September really is a lovely month in the Northwest. You wish it would last forever. We need rain, but this seemingly endless string of mild, dry days has spoiled us. What a memorable summer, in many ways. So often, October feels like a curtain coming down. I don’t look forward to the dark time.
As usual, once I left Seattle (an hour from our house just to the freeway) the solo drive was OK. It always feels good getting out of Seattle. When I finally got to the downtown exit for I-90, a crazy person was running through the stop and go traffic in the middle of the freeway. No one paid the slightest attention. Between the homeless camps, the graffiti and trash, the traffic and noise, Seattle feels more and more dystopian.
After the long drive, pulling into this little place by the river is a haven of peace. Despite all expense and hassles (endless!) of owning a second home, nothing compares to that wonderful feeling of opening the door and finding everything just as you left it. Once I got the car unloaded and things put away, I realized we have just about everything we need now to be comfortable. Enough, but not too much.
The girls only have a half day of school Wednesdays, to the great annoyance of working parents. I picked them up yesterday, and chatted with the grandma of Maya's best friend, also on duty. Karen lives just down the street. She is a lovely person and we hit it off. What a pleasant surprise making new friends at this stage of life. I've met many nice people in Twisp already, including our neighbor who will plow the driveway this winter. A relief to check that off the to-do list.
Wildlife. The deer ate some young trees the previous owner planted by the garage. Goners. The turkey family still doing their turkey thing, the kids nearly as big as the parents. Otters live across the river in the bank, and I saw one swim over to "our" beach for the first time. We jokingly refer to it as the "Twisp community beach." The river is as low as it gets now, and there are fishermen passing by, trying to coax trout out of their hidey-holes.
John gets here tomorrow, his first big spin in the new Honda. All is well.
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