You know that constant busy-ness that’s afflicted (or blessed) me since late spring? It culminates this week. Specifically tomorrow. After that, though there’s another week or two of “heightened activity”* as the folks at the NSA-CIA-DHS like to say, it is done<\/i>.<\/p>\n
I can go back to being my usual slug-lazy self** and poke around on the Tubz for good (and bad) stuff to blog.<\/p>\n
But look for the blog to have a couple of quiet days. Of which today was one. Tomorrow will probably be even quieter. So I count on the Commentariat to pick up the flag and carry on in my absence.<\/p>\n
—–<\/p>\n
Because of tomorrow being a Big Day, I decided to take the afternoon off to rest up and give the dogs some extra attention.<\/p>\n
We took a longish drive to a logging road we used to walk a lot<\/i> when we lived in Cabin Sweet Cabin. At first, I drove right past the road’s gate. Where I recalled a wide gravel parking area, there was now only a narrow, overgrown tunnel of greenery. Only after driving another half mile did I realize I must have missed it.<\/p>\n
Once I found my way back to the gate, walking on the road was a strange experience. It was raining and bleak and otherworldly and while I recalled every turn, every uphill, every downslope on the path, nothing else was as I remembered. <\/p>\n
“Wait. Didn’t this spot used to have a view?” It’s a grove of tall alders how.<\/p>\n
“I know this is where we used to turn around. But where’s the … what was that old landmark, anyhow?” Not there any more, whatever it was. Or hidden beneath masses of creeping blackberry vines and morning glory. (The Pacific North WET is like a tropical rainforest — or at least it’s as fecund as a rainforest, but unfortunately without the “tropical” part.)<\/p>\n
Once-open stretches of road were now as eerie as the forest from The Blair Witch Project<\/i>. Strange, pungent wildflowers grew as tall as my shoulders.<\/p>\n
The road itself was disappearing under a haze of tall grasses whose rain-laden blades soaked my tennis shoes and socks. Unless Weyerhaeuser opens the road again soon in a few more years it’ll disappear entirely.<\/p>\n
Heading back I paused at the old spot (I know it must have been the old spot) where we used to stop and catch our breath before the last uphill trudge. And there it occurred to me that the old road is like this country.<\/p>\n
The grounding is still there. Somebody who knew it well would recognize the fundamentals. But it’s all been overgrown — taken over — by strange and vaguely (or more than vaguely) ominous excrescences. And doomed to disappear altogether unless someone makes a determined effort.<\/p>\n
The only thing about the surroundings that was pretty much the same as I remembered (and watch for it; this is Portentious and Deeply Significant) was that right near the beginning, where the road forks in several different directions, people had been setting up targets and shooting to their hearts’ delight.<\/p>\n
—–<\/p>\n
*Dear NSA-CIA-DHS: Other than “heightened activity” I have nothing to do with anything you might be legitimately interested in. I know that won’t stop you. I’m just sayin’.<\/p>\n
** It is one of my most sincere aims in life to become lazy. I try very hard. But actually I’m lying when I claim to have succeeded at becoming slug-like. I know me; when this long busy drudge is finally over, I’ll just find some other Giant Project.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
You know that constant busy-ness that’s afflicted (or blessed) me since late spring? It culminates this week. Specifically tomorrow. After that, though there’s another week or two of “heightened activity”* as the folks at the NSA-CIA-DHS like to say, it is done. I can go back to being my usual slug-lazy self** and poke around on the Tubz for good (and bad) stuff to blog. But look for the blog to have a couple of quiet days. Of which today was one. Tomorrow will probably be even quieter. So I count on the Commentariat to pick up the flag and…<\/p>\n