Saturday, September 12, 2020

Dispatch From Oregon


Not much. You?

It's actually kind of nice this morning. The wind has died down to nothing and so the smoke from the fires seven miles away is just sort of meandering over here and loitering rather than galloping in. It's keeping us fully twenty degrees cooler than predicted, too. The humidity has gone back up, which is also good, and we're anticipating not having to check our hankies for blood and crud any day now.

All in all, it's a fine orange day in the neighborhood. We have a number of friends who have had to leave their homes, and even those who have been wanting nothing more than to do that for the last six months are unhappy about the circumstances. So far our friends have found shelter that is not too odious and haven't had to camp out in a school gymnasium somewhere whilst keeping distance from fellow possible disease vectors, which is truly unfair. But that's the kind of year it's been, right? The kind of year when there's no room in the hospital for you even though you've broken all your bones slipping in locust poop.

We check the news several times a day to make sure our anxiety levels are topped up. Our next-door neighbor Anna reports she has a go-bag all ready, which is annoying of her, because it means we should have a go-bag ready but we don't, and that leads to a lot of inner conflict between the sensible and lazy portions of our psyches. As a sort of compromise, we have begun to imagine what we might put in a go-bag if we ever got off our dead asses.

Peanut butter. That would be a good thing to put in, and we don't seem to have any. We do have a mess of broccoli in the freezer and if we added popsicle sticks we might have a plan, but we don't have popsicle sticks either. You're supposed to put in all your important papers. I do not know what those might be. I truly don't. Also your safety deposit box key, which is just silly. Can't sleep in a safety deposit box.

Photos, mementos, all the things you'd really miss if you didn't have them? There are fewer of those things all the time. I've wondered what I should do with my photo albums. I have scads of them. My heirs might be able to spend a fun evening looking through them once, especially the nude years, but after that there'd be this awful weight on them as they recognize they don't want the albums but feel they must store them as some kind of mandatory monument. Honeys. Just throw them out. It's okay. I should get around to doing it for you. Somehow I haven't. I should get rid of my parents' old albums also, but, well...you know. Somehow I haven't.

 

So what would crush my soul if it didn't make it out of a fire? That's easy. Tater cat. And Pootie. Maybe not even in that order. And, I am not kidding, Pootie's best friend Hajerle. Hajerle used to live with my sister Margaret and he came to live with us after she died. I don't think I could bear to look into Pootie's eye buttons if we managed to escape without Hajerle. I know this sounds emphatically dumb, especially to people who have lost family members and pets and have a good grip on what's important in life, but this is a fact: the threads of love and grief are anchored in peculiar, personal ways. And even giving them an imaginary tug will reveal which ones are attached to the heart.

This morning it appears that Portland proper will escape the current inferno. But there is much to mourn. One of these things is the news that a whole lot of people in this country think the Black Lives Matter people are setting these fires. And that if you tell them they're getting that BLM confused with the Bureau of Land Management, they will think: We knew it. We knew BLM had Management all along, and a headquarters, and shady overlords that hate America and want white people to die so they can steal their property.

I mourn this.

But Dave and Tater and Pootie and Hajerle and I are not on fire. We should probably work on that go-bag anyway. At this rate, there's no way our predicted big-ass state-leveling earthquake won't show up before the year is out.

51 comments:

  1. This is a most trying time. There are tragedy in the makings everywhere it seems. Take care of yourselves, Pootie and Hajerle.

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    1. A sobering thought is that although this might be the worst fire season on record, it also might be the best fire season from here on out.

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  2. Plus there is an asteroid due to pass very close by the earth in late October (or will it hit?) and scientists are speculating about a black hole the size of a golf ball but with the mass of ten earths orbiting our solar system (fortunately much further away than the asteroid. But THIS year -- who the fuck knows.) I get all this information from my husband, who is a news junkie, as I can no longer listen to most of it without major depression. Sometimes I accidentally hear some news on our local NPR jazz station. It immediately counters the nice buzz derived from listening to jazz.



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    1. I'm pretty sure we're in the "black hole", so maybe the asteroid could buzz us out?

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    2. I'm embarrassed to admit that most jazz makes me want to listen to news. Unless it's really old, I don't appreciate it as much as I am supposed to. Just a rube I guess.

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    3. Linda, would you say we're in a black hole because everything sucks?

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    4. Oh that the two black holes of Trump campaign conspirators and alt right conspiracy theorists would collide and implode simultaneously, leaving at least the latest layer of "the swamp" sucked off. Ha! Murr, you and the go-bag boys stay safe. I have friends close to the Powerline fire, standing at the ready to evacuate. Her pictures are horrific, flames shooting up into the sky behind their home. Get your running shoes untied and ready to go.

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    5. Looks like we're in the clear. Well not clear. But no fire here. We're on day four of heavy smoke and it's not fun. One more day, and then it should clear out a bit and we'll even get some rain.

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  3. Stay safe and hoping you do not get too much more bad air. This is just the tip of the smoke cloud as climate change hasn't even really gone to town yet.

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    1. True enough. I know yesterday Portland was reputed to have the worst air quality on Earth, but I've certainly seen worse. There were a few really bad days during the Gorge Fire a few years back and then we also had a rambunctious volcano.

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  4. We're getting reports of clouds moving in this weekend. How will we know? Will the skies be a little less orange, trending toward gray?

    Wondering too, if the clouds bring rain, what the first raindrops might look like as they pass through the layer of smoke and ash. My dad's wondering what kind of sludge will result when they mix with the ash cover on the surfaces of Oregon.

    My biggest wonder is why this coast continues to hang around with a federal gubmint that refuses to do jack shit for them any more!

    Can you tell I'm just a little bit sick of this year?

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  5. Dave, Pootie, Tater and Hajerle sounds like a damn fine go bag to me.
    The fires were set by BLM protestors? Now that as an insanity I didn't expect to read. Foolish and naive I am.

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    1. Followed immediately by reports that alt-right agitators dressed as Antifa set the fires. Oh, it's out there.

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  6. I've been a wee bit worried about you, Dave, Pootie, Tater, and your go bags. I'm just meeting Hajerle so I'll add him to my list of of west coast folks to keep mentally checking in on. It's no longer being called 2020, it's now ZOZO.

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    1. Ouija Board Devil and that comment by Cheryl cracked me up so much I may have to Steal it!

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  7. Yes, please pack that damn go bag this afternoon. And put in it a copy of your home's insurance policy, just in case you might need it later. Uncle Ed is worried.

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    1. Oh! An important piece of paper! Thanks!

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    2. Birth and marriage certificates are also important for proving who you are when you need to collect on the home insurance policy.

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  8. Pack your birth certificates because the orange scourge might want to require them for any monetary relief you may be eligible for.

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    1. Shoot, I don't know where they are. Safety deposit box probably. Oh! That key!

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  9. Pootie, Hajerle, and Dave should be your main go bag. Anything else is smoke flavored gravy. Take care out there.

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  10. I thought about this priorly when I had 2 cats. The trick is to have the cat carrier at hand without said cat freaking out and hiding really really well.

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  11. “We check the news several times a day to make sure our anxiety levels are topped up.” Love this.

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  12. How do I get a name I. D. here? I wanna take responsibility for snarky laughs.

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    1. Dear Unknown,
      If you have any really choice snarky laughs please post them under the byline "Deb" as I can't hold a candle to the commentors here for snark, clever, funny, etc. and it's beginning to wear on my self-esteem.

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    2. I dunno! You don't have a young person handy by either, huh? Do you have a Google account?

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    3. "Unknown", after you type in your comment, when you come to the "Reply as" button, select "name, URL", then type in the name you want to use. (You don't need to type in an URL. Your name is sufficient.) Then hit "continue", then hit "Publish", prove that you're not a robot, then hit "Publish" again.

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  13. I like the way you captured how the most precious things to us may be the least valuable ones.

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  14. I once thought about what I'd grab if I had to leave in a hurry and it came down to Harvey Banana (stuffed chimpanzee baby)and all my usb's tipped into my backpack along with the contents of my small safe.

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  15. In my go-bag: Curtis. Binoculars. iPhone. McVittie's. I"m glad to have this update, even though it's sickening to think what you're going through. Rain, rain, please come again. Rain, sweet rain.

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    1. This morning there was water vapor in the air. And rain's in the forecast for next week.

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  16. Locust poop! They’re probably on the way bu no one wants to alarm us.
    Janet, friend of Margaret

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    1. Hi! Which Margaret? Doesn't matter, all my Margarets are top-drawer.

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    2. Sister.
      I met you and Dave at the celebration at Margaret’s house. Sheila and Debby are besties.

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    3. I’ve followed your blog for years. This is first I’ve posted. I almost always enjoy it . . . and get a snort out of it.
      It brings a little Margaret into my life.

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    4. But I like you on your own merits.

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    5. Hi Janet! I knew the name was familiar! And everyone could use a little more Margaret.

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  17. I can’t begin to compare our local Knoxville, TN, news with yours, but some of it may cause a chuckle. In the past two days all the local TV news and the newspaper featured the report of a tiger on the loose. No one seems to be missing a tiger. Then there is a wallaby, that’s reportedly not a threat, on the loose in upper East Tennessee. However, today there was the sad report of a black bear, since euthanized, scavenging on human remains in the Great Smoky Mountains back country. Tigers, and wallabies, and bears, oh, my. You’ve reminded me to gather my pandas in the event of emergency. And my late husband’s ashes. I hadn’t given that much thought.

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  18. Your dark humor during trying times is admirable and it's hard to even laugh about it, but that last part I just had to. I had to laugh because otherwise I'd cry about the sheer ignorance of some people and what they actually Believe and can be convinced of. There is so much going wrong on an epic scale and I try to tamp my Anxiety levels down by missing a few days of the News. Usually I'd want to be informed, but like your Go-Bag procrastination, there are some things that just get too Real when I must actually prepare for the possibility of them. Too much of it is very scary unsettling stuff... and we're all potentially involved and have to face the discomfort of things getting worse and possibly not getting better for a mighty long time. The smoke is hanging heavily in Phoenix too, so I can't even imagine how bad it is closer to the West Coast. Some of our fires have been put out, some still rage, but it's nothing like my Grandson is experiencing in Washington State and my Younger Brother is experiencing in Cali... where it's Apocalyptic right now.

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    1. At first I was thinking Phoenix, Oregon, where smoke is probably no longer hanging heavily because everything has already been burned up. Oh! Arizona! You have had the absolute worst summer as far as I can tell. Ridiculous heat. And it's only the beginning. I'm sorry.

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  19. Flying from Tucson (air quality Good today) to Seattle (air quality unhealthful) on Saturday. Maybe.

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  20. did you think that destroying your own children's future would have no consequence? We millennials are now full blown communists, and you boomers are going to watch your country become communist before you finally drop dead

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    1. Ha ha ha! You can't scare a bunch of old hippies with communism.

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