Dear John, Week 3

Dear John,

Remember how excited we were when I booked the tickets? I know you do. We told everyone about our plan. We would drop off the littles at summer camp for the week and then go another 45 minutes to get on the Amtrak train and spend two days in peace, just the two of us. We would watch the world go by and feel the rocking sway as the train moved along the tracks. I tortured you at night with the sound of dozens of YouTube videos of others on the same trip. We couldn’t wait! After all, the littles had surprised us the year before at camp. We dropped them off on a Sunday afternoon and immediately made bets on how long it would take until we got a phone call from the Camp Director asking us to come and quickly pick them up because of their behaviors. My bet was  that the call would come on Tuesday night; you said we would hear from them already on Sunday night! Well, not only did they make it the whole week, but Alena, of all people, managed to earn the most prestigious little award – The Sweetheart Award? When the camp counselors saved her award for last and started talking about how wonderful, sweet and kind this last camper was, we found ourselves fumbling on the sandy ground for our bottom jaws, pulling them up quickly in order to close our gaping, surprised mouths! So, based on the success, of the first year we decided to tempt fate and take a one week vacation on the train to Seattle during their next week at camp. Once we arrived in Seattle, we planned to walk from the Amtrak station to Pike’s Market, see the fish guys, eat at a nearby Pho restaurant like Anthony Bourdain, and then head back to the station for two more days of lollygagging on the train home. We couldn’t wait! But, that isn’t what happened.

Instead, I woke up that early morning in my cot. We quietly went through our morning rituals of dressing, ordering food, getting the room into “day mode” and putting on some music before the doctor rounds and nurses aides began to come in to get their own morning rituals completed. After the morning had settled down, without looking at each other, you said, “I’m sorry about today.”

“I know. So am I, but we are where we need to be and the train trip will always be there for us.”
Except, it wasn’t.

So, Seattle became a “Must See” on the 83 day trip I now find myself on. Like always, I had planned certain things out in advance, but left most things to work themselves out in their own time. This always made my mom nervous about our trips, but most of the time, we found that the best memories of our trips came from those unplanned moments that just turned into something special.  I was nervous about finding an RV Park near enough to the city so that we could access it by ferry and foot. I had researched places to go for weeks before even leaving – THIS was one part of the trip that I feared the most…. And as always…. You seemed to take care of it for me.

When we arrived at Port Angeles, WA, I wasn’t feeling well. We went out to eat and walked back to CeeCee’s parking spot a few blocks away. On the walk, I looked up and saw an advertisement for Dungeness Lines – Daily Bus Service to Seattle. In about 5 seconds I had the website up on my phone. Sure enough, we could stay here in Port Angeles and make Seattle a day trip, except that I would have to have myself and the littles up, dressed, have CeeCee disconnected from electric and water and parked in the lot downtown so we could hike a few blocks to the bus stop. By 5:45am! You know how much I hate mornings… and the littles don’t like to move fast, but this was a great plan. We would have the whole day in the city, returning to CeeCee by 10:30pm. I called the company and asked them which drop off spot in the city would work best for my plans, the Amtrak station or the hospitals? They told me that the hospitals would be best. I sighed…. Not really the place I wanted to go, but we wouldn’t have to go inside, I hoped! We filled our backpacks with the essentials for the day, raincoats, blankets, books, water bottles, snacks, and dry sweatshirts. The forecast was bleak, there was supposed to be rain most of the morning, some storms around lunch and then it would hopefully clear up.

The bus dropped us off at the hospital, and similar to the TV show “Naked and Afraid,” I found myself standing in a desolate location with two little girls asking me, “Which way do we go?” I swore to myself for a few minutes. Normally I watch as drivers get close to my destination  so that I can get my bearings. On this trip, however, I found myself awoken a few blocks before drop-off by the sound of my own snoring on the bus. Great! I had no idea which was was East or West so I whipped out my phone and opened google maps. I was on 9th street between Spring and Seneca, but which way should I go to get downtown? I couldn’t see any signs of larger buildings in either direction because of the ridiculously huge hills. Seattle is hilly? I had no clue. On the map it looked flat! So I picked the hike uphill, hearing Kady groaning already, and quickly realized that downhill, as my first instinct had told me, was the way we needed to go. We walked the mile to Pike’s Market, both girls complaining the entire time. “Why are we going here? I don’t want to see a market with fish. So what if they toss it. My legs hurt. Why are there so many hills? I’m tired.”

It was going to be a stellar day.

We arrived at the Market, which was already packed with people on a Saturday morning. I smiled with joy when we got to the fish market we had seen so many times on TV. It looked just the same, the guys working were kind of subdued, but I had heard that they waited for crowds to form before going into their antics, and that was true. They were funny, but to be honest,

I’m not sure if it was the piss poor attitudes of the girls or something else that made it kind of a let down

for me. We found the gum wall, tried to add our own gum to it, but the gum in my backpack was soggy (Eww… I don’t want to think how that happened… it hadn’t started raining yet) so we just took pictures. The girls were not enthused and I was quickly losing my own enthusiasm. We walked around the market looking for amazing food to eat for breakfast and a cup of coffee for me as I hadn’t even had a sip the whole morning, which may not have been helping my mood. Seeing so many others holding a nice fresh cup

of coffee made me long for my own cup even more. There was little to eat – and what bakeries we did find (which, by the way, you would have loved! Snickerdoodles, raspberry scones, and everything was HUGE!) the girls weren’t interested.

We left Pike’s Market and I admit, I was a bit deflated and worried about how this long day was going to go. The girls spotted a Subway restaurant and begged me to eat there? Eat? At Subway? When we are in a amazing city known for amazing food? Whatever, it was cheap and if they wanted it, fine. Plus, we could sit down and rest for awhile. The girls asked me why I didn’t order anything, and I told them, “I’m holding out for what I want.” Yes. Pho!

I had found a Vietnamese restaurant between Pike’s Market and the monorail. Pho 25. It was a short walk from the Subway restaurant. With the girls whining about how they didn’t want to eat anything in there, I told them that THIS was the only thing I wanted all day, and we went in. I knew what I wanted and didn’t need to spend a lot of time with the menu. Pho, with every variety of meat in it… and a shrimp spring roll to keep Kady happy. Alena sulked in the corner and tried to hide her Subway cup as she rolled her eyes every few minutes. I waited. I happily sat, watching families slurp their noodles, smelling the broth that I knew would be in front of me soon. And then it arrived. Oh. My. God. Just like Anthony Bourdain has promised. It

was life-changing. In many ways, it tasted a lot like the Pho I tried to make for you, which you said was “Pho King awful.” It’s the fish sauce. I needed to add it earlier and simmer it in. I need a do-over for you. You should have tasted this stuff! The entire world stopped for those ten minutes that I slurped and sipped and rolled my own eyes, but for a completely different reason than Alena did. It was fantastic. Everything I had hoped for in one large, white, steaming bowl. The rest of the day could fall into the crapper as far as I was concerned because I had found my perfection for the day. I paid for our meal, and walked out of the restaurant with a huge smile on my face, feeling the warm contendedness in my belly, and wearing the proud slurp stains of the noodles on my shirt. This was heaven. It couldn’t get better than this. But strangely – it did.

With eight hours left to go before we needed to be back at the hospital for the bus, I had planned to spend time in Seattle Center. I had no idea what we would find there. I knew there was the Space Needle, but I really had no interest in that. You know me, I prefer to find some park, sit among the locals and just enjoy the feel of a city rather than do the iconic touristy things. You learned to love that, too. So, we got on the monorail to save our feet from the hike up more hills and to give the littles something fun in the day, and arrived at Seattle Center. We walked past a dark, old entrance to the Armory. I couldn’t imagine that anything enticing was happening in there, so we kept going. That bubble tea I drank at the Pho restaurant was talking back to me, darn lactose intolerance, so I needed to sit and rest. The girls watched a lady doing caricatures for a long time while my stomach settled down and then they asked if they could have their caricatures done. Normally, it’s not the kind of souvenir I go for, but everyone has to have their caricature at some point in their lives, and the girls had already decided that they didn’t want to go up in the Space Needle, so I figured, why not? They had a blast.

After my stomach finally settled down, why DID I drink so much of the bubble tea? Oh

yeah, because I love it and it reminds me of the first time I had bubble tea in New Zealand, we walked to the International Fountain. I had planned to spend some time there, having researched it online. We got there, and it was magical.

The giant fountain is set to music, and the water spurts out unexpectedly in different spots, to the delighted screeches of the kids running around beneath it. It was then I realized, it wasn’t raining. It hadn’t rained all day. The forecast had said a 90% chance of rain before 1:00pm and here we were, blue skies

above with puffy white clouds, and warm sunshine. The girls played in the fountain for a very long time and I smiled. I actually got out my knitting, something I haven’t done in public in a long time, and worked my stitches while feeling content. I giggled when huge spurts blew out of the top and all of the kids ran screaming away from the fountain to avoid being drenched. I looked around at other people, who were also smiling and laughing and feeling joy. I watched a small dog roll on the grass, smudging himself with the smell of summer, the smell of life, and I truly felt it for one of the first times. Joy. It crept into my heart slowly and fearfully, worried that I would push it away or attack it, but I didn’t. I let it seep in. And I smiled again. And I missed you.

We sprawled out on the grass in the warm sun, giving the girls some time to dry off until the darker clouds came and the wind became cool. Rain was finally going to come, so I decided we needed to find a building to get into. The armory. We walked in the back way, past several homeless people, hearing the distant sounds of activity from some other cavern and we walked towards that sound. When we entered the main hall, I was shocked. Again, I found myself picking my jaw up from the floor to close my mouth ( I really should get some type of bungee cord to keep that lower jaw in place!). Today, for one day only, on the day I planned to come into the city, without knowing it…. It was the one day celebration called “Spirit of Indigenous People.”

There were stalls with Indigenous artwork, beading, blankets, and there was a band playing. I felt at home. We sat down and listened to one of the bands until it was time for them to take a break. The announcer, sounding like so many Ojibwe announcers, spoke about what would be happening next. A group would be demonstrating dance outside. Kady, who you know is really interested in Indeginous dancing, looked at me and asked, “Can we go watch it?”

“Of course,” I told her.

We waited outside for a little bit and then the three dancers came out with their drummer. The woman explained what they were doing, and I watched her turn to the four directions, knowing that she was doing it to honor and ask permission for doing the dance. Then she opened up the dance for volunteers and walked up directly to Kady, asking her to join. At first she didn’t want to, but I encouraged her and finally she went up with a small group of others to learn the dance. As I videotaped her, tears started streaming down my face. We were meant to be here. On this day. On this ground. To be a part of this to remind us that while we are all different, we are still all the same. Kady came back from dancing beaming, and wiped the tears from my cheek. “Why are you crying, Mamma?” she asked.

“Because I’m happy.”

After the dancing, we went up to the woman who introduced herself as Ixtli. We talked for a bit and I told her our story, told her about Kady’s interest in Pow-Wow dancing and my plans to help her get what she needed once we returned home. Ixtli told us about her story, about a young girl who she had promised to help make regalia for dancing but wasn’t able to keep that promise. She talked about how she felt everything in life happens for a reason, a feeling I used to share until you died because seriously? I will never understand ANY reason for that happening other than pain and sorrow. Ixtli asked us to meet her inside in a few minutes so that she could give us her card and help Kady with her dress once we returned home. It turned out, we gave each other something that we both needed, and really… isn’t that the beauty we should all experience in life? Helping one another in genuine kindness for no other reason than the joy it can bring?

We went back inside, I exchanged cards with Ixtli,

and then we went about finding some supper to eat. When we arrived in the hall I had spotted a restaurant in the food court called, “Meat Pies.” I hoped that maybe THIS shop would actually have the style of meat pie that you can eat in your hand, the kind that I ate so often in New Zealand and have never found since I left there several decades ago. I walked up to the booth and sure enough, they looked the same. I asked the worker about it and she told me that the owner made, “Legit meat pies as he had been taught when he grew up in Australia.” Oh. My. God. More food heaven!

I ordered the lamb and curry meat pie and also took a sausage roll to go for my breakfast the next day.

I couldn’t stop giggling. Meat pies! I had told you about them so many times and hoped for you to be able to try them, and here they finally were. I sat down and ate the pie, smiling the entire time. This was the best food day of my life!

It was still pretty early, but there was nothing left that we really wanted to do, so we started back on the monorail and began walking the nine blocks back to the hospital. Only nine blocks. No big deal. HA! Seattle, you made me love you for your food, and hate you for your hills all in the same day! That nine blocks took us what felt like hours to walk. Later I looked it up and many of the streets have a more than 20% incline. My knees and my feet were killing me, but finally we arrived at the hospital. “I don’t like it here,” Kady said as we watched a home health person bringing in a new walker for some patient,” It reminds me of daddy.” I agreed with her.

With two hours to wait, it was inevitable. Someone would need to go to the bathroom, and after about 45 minutes Alena announce, “I need to go to the bathroom.” Now, this hospital was right in the middle of a neighborhood, and didn’t seem to have a main entrance. The same day surgery doors we were sitting outside of had closed for the day, and the emergency entrance was inside of a parking garage. We walked inside and found a bathroom. Locked. We waited in the ER for a few minutes watching people being checked in, hearing familiar words and phrases like dilaudid, rate your pain, wheelchair, and temperatures in Celcius. I knew this wasn’t the place to find a public bathroom,

so knowing hospitals as well as I did, I walked around like we were meant to be there and found the cafeteria. I ordered my first coffee of the day, the girls got snacks, and we sat down to work on Junior Ranger books for the final 90 minutes we had to wait. And of course, we used the bathroom. We commented many times about how we didn’t like being in a hospital again, but really…. I had been left with no other options.

When it came time to go and meet the bus, we walked outside to find it pouring. We couldn’t have waited outside the entire time anyway, and I was reminded about how amazing it was that this rain had held off ALL DAY so that we could get from one place to another without getting wet. The bus arrived, and on the way home, both girls fell asleep. We got back into CeeCee and I drove us back to the RV Park. We would be on a different site tonight, a pull through, which in the dark would be exactly what I needed, except that when we arrived at 11pm, someone had taken my spot. The site next to it was empty, but CeeCee was too robust to fit into it. I tried to squeak her in several times, pushing the sign the picnic table and the fire ring around to try and make room. It was no use, she wouldn’t fit. Now what do I do? I drove up to the main office, which I knew would be closed, and surprisingly… the owner happened to notice me and came out. I told him what had happened, and he offered me a different site and helped me with his flashlight. We realized that this site also wouldn’t work, and I said that I wanted to try the first site again. He moved things out of the way for me, I took the turn as wide as I could, and slipped CeeCee in. He commented, as you have been used to hearing, “Wow! I’m impressed! I don’t see people manuver that easily.” I told him that you would have been proud!

Finally… we settled into bed. And finally, I got a decent night’s sleep.

Now we turn south again, stopping at Mt. Rainier, Mt. St. Helen’s and Crater Lake on our way back into the expensive gas state of California. Thank you, honey, for giving us a great day in Seattle. I know you were part of everything that happened.

Till next week,

Love you forever,

Your Liebchen

June 9, 2018

Day 20 of 83

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