That Was The Week That Was

When I haven't been writing, I've been listening. When I haven't been listening, I've been driving. When I haven't been driving, I've been doing something with the grrr-animals. And I've been completely ignoring the cleaning, the house, ...sleeping, things like that. Maintenance has fallen off the cliff. In fact, that's the direction I should probably do all my sweeping.

Katheryn's away (seems like she just got back), as no sooner had her business stuff got taken care of, that it was time to go to finally head for Eugene for a long-postponed trip to see her mom. Long-postponed as in the original intention of helping her plant her garden has become irrelevent. Hell, it's almost time for harvest. Smokey almost went with, but cooler heads prevailed, and he's been alternating between being left at home, and visits to Mary Jo, the Island dog-sitter. He likes it there. He has the run of the house. he gets along with all the other dogs and the house-cat. In fact, last week he didn't want to come home with me. I kept walking to the car, and he just walked over to the sitter and sat by her, looking conflicted (but only semi-)

I tell myself it was because I left his leash there that night. He didn't have all the signs that we were, in fact, leaving.

I tell myself that.

Also, my sister-in-law Jane came out from Detroit to spend time with niece Annie up on the Mountain. She was here for a solid week, but it was a whirlwind visit: a couple of days with Annie, a couple days with my sister, a Sunday on the Island, and a couple days with her brother on the Mainland. The two sisters had it in mind that they'd rather walk onto the Island than drive, not wanting to spend too much time sitting in traffic. I scoffed. And I scoffed in that condescending way that's irritating even to me. Ferry traffic! I face that every day!

When we drove out to the coffee shop where they were spending the morning relaxing, we noticed that the line leaving the Island was (by my calculations) about 3 1/2 hours long. Head-rattlingly long. "Let's go find a slow-cook restaurant" long. "Let's go find a room" long. Scales fell from eyes. We spent the day in the charming town of Langley. Charming as in "more galleries per city block than any town has a right to." Had a good meal. Ambled. Sauntered. Stopped by a "chocolate bar," and had an iced chocolate drink--sorta like a mild chocolate slurpee--that could become a habit if I didn't have so many to begin with. I forget the name of the variety of drink, but I'm sure I'll be going there again sometime, so this will probably get updated.

But it was a long, nice relaxing afternoon and early evening. And when we returned the sisters to the boat...the line was still 3 1/2 hours long. Good golly. Labor Day's coming soon. That will signal the end of "High Season" and the Island's population will sink back to its humble low tide. Ferry lines will shrink. Prices will come down. It'll almost compensate for driving everywhere in the dark.

Early morning last week I was getting ready to head for the Mainland when up the drive-way a young two-point buck bandied slowly to the back of our cars. He stood there for a good 45 minutes helping himself to the early blackberries that are ripening on the sticker-bushes separating us from out neighbors. Good eating, there. I've been picking them, myself, but only the high ones. You never know when a guest may drop by to eat.