Working On It in Everyday Ramblings

On Sunday Mrs. Sherlock was still feeling a bit fragile and so I walked by myself. (She did stop over briefly with Frieda later to drop off the tomatoes she had picked up for me on one of her bike rides earlier in the week.) Because I am teaching the big muscles in the front of the thighs this week, I wanted to challenge those muscles by walking down a lot of stairs.

Challenging the muscles I am working with allows me to gauge the amount of effort to put into the practices I teach and where the target areas are.

There was a plan to go up one intense set of public stairs and come down another and wander around up top. It was a stunningly beautiful morning. So far, we have been blessed with unusually clean air during fire season. The mountains are still partially obscured by fires to the east, but the local air was fresh.

(Speaking of blessings, it turns out that the accident we witnessed the aftermath of at the grocery last week was not reported… is because the only person hurt was the driver of the car and he survived! The fact that he survived running into a median coming off the freeway at high speed and ripping the front part of his car off and flipping over completely onto the roof of the car is a miracle. And that no one else was injured. He must have been unbelievably drunk or having a seizure.)

As I was approaching the big scenic stairway, I was going to climb I noticed a small side street that curved around and had what looked like some historic houses and I thought, what the heck, I will explore.

A bit of the way up after climbing a much less scenic shorter metal stairway there was a fork in the road literally, three ways to go. I went up to the left and it turned into a curved dead-end. Then to the right another curved dead-end.

But! At that dead end there was this remarkable building (pictured above) in beautiful shape with a fantastic view of the city, the river and Mt. St. Helen’s. Old but beautifully restored. It has a two-story tower with a cone shaped roof with a fabulous weather vane on top.
I am a total sucker for buildings with tower rooms. It must be all those fairy tales I read as a child.

The streets are all crazy around this area because of the freeways that were added but I could not figure out what the front street for the property was.

After I got home, I Googled and mapped and Googled and could not find the address or the building anywhere. Bulldog me was determined to find out more.

I did have a really enjoyable rest of the walk that involved walking up a super steep one-way street, the middle fork, into an exclusive neighborhood full of all sorts of fabulous homes and then back to my favorite hill walk past the Castle house and French garden.

Oh, and I did walk down the narrow steep Elevator Stairs to successfully complete my mission.

I so wanted to go back and find out more. An actual physical book I had on hold at the library, for over six months became available. I made an appointment to pick it up in a supposedly contactless exchange (the guy actually handed it to me) late yesterday morning.

I have a student that is on her own and struggling with depression that likes to walk and so I asked if I could meet her for a walk after the pickup and she agreed and met me at the church.

She was game to go where I led so I got her to come with me and we found the house from below and realized that there just plain wasn’t a fronting street. Apartments were built directly under it on the hill below.

We walked back up the dead-end and I got a number of pictures including the one above. And I got the address. It is a number on a street that no longer exists! It was built in 1890 and now is composed of 5 restored condos. Very expensive condos I might add, with marble fireplaces and beautiful floors.

I still haven’t found out anything about who built it or if it was a mansion.

But I am working on it… :)

Last updated August 26, 2020