Possibly the worst selfie we will ever post, but it’s all we had from our flight to Portland, Oregon, this evening.
The Approach of 50
Today starts Caroline’s march into her 50’s as back on this day in 1967 she started day one on her journey to a one-year-old and so today replacing mother’s milk with a shot of scotch she starts day one on this new journey to her 50th year. I love you, sweet wife.
Oregon – Day 9
Another perfect day at Cannon Beach. What do you think because it rained for the majority of the day, it was less than perfect yesterday? Every day and every time we’ve been up on this coast has been a unique experience with memorable moments that would not be traded with being somewhere else or having different weather. We’ve loved this place when it’s cold and windy, drizzling and gray, or warm and sunny. Maybe the fact that we are together next to the water is enough to make everything perfect.
The patterns of black streaks in the sand and the indentation due to the way water flows around this stump are enough to stop us and have us admire the work of the ocean and light. I also took a photo of a dead sea lion with about a third of its skin missing, a bunch of flesh gone from its face including its eyes, and some white bones protruding from the rotting rear flipper. I’m guessing for most readers, the description was gross enough, and you might be wondering why I took a photo. Because I wanted to get the image so I could study what was there before the smell attacked my nose…and who doesn’t think dead things aren’t interesting?
That’s Haystack Rock, and while it’s just a giant rock offshore, it helps make this place look even cooler.
The silvers and blues of this monochromatic ocean and overcast sky create a drama and mood befitting the late fall day on the Oregon coast, where wool is more appropriate than the nylon of a bikini. If hot tea, coffee, or hot chocolate come to mind, and maybe a hot bowl of chowder between walking along the surf sounds good to you, then the Pacific Ocean here in Oregon might be the place for you; it certainly works for us.
Because it’s just that beautiful. Notice our footprints in the sand? They were the only ones out here this far south on Cannon Beach.
The weather and the lighting can change dramatically and quickly here during the fall into winter, but what doesn’t change is our feeling for these kinds of landscapes. I shouldn’t forget to mention the incredible sound of the surf rushing in and being dragged right back out.
Three layers are all it took to stay comfortable, well that and Caroline stealing my beanie. Good thing I effectively have a chin beanie that keeps the lower half of my face warm. This was our last day out on the coast, and soon after I snapped this photo, we were back on the road to Portland to stay the night. We’d wake early so I could make a special visit to a special place, more about that tomorrow.
Oregon – Day 8
Happy Thanksgiving. I’ve got this day figured out due to having other photos, but only of shots out the window of the Wayfarer restaurant in Cannon Beach. The rain was coming down hard on the glass and so the pictures instead of being artistic are simply blurry. During one of the breaks in the weather Caroline and took a walk out on the beach in the wind. Because our room at the Inn at Haystack has a nice fireplace and a writing table it has been perfect to sit next to the fire and knit, read, or write the day away while getting out from time to time to get some food. It’s nice not being rushed to go anywhere or do much of anything.
Oregon – Day 7
What a peculiar day. I don’t believe we’ve ever traveled anywhere else where I only shot one photo all day, but apparently, that’s what I did today. Was it raining earlier? Did we sit somewhere and knit and write in a coffee shop, letting the world go by, not concerned with the photo travel trophies? Without notes or other pictures buffering this image of Caroline walking down this lonely beach, I have no idea where we started, where we ended up, what we ate, or what precisely we did. Kind of nice in some way, only having this one photo of a walk along the shore.
Edit: After writing this, I found a bunch of stuff I was writing on those days in Oregon, and the following was how I spent the morning so it would be certain that Caroline was next to me knitting or reading and that we just chilled the entire day. Here it is:
Preoccupation
The problem with preoccupation is that it saps my ability to broaden my scope of thinking. My greatest time with creativity and having a spectrum of thought that delights me is when I’m fully in the moment.
On this trip to Oregon, I compromised the full relaxation element by focusing too much on a recent hobby I acquired: modular synthesis in the form of Eurorack. I knew going into this ten-day sojourn that I’d be stopping in Portland on the way home to “possibly” buy some new modules; in retrospect, I should have done this right away so I wouldn’t spend the next week configuring my purchases.
The problem with this new endeavor is that it is incredibly expensive, so purchases can not be taken lightly. While there is great resale value in used equipment, even selling the stuff takes precious time away from learning the incredible complexity this embodies. Each component plays a specialized role in music synthesis, so some level of familiarity should be had so the builder of such a system has a fairly good idea of how a new piece will influence the whole.
Realizing that you have fallen into this trap a week after you started a vacation is not a great place to find yourself. If I had it to do over again, I would have spent a week before vacation figuring out and planning which modules I wanted so I could have visited the shop at the beginning of the trip and had them sent home, thus clearing my mind of a million synthesizer thoughts.
This has been so consuming that my dreams have been of wires and knobs. Being obsessive has its moments, especially when planning a business or organizing large projects, but on vacation, it is a burden.
I wonder how this affects us in our daily lives. What happens when we are obsessed with being lonely or without someone close? How does this bring stress into someone’s life when they are worried about job security or learning something new and challenging? Maybe we cannot earn enough money to support the basics, and we fret about the fear of an unexpected expense that can derail us. No wonder then that people turn to substance abuse, be it food or drugs, to combat the uncertainty and preoccupation of things we cannot control.
A small example of clearing the mental deck so I can better enjoy myself and, in turn, my wife can better enjoy her time with me: before leaving for a vacation, I wash all the laundry, pay the bills in advance, arrange for someone to water our plants, clear out food that might spoil in our absence, deep clean our place, fill the gas tank in the car so we have one less thing to worry about when we get back and then finally we can take our vacation and be in the moment.
Being in the moment is an essential key to happiness in my worldview. We know this from our visits to the Whitehouse, rafting the Colorado River for three weeks, or rafting the Alsek in Alaska for half a month. On road trips that have taken us across America, we have been free to enjoy the open landscape of Kansas without worrying if we left the stove on or that we’ll have to go home to dirty dishes and unpaid bills.
Well, then, it would seem to me that we must always be aware of the need to “clear the deck.” A list should be kept at hand that allows us to check off things that might derail our intention of having a great time when we venture out of our routines.
Oregon – Day 6
Hung out and did little. I’m sure we ate, probably knitted, and didn’t write two words all day. Oh, I know, I might have stayed in front of the computer too long, noodling about all things music between cups of coffee and short visits to the beach.
Beach rocks because rocks on the beach rock the scenery.