Extra (Secret) Out of Time Week Requested Please in Everyday Ramblings

It was a gorgeous mild day here today. It is a bit disconcerting to see through the haze the mountains that are normally so startlingly white this time of year and to know they have no snow on them. And… to read about the substantial rains others folks are getting…

So yesterday I had pretty much all day to get myself worked up into a whirlwind of insecurities about actually meeting a number of my neighbors in a relaxed potluck setting in the evening.

I fretted about the Oregon wine I bought, the yummy dish I cooked with fresh colorful veggies from the farmer’s market. I fretted about what to wear. I fretted about whom to talk to and what about. My social anxiety seems to be getting worse, at least in a circumstance like this where it really matters to me that my neighbors are comfortable with me because I love it here and they are stuck with me.

I thought of 20 reasons not to go. I was getting very creative in my imagination.

This is where having a reassuring partner would come in handy. “We’ll be fine, they’ll like us, we’ll like them, you will look totally appropriate, the food and wine will be welcome, they will be smart and interesting, we will be smart and interesting”, my confident imaginary successful professional fellow would say…

In fret mode I looked up the husband of my hostess, who I had not met before and he turns out to be a successfully geeky guy at Intel and…I love this… a world-class juggler.

Oh and a former partner in a distillery.

After all that I went anyway.

Beyond their back gate is this absolutely enchanting small but perfectly proportioned garden with two seating areas, a grape arbor with a outdoor table under it and a remarkable brick pizza oven. It is all centered on this old fig tree that may have been there since the house was built in the 1880s.

The people were all interesting and I talked history nonstop for two and a half hours. They even called this fellow that everybody has told me I need to meet, he is about 70, and has lived in the neighborhood for over 40 years. He is of Japanese American ancestry and was interned in a camp as a child during the war everybody tells me.

He came over to meet me and brought a couple of big poster size aerial photos of the neighborhood, one from the 20’s and one from the 30’s. (They tell me they turned the apartment building with the turret in 1949. One of the guys I talked to the most lives on that block.)

I can see why they wanted me to meet him, I need a diary name for him. He is charming and smart and hip (seriously, it is hard to be hip at 70, but he pulls it off). He knew the woman that was the daughter of the owner of the stables that were here and he described the ruins a bit to me after they closed down before they built this place. I very much want to spend more time somewhere where there is more light chatting with him and now I know where he lives…

Oh and did I say he was a cat person? He is a cat person.

They all told me that I also need to meet the guy that wrote the book that I have been using as a reference. He is in Croatia this weekend because his daughter is getting married there.

Oh and the food and wine were fantastic. The pizza was divine.

As penance here on this day of the annual Portland Marathon that went right by my place, S. and I walked what turned out to be our own a little more than half marathon. She has been building stamina for this for over six months and we both had our Fitbits on to help us with all the stats. We met half way between both of our places. By the time she was completely done and called it quits and caught the light rail she had walked over 16 miles (26 km). She had taken her dog out for an early walk. I walked just over 15 miles.

We had fun. She is such good company and though most of it was on a rail to trail pathway, we also walked through this funky older residential area across the river that neither of us spends very much time in and looked at the houses and trees and interesting architectural details.

What a lovely way to spend a weekend! (except for the insecurity part.)

Now all I need is a magical free week in there somewhere so I can actually work on this poems that are forming in my head…

I am sure a few of you could use an extra week in there somewhere too.

Last updated October 05, 2015