stepfather had found a used car he thought I might like near his hometown and that ended up being the first car I bought. Dad came into my apartment for a while and when it was time for him to go, as we walked to the door and he turned to say goodbye, he had tears in his eyes and I wanted to grab him by the shoulders and let him know that this was the side of him I wanted in my life, the part that took pleasure in spending time with me and didn’t want it to end. I didn’t expect our relationship to be perfect or even easy, but at least open and honest. It wasn’t to be. He had a vision of me in his head that fit a narrative he needed it to, something we all do to an extent with others and even ourselves, but his was a wall I couldn’t climb.

At some point during those years I asked him if I could keep a picture he showed me, he was surprised and said yes but couldn’t understand why I wanted it. I didn’t tell him but it was simply because he had the most wonderful smile on his face. Not the kind you make when you smile for the camera, but a natural one, caught in a moment of pure joy. I hadn’t seen that smile in a long time and hoped one day to see it again. I never did but I’m sure others did and I’m thankful for the friends he had over the years, even if we couldn’t be close I’m glad he found happiness with others.

That picture, that smile, was a reminder of the beautiful part of him and it’s how I’ve visualized him for the many years since. It’s not that I don’t remember the bad, the bad is obviously why we’ve never been close, but I didn’t want to forget the good. We sent email occasionally over the years but never very often, but there was never a point where I felt like we could have a meaningful relationship. He knew about the blog but I don’t know how often he read it if at all. I sent him an email months ago when I first heard he had a brain tumor, letting him know how good my life was and how I still loved to hike like we had when I was growing up. I tried not to phrase it as a goodbye, he was still in decent health even though the long term prognosis wasn’t good, but it was a goodbye. I have no idea what he thought of me over the years or in the end, but I wanted him to know I love my life and am grateful for his part in that.

When I was young we were traveling somewhere to camp when someone in the car asked him what he would be if he could be anything he wanted (like me he was an engineer). He said he’d want to be a forest ranger and I laughed, thinking he was goofing around, and asked him what he really wanted to be. He said no, really, a forest ranger, and he said it in a way that even as a child I realized he was speaking a fundamental truth about himself. I reflected on his answer often, he didn’t choose a job that would make him wealthy or famous, but one that let him be out there in the quiet, near the trees and the babbling brooks, helping others enjoy them too. I didn’t ask him why he didn’t become a ranger, maybe he chose a higher paying job with a family to raise, maybe he realized that about himself too late. Maybe I took him too literally.

I don’t know if he continued hiking through the years, but even if not it was certainly a gift he passed on to me. He also was interested in computers even in the early 80’s and bought a Mac when they first came out to use in his business, he let me type my school essays on it at night and I fell in love with computers because of that beautiful thing. We had a wonderful dog that was with me through most of my childhood and if you’ve been here long you know how much I love my pets. Part of me feels like my father’s son, part of me not at all. I’m sure I could have been a better son, but even at the end some of his behavior reminded me why he hasn’t been a meaningful part of my life for so long.

The tears I shed as I write this are for decades of frustration, at wishing I could have known more of the beautiful part of him. I’m thankful that some people got to know it, and that for a while I did too.

In My Dreams I Run With You

I love it when Ellie sleeps on her side in a running position, sometimes her legs churn and she makes “whoop whoop whoop” noises as though she’s running in her dreams. She does it more now, either from old age or the medicines she takes. I used to think that sleep separated us but it occurred to me recently that perhaps instead we’re continuing on together in her dreams, running without old age to slow her down, and the treats that come from my pockets are pizzas and pot roasts.

Shadows and Garages

Will Block Driveway for Treats

Generally she’s very well behaved, but when it comes to food …

Commuting Gear

Continuing on the yellow theme, I recently had to shift my beloved orange New Balance running shoes to dog park status as the fabric was starting to tear. I like having bright shoes to make me more visible as I walk to and from the train so I replaced them straightaway with a pair of bright yellow sneakers, as this seems to be their current bright color of choice. Sitting between my feet is my Tom Bihn ID messenger bag with its lovely aubergine front, keeping my MacBook and iPad safe and secure as I ride the MAX to work.

Yellow

One of the reasons I went to Latourell Falls was to see if I could get close-ups of the massive yellow lichen patch near the waterfall. I brought my 100-400 Canon zoom and hooked it up to the Sony A6500 and found the biggest difficulty while trying to manually focus was that, as I had the peaking indicator set to yellow, and since I was photographing a fairly flat scene, the whole screen would practically light up yellow when the scene was in focus. But since everything was already yellow …

You can change the focus peaking color but I couldn’t remember how and since I was in no hurry I was able to zoom in on the display and get the focus set. If I could have seen a bit better I would have shifted things slightly so the plants on the far left would have been a little further inside the picture, but I was pretty happy with this as a first attempt.

I’m amazed by the diverse forms that life takes, and how often life can take a foothold even in inhospitable areas.

Damp and Moldy Dreams. But Still, Hope Remains.

I took this picture in December to reflect my mood after a national election I still can’t wrap my head around. After a wet fall the wishes attached to the Wishing Tree were damp and moldy and fading, dreams dashed. But then I got home and read the messages and I could see the hope that couldn’t be repressed, the light that would not yield to the darkness.

Some people break my heart, others heal it.

I wish for poems like sparklers or even night constellation fireworks. Kisses. I wish for love kisses.

I wish my sister gets everything she truly deserves. She is my everything. Please!

I wish I could live here so I could see my daughter every day!

I wish to level up!

I wish I wood have a dog

Spelling is not important at the Wishing Tree. You need hope, and hope I will cling to.

First Hike

I spent this lovely spring morning on my first hike of the Latourell Falls loop in Oregon’s Columbia River Gorge. I wasn’t familiar with this waterfall even though it isn’t far from the others I visit as the trailhead is past where I normally turn off to go back to Portland. They featured the waterfall during an episode of Oregon Field Guide on Oregon Public Broadcasting and I was hooked when they showed the lichens and basalt of the main falls, so I had some fun photographing them this morning with my 100-400 lens. I then took the loop up to Upper Latourell Falls (shown here) before heading back down to the main falls. The return loop takes you down to the base of the falls where a group of photographers was huddled with their tripods around a small bridge. I didn’t stop for pictures and just admired the view instead, I’ll head there first on my next visit.

An absolutely lovely morning, I don’t know how I missed out on this hike having been in Oregon for 20 years now but I’ll be back soon. I’m always a little nervous about new hikes in the Gorge as some of them I can’t do because of my fear of heights, but this one was easy (I’d give it a 2 out of 10 on the Boolie Utter Panic Index). There is an optional loop that takes you onto a little outcropping above the main falls, which I would rate a 10 out of 10, but you don’t have to go anywhere near it if you don’t want to (and I didn’t).