Forces of Nature in Everyday Ramblings

Once when I was about 17 I went on this ill-fated camping trip with a roommate couple and a guy I didn’t know and my beloved Great Dane, Lucy. I was living independently by then and thought I was so grown up! Ha, Anyway, my woman roommate had heard there was a cabin out just off a particular beach on the Olympic Peninsula in Washington state.

We took sleeping bags and cooking stuff but no tent or shelter. We left late, as young folks are wont to do, and hiked through the rain forest in good spirits and full of a sense of adventure. When we hit the beautiful deserted beach we also hit a storm. Winds were gusting up to 60 mph (96.56 km/h). It was too late to turn back so we fought our way to the cabin.

Only it had burned down.

We spent a wet night in a lean to built out of driftwood and the one tarp that the unknown young man (who of course I fell in love with) had thought to bring.

It turns out the whole point of the trip was that my roommate had a crush on the mystery guy and wanted to spend time with him (even though she was coupled up with another of my roommates, the one that went on to be the world famous paleontologist.)

My current boyfriend at the time was in a minimum-security jail in Northern California on charges of trying to rob an antique store on Polk Street in San Francisco with a spoon. He had a heroin addiction. We wrote long angst filled letters to each other on brightly colored paper. I still have those letters in a box somewhere, both sides.

I just finished reading the first book in Lev Grossman’s Magician series and I had a lot of trouble with the long section after the young magicians graduated from Magic College and were at large in New York City with unlimited resources. Their entitlement, dissipation and whining were, umm, unattractive.

But it did lead me to think about that time in my life.

Back then that wind, fighting that wind, on that beach, was so elemental, so overwhelming I won’t forget it as long as I am able to keep my wits about me.

Last night walking up to the hospital we had wind gusts almost as strong. I literally thought I was going to be blown backwards. And there were folks attempting to ride bicycles in that. Kes tells me a big tree came down near my place and hit a bicyclist and a car. Luckily, everybody but the tree was relatively okay.

This scouring East Wind is freezing and it is like overnight we went from fall to winter so I am so glad I had the camera with me on Saturday to take the picture above.

The wind continues this afternoon. I hope we are able to maintain power. First world problem I know…

I find it fascinating how although we have so much in common, our day-to-day lives are so predicated on the weather where we are. Mood and affect, navigation and logistics, communication and flexibility are all in play based on these elemental forces.

It is so hard waiting for Carlo and Diego. I fret. Are there going to be logistical issues getting them home, problems with the adoption, behavioral problems (none could be any more difficult than Sam) or any number of other things that could go wrong are all conjured up in my vivid imagination…

Bring them on! Only two more days. Deep breath in, deep breath out.

Last updated November 12, 2014