So who knows if we'll be leaving for the Front Range tomorrow.
"Who knows?" seems to be the theme of this summer. Who knows if Cummerbund will actually make it the whole five thousand miles without breaking down? Who knows if we'll find couchsurfers who will take us even though we're a *GASP* couple? Who knows if the couchsurfing hosts... you know... READ my entire request and understand that we're a couple and won't cancel last minute when they find out I'm bringing a boyfriend? Who knows if my knee will hold up under the monstrous weight of my chubby, aubergine backpack?
I suppose that the entirety of life is a big, fat, "WHO KNOWS?" regardless of whether I'm an unemployed vagabond or a working homeowner. But the "WHO KNOWS?" is a much louder, persistent question when taking on the role of the former.
During the last few months, I've spent a lot of time pondering my last few years of traveling. And I've come to the conclusion that for quite a bit of the time, I was miserable. Life was exciting. Life was profoundly meaningful to me (I'm extraordinarily deft at the art of mingling misery and meaning). But life was mostly misery punctuated by moments of extreme bliss (aka, Slovenia).
I could say that those months of unhappiness were because a) some workaway hosts were exploitative, or b) some couchsurfing hosts were the kinds with expectations, but putting blame elsewhere wouldn't help me change the situation.
I'm not responsible for the couchsurfing host who molested me in Germany or the farmer in Ireland who had me work nine hour days and never fed me properly. But what I am responsible for is a) compromising my safety for the sake of frugality, b) compromising my happiness for the sake of commitment and b) not asking for help when I was desperate for it.
I don't want to live that life again. And I'm not going to.
Boy and I are going to spend as much money as we need to in Europe this summer. I'm not going to worry about my five-dollar-per-day ideal budget. Boy and I are going to honor our commitments if we're being treated well, and if not, I refuse to feel the tiniest twinge of guilt about abandoning ship and letting the current carry me somewhere else.
And I am so going to ask for help if we need it.
We drove from Seattle to Camas on Tuesday afternoon. I google mapped the route and was unpleasantly not surprised to see that there were three accidents in our way. The biggest accident caused a forty-five minute delay.
"Typical," I mumbled grumpily, texting my Aunt Julie to let her know that we'd be late for dinner and to apologize for the inconvenience.
"As long as you still come hungry, no inconvenience at all!" she texted back.
"OH MY GOODNESS," I wrote. "WE WILL BE SO HUNGRY."
I looked for the accident as we approached the end of the red on google maps.
"Holy cow, it's on the other side of the road!"
Two semi trucks were sprawled over on their sides. A white sedan was crumpled like crepe paper. Helicopters were flying overhead. Ambulances and stretchers everywhere. Bumper to bumper traffic for miles.
"Hope everyone's okay..." Boy craned his head to look over his shoulder at the catastrophe, slowing down and contributing to the traffic on our side of the road.
Everyone was not okay. Two people died and three were injured: I-5 accident
We reached my aunt's home in Camas at about 8:30. She welcomed us with a smile that reminded me of my mother's and her own version of the infamous Kressin laugh. Her apartment was tiny, tidy, and chocked full of art and knick-knacks my Aunt Julie had picked up from her travels around the world. Including a table set with china, placemats and cloth napkins from Uzbekistan, Pakistan and Japan.
Boy and I were stunned. We knew Aunt Julie had planned to cook us dinner, but we didn't realize that we were going to be treated to such an event. Tomato soup, chicken salad, ice cream with homemade rhubarb sauce.
We chatted until nearly midnight, all of us sharing travel stories and admiring the maps on Aunt Julie's wall.
The next morning we headed into Downtown Camas, puttered around for a bit, peeking into the windows of the quaint, closed shops, and then sat down for coffee in Piccolo Cafe.
When we'd finished sitting (a good four hours later), Boy and I set off for Portland. After ages of searching, we chanced upon some expensive street parking with a limit of 90 minutes, groaned at the inconvenience of paid parking, and then began to wander.
We wandered until we found a farmer's market,
-- and a tamales stand that sold little parcels of joy stuffed with artichokes and cotija cheese.
The city of Portland is bursting with street art,
-- old looking churches,
-- and drinking fountains. Seriously. There's at least one drinking fountain on every block. Nary a soul will go thirsty in Portland.
Decked out food carts/buses were nearly as prolific as the drinking fountains. Nary a soul (a soul with a full bank account) will go hungry in Portland.
"But I think I would still take Seattle's banana cart over all these food carts," I told Boy as we walked through an outdoor smorgasbord of meals on wheels.
The other thing I noticed about Portland was the homelessness. Men, women and children on street corners with signs, in sleeping bags in front of shops, in parks, in tents by the river. As of April, there were 4000 people living life homeless in Portland.
"Question --" I asked my aunt Julie the next day, "is the homelessness in Portland a result of people being forced out of their homes due to high rent or is it because homeless people move to Portland because the resources are better here?"
"A bit of both, I suppose," my aunt replied. "Probably more about the resources, though."
Ninety minutes drew to an end and we scurried back to Cummerbund, re-parked in a nearby garage and then scampered off to an Irish pub to watch yet another soccer match.
WHEN WILL THIS BE OVER?
"Did you notice which floor we parked on?" Boy asked as we hustled towards the pub.
"Course not. Somewhere in the middle. Maybe level four or five. Doesn't matter, we'll find it."
Boy and I returned to the parking garage around five. We'd given ourselves plenty of time to drive to Vancouver to meet aunt Julie and cousin Amy for dinner at a Persian restaurant my aunt had been raving about. So we paid our exorbitant ticket, mourned the cheese we could have purchased with that money, and then pushed number 4 in the elevator.
"He's not here... next level?"
We pushed number 5.
"Not here either... I don't remember parking on level 6," my stomach started to clench with worry. Nobody would take Cummerbund, would they?
"He has to be here somewhere," Boy reassured me. "Let's check six."
Nothing, nothing, nothing.
Boy flew up the stairs and checked each floor. As my knee was throbbing with pain, and stairs exacerbate my pain exponentially, I took the elevator down to level two and walked the spiral all the way up. As I walked (panic rising in my throat), I noticed that the floor numbers were only odd.
3.
5.
7.
9.
That's strange... not what it says in the elevator.
I walked all the way to level nine.
No Cummerbund.
"Troy... I had everything in that car," I cried, feeling immensely stupid and scared. "BOTH of my passports, my debit card, my credit card, my laptop... everything."
We took the elevator to the bottom floor and walked all the way to the roof for the second time. I forgot all about the pain in my knee as my stomach transmogrified into a veritable battlefield of worry.
No Cummerbund.
"We're new here," Boy told the parking lot attendant. "Is there another lot we could have parked in that's close to here?"
"No, you're in this lot. If the machine accepted your ticket and you paid the fee, you're in this lot."
"How do you know the car's still here? Do you have cameras?"
"Nah," the attendant chuckled, "we don't have any of those."
My stomach felt dead.
BOTH of my passports. Why didn't I just leave those at home with Julie? If they're gone... our trip this summer won't happen. It'll take at least two months to get new ones.
"Do you want to walk up again and look, or should I call security?"
"Call security," I looked at Boy and then the attendant. "We've already walked the whole garage. Twice."
"Alrighty, he'll be here in about ten minutes," the attendant drawled. "You can just wait here."
True to his word, ten minutes later, a young bicycle policeman rode up.
"Do you remember which floor you parked on?"
"Nope. Somewhere near the middle."
"Okay, was it the orange floor or the blue floor?"
"Wait... there are two different floors?" Boy and I glanced at each other in relief and embarrassment.
"Yeah, blue and orange spiral in between each other. You can access orange from one side of the garage and blue from the other."
"I don't remember what color," I shook my head, a whole different color flushing my cheeks.
"Do you remember if the floor numbers were odd or even?" the policemen continued patiently, not a hint of judgment found in his voice.
"Well... where we just checked twice... those floors were odd. And the car's definitely not there."
"I'll check the even. Be right back," the policeman said as he mounted his bicycle and sped up the even spiral.
"THERE ARE TWO DIFFERENT SPIRALS?" I vomited all of my stomach warfare casualties onto Boy.
"That's not complicated at all... gosh," Boy held me close. "By the way, what did you think you were going to do with two passports in Portland?"
"I don't know...they were just in my backpack," I moaned. "That's where they live."
The police office rode down the spiral and kindly informed us that our 93 Geo Metro was on the 4th floor.
We neither drove nor parked the next day. We let my dear aunt Julie chauffeur us around Camas and Vancouver. And spent most of the day walking.
 |
| Blackberries grow like weeds. The most delicious, prickly weeds. Boy was in heaven. |
We strolled along a riverfront trail, hunting for blackberries, noting the tents of homeless people on the banks and snapping the random picture.
 |
| There are all sorts of monuments honoring the Native Americans who lived here |
We found a tasting room in downtown Vancouver and used it as an excuse to rest our feet for an hour or so.
I love that Boy has become this serious about enjoying wine... this obsession is significantly more satisfying than watching men kick a ball at each other for hours...
My aunt went to take care of her mother for the evening, so Boy and I took a nap and then strolled into Downtown Camas.
 |
| The giant paper mill that borders downtown. |
We said goodbye to my aunt the next morning, asking her to please visit us whenever and wherever we happen to find a place to live in the world.
Our final days of roadtripping were spent with my family in Bend, Oregon. There was karaoke, dog cuddles, cat cuddles, soccer and downtown food festivals.
We'd hoped to spend at least half of this adventure couchsurfing and wild camping. But I don't wild camp illegally and couples don't couchsurf, so we stayed with friends. We crashed with family. And it was extraordinarily beautiful. Boy and I have lived long enough and full enough lives to find friends all over... maybe this next stage of life will be about investing in the friends we have. My community in Slovenia. My friends in Buckinghamshire. Boy's friend in London. Hopefully we'll still have the opportunity to meet and invest in new people, but perhaps that's not the focus now.
