As For Me

As For Me

Now that I've narrated some of my sister's story, it's time to explain myself. I'm not a naturalist. I like the outdoors in a religious kind of way and spent some time hiking the up and outbacks of the Cascades with my sister during the 90's. She is not what I'd call an extreme hiker but an unplugged one. She hiked the Peruvian Andes before everyone started going to Machu Pichu for their honeymoons. Actually, outdoor folks were still really worried about the Shining Path then and Cuzco was just a spit-bathed village. She has hiked the Swiss Alps on five different occasions and even trekked them from the eastern border of Switzerland to the western border. She even knows German. And then there's the little story of the summer she spent hiking the Pacific Crest Trail from the California border to the Washington border. She took her dog along that time.

I too love to travel. I'll go just about anywhere as long as I can be home for lunch and have some afternoon time to read or grade papers. Those trips into the Cascades were a real leap of faith for me and the faith was in my sister and in the memory I have of fun times at Silver Creek Falls. That was a magic place for all three of us kids and I even wrote a documented paper about falls for a creative non-fiction writing class I once took.

Going into the mountains with my sister presented an experience of heaven for me. She did all the work (plotted the treks, carried all the emergency equipment, pointed out wildlife and unusual plants) while I did nothing but carry my own lunch and water and enjoy the trip. I learned how to really look at the sky, how to look for animal scat, what not to touch, and what good camp sites might look like. I can tell some good stories about heat exhaustion, looking out for bears, and refusing to ride with her on certain mountain roads that make long, sheer drops on both sides.

But I only became expert at learning how to savor an after lunch nap on a bed of springy moss next to a burbling stream. I still can't really read maps unless they are of city streets and I just learned what the word "talus" means (hmm. . .that sounds like part of the male body). I can tell you energizing stories about negative ions and I can really discuss the term "elevation gain" in a way that has high meaning for me. That's about it.

I'm a wordsmith who believes aggressively in the power of language. I'm a reader, a writer and a teacher. I like to cook and I belong to a knitting group of women most of whom work on the psych. ward of a local hospital. They're chillingly smart and their shop talk is really entertaining once you get to understand some of their pet names for c0-workers and patients and which floor is which. And among my most important humans are my grandgirls Mary and Alicia.

Besides being an okay cook, I am a foodie. I like to talk about food, plan menus in groups, read cookbooks and munch on chocolate while doing just about anything. I can't even go hiking without chocolate.

I live in a dinosaur marriage. He and I have been married for nearly 42 years. Sometimes I really REALLY hate him but most of the time we make easy and affectionate companions. His even temper is a good balance for my wild-tangent personality.

So how do I fit in with my sister's owl adventure? Well. I became part of the adventure from the first sighting. She kept me up on all the rest of the sightings and then she took me for a last visit to the grove deep in the summer time. "We won't see them this time," she kept saying. "They are gone from the grove since the baby learned to fly." But, guess what? We DID see them again that time and once more there we were cavorting around the grove.

I told her she needed to write a book about the experience. A children's book. The story needed to be shared with people besides our family and friends. "Yeah, right." She replied. She pretty much shut me down but the next time I saw her she said, "Ya know. I think I should write a book. You should help me." Guess what else? She already had a draft completed. This is where I stepped right beside her on this particular path. This is the part where I could bring my own brand of expertise into place.