The Dark Side of Vagabonding

I promised myself I would write this blog when events settled down enough to collect my thoughts. For the past four months all my posts have been a combination of joyful happenings and travelogues. Today, I want to write about a major difficulty to this life style Drake and I have chosen. As most of you know, my father has severe dementia and has been residing in a dementia care center in Claremore, Oklahoma run by the Veteran's Administration. He is pitiful, but, fortunately, he doesn't know that. He's settled in the past year and a half to be a mostly happy two year old. He has no sense of time or place and hasn't recognized me for over a year. Basically, he eats and sleeps since he's no longer able to have dialogues, read books, watch TV, write, work puzzles or do any other leisure activity beyond those things that would interest a toddler.

Ten days ago he fell and broke his hip. He was transported to a major hospital in Tulsa for surgery and recuperation from that event. I had expected something of this nature to occur, but we made a conscious decision to not put our lives on hold waiting for the shoe to drop. This blog is not so much about what has happened in the past 10 days as it is about my responses and feelings about the events. I hope it will help others who read this when they wind up coping in similar situations.

I've learned some very hard lessons. Here's the first. I naively assumed that once my father arrived at the hospital that he would receive care for his injury. That was an incorrect assumption. I'm in Washington state trying to get a grip on the situation as well as finding a way to get to Tulsa where I knew I would have to be prepared to stay for quite a while. The Claremore care facility did everything correctly and very promptly. I got the call he had fallen at 9, and knew he was in the hospital by 10:30. I was told the hospital would call me when he arrived at the Emergency Room. By noon I still hadn't received a call. When I called, the response was along the vein of "Yes, he's here." I was listened to politely, but pretty much brushed off when I tried to explain his dementia and ask what was happening. Finally, I wised up and call my cousin Crystal, who works at another hospital, and told her what was happening. She immediately left work to go to the Emergency Room to discover my Dad in severe pain laying on a guerney in the hallway of the ER. He had received no attention, and more importantly no pain relief. He'd had nothing since the morphine shot in Claremore. She went into quick and angry action. From my end, I got the hospital to accept a verbal authorization to treat for both Crystal and my other cousin Travis, so they could at least get some comfort care established.

First lesson: Have someone (more than one someone is ideal) with authorization to make medical decisions in hand on the ground. Thanks to Crystal's relentless badgering, my Dad finally got a morphine shot and was moved to a holding room - naturally the hospital was full and there was no room available to be assigned. If I had just been soothed aside from afar, I guess my father would have laid in the hallway for hours. I couldn't get out of Washington and to Tulsa until Friday morning (I left at 4 am to start the trek to Tulsa during which I saw 4 airports and finally arrived at 8 pm Friday night.) I had instructed Crystal to approve surgery as soon as possible - it actually occurred while I was literally in the air.

Second lesson: Your on the ground emergency people have their own lives and jobs and responsibilities, and you can reasonably expect them to help during the immediate crisis. However, my father is not my cousins' responsibility. Be prepared to hire help until you get to wherever you need to be to assume the reins of responsibility. Fortunately, I used a nurse's aid service to be with Dad when he was trying to get adjusted to being in care. These services hire out skilled professionals to literally give one on one care to someone who is sick or hospitalized. Within 3 hours after Crystal arrived at the hospital I had used the service to hire a nurse's aid to be sitting by his bedside attending to his needs. It's expensive (think $20 a hour), but worth every dime. Consider that my father can't use a call bell to summon a nurse, doesn't realize there's anything wrong with him when he wakes up (every time), can't ask for anything to eat or drink, can't be reasoned with, and doesn't understand where he's at. Think of it this way: You wouldn't leave a toddler alone in a hospital bed with a broken bone. I even kept an aid hired while he was in surgery to sit in the waiting room, so she could immediately go to his room when he came out of recovery. She could also give me instant updates while I was traveling.

Third lesson: Hospitals are a business, and in these sorry times the way a business stays in the financial black is to fire people. The hospital my Dad is at, which has a good reputation, is running on a skeleton staff. They literally don't have a person to stay by the bedside of an incompetent person 24 hours a day. Actually, I discovered about 7 days into my Dad's hospital stay that the doctor can order a 24 hour a day sitter to be assigned. However, here's the catch: There are never enough sitters, and they are assigned on a priority basis with priority being given to suicides and the severely mentally disturbed. Dementia falls far, far down that list. Oh, and no one volunteered this service either. When Dad left the ICU, the doctor ordered a sitter which is the first I heard of it, but the sitter manager told me candidly that she couldn't guarantee one would be available. After a sitter was simply taken off my father in the middle of the evening and predictable chaos and a failure of care occurred, I simply continued to hire my own private nurse's aid/sitters round the clock. I quickly discovered after my Dad began to 'wake up' that bedside care was NOT my highest and best use.

Fourth lesson: Do not expect continuity of care. Over a ten day period, I have seen the same nurse twice. Every other day, every other shift there has been someone different. The only person who has continuity is the doctor - the internist (think primary care physician). Even the orthopedic team has faded from the picture. I did see the physician's assistant from the orthopedic group for about 4 days running, and the surgeon once.

Fifth lesson: Do not expect for your loved one's condition to be known to the care people who walk into the room. As far as I can ascertain, only the nurse assigned directly to him has any idea about what is happening. I have spent days being a door keeper and giving out the same spiel over and over again about his dementia, his inability to follow directions, his tantrums, his strength - which is much, much greater than they assume, and his inability to communicate except on the most elementary level. I've become accustomed to the blank stare which means, "When you stop talking to me, then I can get on with the task I was sent here to do - see, it's on my check-off chart." This has happened again and again and again and again. We've been in 4 different rooms (including the Emergency holding room) over 10 days. All personnel float all over the hospital (nurses, ex-ray, sonogram, blood drawers, etc.). I've pretty much never seen the same one twice.

Sixth lesson: Take control of care. Question everything and everyone. Start immediately. When my Dad is sleeping, I sent away the blood pressure/temperature check woman. Here's another more critical example: I made the mistake of going to the bathroom, and I was out of the room for a cruicial 10 minutes. When I returned, I discovered a woman with a portable sonogram machine putting that cold jelly on my Dad's legs and running her little wand up and down while he is fidgeting and complaining of the cold. When I asked her what she was doing, she replied that she was 'looking for clots'. Upon reflection, I realized how stupid that was. Like throwing a blood clot would be such a bad thing for an 86 year old man with a broken hip and severe dementia? I had no idea the test was even ordered. It's standard procedure - after all, the hospital needs to pay for that expensive portable machine, and in our litigious society - hey, I could sue if they hadn't looked for clots and my Dad died of a blood clot. That episode made me realize that I would have to be more vigilant because I should have turned her away and refused that procedure.

Seventh lesson: Take time to make decisions. I took over an hour to decide if I was going to let the ICU people put a nasal/gastric tube down my father's throat and into his stomach. There's a lot of subtle pressure for you to make an instantaneous decision when presented with a treatment option. The ICU doctor was all but tapping his foot (hurry up, hurry up - decide!) when he presented this treatment option. I won't bore you with the details. This was a medical necessity, but not something that had to done IMMEDIATELY. The insertion is not exactly a piece of cake for someone who can cooperate. I checked the internet to become familiar with exactly what an N/G tube was - they always used acronyms - don't be afraid to ask. I talked to Crystal. I formulated seven questions I wanted answered before I decided. Let me tell you, the ICU doctor didn't like any part of this routine, but you have to grow a thick skin and let their disapproval roll off you. Overall, I've found the nurses to be more helpful and better question answer people than the doctors when trying to get all the facts.

Eighth lesson: Unless an emergency situation develops, then all the procedures as well as the people you need to talk to about condition (ie doctors) all happens between 6:30 am and 3:30 pm. In 10 days I've never seen a doctor past 3:30. Between 3:30 and 11 - you get blood draw people, and that's about it. Of course, every situation is different, but I suspect that unless there are extenuating circumstances, all the action for every patient happens on the day shift. Be there. They don't wait for you, and no one will give you their numbers. I have discovered that you can ask to have a doctor paged and get a call back. Oh, and that information is NEVER volunteered. You have to ask for it, and I suspect be pretty demanding to get it.

Ninth lesson: Once you get control of the situation - well, when think you have control - then use your time to best advantage. If you can afford to have someone other than you sitting at the bedside doing bed care, then hire it done - the hired sitter/aid I talked about. This leaves you free to solve problems and interact with the treatment staff, and you can run and fetch. (This week I've gotten gowns, towels, blankets, food trays, toothbrushes/toothpaste, diapers, pads, sheets, ice water, requested medication, new IV bags, etc.) My Dad has never been alone for a minute - except for the time the hospital supposedly had him under their sitter care - and he managed to pull out a catheter and a rectal tube and spray the room with feces.

You can also use your time to anticipate the next steps of treatment. For instance, I used my time to figure out where Dad would be returning to at Claremore - his same ward, thank heavens. I called the ambulance service - oh, another tip, if you have someone who MIGHT need ambulance service, join and pay the annual membership fee. It will save you thousands of dollars. I figured out what will change in his daily living situation and made adjustments to his clothing that he will now be needing. I met with his primary care team at Claremore to understand what the rehab treatment plan would be, and to make it clear that I hoped they could get him walking again. (My father has only 2 things left to him - the ability to move around where he wants to go and eating.)

Tenth lesson: Give yourself permission to leave the hospital when it's appropriate. I quickly got into a routine of arriving at 6:45 in the morning and leaving after 4 in the afternoon. I interacted with everyone who would be making a care decision. I met every aid that sat by his bed and gave him direct care. Another thing I discovered is that while hospitals do run 24 hours a day, there is a holding pattern that they enter into after 4 pm and for every holiday and every weekend. For instance, my father could have gone back to Claremore on Friday, but there are no transports after 2 pm Friday - and I saw the doctor at 1:30 Friday. I got her to agree that my father would stay in the hospital until Monday. Good facilities don't take transports into their facilities except Mon - Fri. Care facilities also have a holding pattern on the weekends. Besides, I wanted my primary care team to all be on board when my Dad returned to Claremore.

The trick to deciding how much time to spend at the hospital is dependent upon how much guilt your mother/grandmother has managed to lay down into your DNA. Initially, I was sure that I wasn't meeting my mother's standard for how many actual hours I was staying up at the hospital. I literally had to step back and detach myself. My father has never recognized me once. I have his physical care covered every minute. I was wearing out physically and mentally from the constant stress. After 8 days of 10 hours (or more), and when he was clearly in no danger, I gave myself permission to not go up to the hospital, but to only check in by phone. That day I slept 13 hours. I had to refuse guilt, and stop comparing the job I was doing to the job I supposed that my mother would be doing in this situation. And, don't be fooled - it was hard to do.

I'm going to have to give myself permission to return to my life. I'm going to have to be prepared for all of this to occur again. Hopefully, I'll have learned from this event and be more effective the next time. I also suspect the next challenge will be fighting with the insurance company as the bills start to roll in. One of the things I have done is keep a calendar of what has happened every day. It could be six months before I start seeing bills. I realized I needed some prompt as to the events that have happened over the past 10 days when I start fighting the who I owe what battle.

Finally, I've asked for help. I've asked for physical help. I've asked for spiritual help. You don't have to go through these events alone. My friends in Tulsa have risen again and again to help me from giving me a place to stay, to dropping everything and going to the hospital, to staying in touch with me every single day I've been here. My friends not in Tulsa have sent me prayers of support and encouraging words daily. They have all made a difference. I am truly grateful and humbled by their care and encouragement. This is not the ending I want for my father. I've been praying for a massive stroke or heart attack. This event has led me to believe that he's not going to go out of this life the easy way. I have to be prepared to deal with this. At this point, the best I can say is I'm getting there. Heartfelt thanks again to every person in my life who has helped me deal with this.

Vancouver, British Columbia

We've been so occupied with everything we've found to do in the lower 48 that we hadn't even been up to Canada. However, we were determined to get up there prior to September 6th because of an art exhibit from the Orsay Museum in Paris. The Orsay is known as the Impressionist museum because that's where the bulk of those artists' paintings are shown. We are talking Renoir, Degas, Manet, etc. The exhibit featured one hundred plus drawings and watercolors. The focus was the changing role of women from 1850 - 1900 as seen through the eyes of the European artists of that time. I had never realized before what a case could be made that this era was the beginnings of the role of women changing to take up a more significant and equal role in Western culture. Considering the seeds of female political revolution were sown in the United States in 1848, I shouldn't have been that surprised. (For you non-historians - I'm referring to the Seneca Falls Convention called by Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott in 1848 to address the injustices toward women. Stanton wrote the "Declaration of Sentiments" based on the Declaration of Independence in which she cataloged 18 points of inequality and injustice toward women - the 9th of which was their inability to vote. To anyone reading this who has a daughter - this is HER history in this country.) I digress, as usual. Let's go back to the art exhibition.

The Impressionists moved away from traditional art and forms of art not only in application of paint and choices of color, but also in choices of subject. Prior to 1850, affluent women were treated worse than children - their property and even their person were considered owned by first their fathers and then their husbands. This was justified by the myth that women were weak not only in the body, but also in the head - no brains, you know and hysterical to boot. Too delicate to cope with life - must be protected from reality at all costs. Art portrayed women in formal portraiture in formal dress as companion pieces to their husband's formal portrait. The Impressionists, because they chose to paint outside the art schools of the time with their restricted subjects already chosen for the artists, turned to their wives, sweethearts, and to women who would be willing to pose for money. This allowed them to pick their own subjects and their own poses and follow their own ideas of what art should show.

Being men, they decided to paint nude women. Isn't that a big surprise? Actually, women have always been painted - both in the nude and clothed - but prior to 1850 if the women were not in formal realistic portraits, then they were idealized as either Madonna's, biblical figures, or as goddesses from Greek and Roman myths. The Impressionists turned this totally upside down and showed women doing shocking things like bathing or combing their hair!!!!!! This was scandalous at best and lewd at worst. These cherished, protected doll like figurines (women of the time) didn't have bodily needs and functions. Horror - talk about take away the romance. Doesn't this put Manet' famous picture of The Picnic (1863) in more understandable terms? He's making several statements about art as well as the role of women in society - she's nude and vulnerable while her male companions are clothed (as in rights and protections of the law - while she has none). Incidentally, what is now considered one of the greatest paintings in Western civilization was uniformly lambasted by the critics of the day.

The Impressionists and post-Impressionists extended the artistic subject matter of how women should be painted to include women who actually worked for a living. Since in the 19th century (and a lot of the 20th century) the number of professions and jobs open to women was quite slim, is it any wonder that we see prostitutes, actresses, and servers such as waitresses and laundresses appearing in paintings - think Toulouse-Latrec.

Another great part of this exhibit was they had two early moving pictures of Paris - taken around 1900. One is at the base of the Eiffel Tower, and you can actually see ONE horseless carriage. Even in 1900 the small number of women actually walking around in the streets is noticeable. The other film is simply young women who are factory workers leaving their factory. Drake and I were both struck at the formality of the dress of women who were sweating for a living. They all had long hair (of course), dresses to the ankle, corsets, formal hats, and multiple piece clothing. That leads me to the other part of the exhibition which was fascinating. They exhibited three actual dresses - one each from the 1860's, 1870's and 1880's. It was a visual to demonstrate how much more freedom women had obtained in that 30 year period as evidenced by lessening of restrictive clothing. (Of course, to my 20th/21st century eye, the 1880's dress looked pretty uncomfortable and restrictive, but not even close to the hoop skirts of the 1860's.)

I was much more moved by this exhibit than Drake was. It struck me forcefully how hard fought our struggle has been to be considered equal not only in the eyes of the law but also in those unwritten rules of society that govern all our lives. I think the women's equality is only the crust on the pie that is our society, and can easily crumble without our constant vigilance. I think the whole concept of women with equal legal, and economic status in society is way too new to be taken for granted. Consider this: More than half the planet is still mired in ideas about women and their places in society that are stuck not in the 19th century, but the 10th century.

Vancouver is a magnificent city. There's just one quirk which cost us hours and hours of frustration and wasted time. This is a populated area of 2 million people. There are NO freeways. In the 1960's the city fathers decided they neither wanted nor needed that type of development, and simply didn't build any. On the plus side, you have very distinct neighborhoods reminiscent of what New York City or Boston must have been like prior to the advent of criss-crossing freeways thru those cities. On the negative side, if you use those new-fangled horseless carriages to get around, it's gridlock. It took us 2.5 hours to drive from downtown to the outskirts of Vancouver traveling at about 10 mph. Imagine driving from Hurst, Texas to Rowlett, Texas on city streets choked with bumper to bumper cars - without let-up. Oh, it ruined the trip to this alluring city. Knowing what I know now, I would never, ever drive a car into Vancouver for any reason. If we return, and the experience was so bad, that's a toss-up, we will park at the fartherest southern terminal of the Sky Train (think commuter mono-rail in the sky) and ride into town on the train. I'm sure their transit system works really well - if you know where you're going. However, for the out of town visitor, this transportation system is a closed box. I always read up before I go anywhere, and I wasn't given a whisper of what to expect or how to circumvent the gridlock.

On a personal note - I finally got back on the bike - still bruised and sore. We found a great trail around the county's regional airport, and we rode 10 miles yesterday. Next sightseeing trip is Mount Rainier. We leave for 4 days there on Monday (Labor Day) thinking we could avoid some of the crowds since school is almost ready to start. (Burlington starts back on Sept. 8th.) Washington is still pretty rural when you escape Seattle and Spokane, and the good weather is from mid June onward. Hay is being harvested in August - no time for school then. We come home for the weekend after the Rainier trip to go to the Dahlia Show in Bellingham (15,000 blooms - can't wait!), regroup and do laundry. Then, the second week of September we are going to the Olympic peninsula - specifically Neah Bay (almost at the most northwesterly tip), and the Hoh Rainforest. There will be lots of pix from those blogs. So, if you suffered through this addition of the blog, you'll enjoy the next few more.

Finally, I stumbled onto a lady's dahlia garden of about a half acre that's just blocks from our apartment. She sells cut dahlia's (5 for $1.00!), and I bought some. Now, I have fresh flowers in the house for a pittance. My favorite one is called "Santa Claus" - it's Christmas red and white stripes. It looks good enough to eat.

Big? I'm Talking BIG HORSES!

We made a trip up to Lynden (the Dutch town) where the Northwest Fair is held every year. This fair was really like attending a Tulsa State Fair with two major exceptions: The Draft Horse Show and Open Driving Competition and the Alpaca Packing Competition. The inlaid wood picture sums up 19th century Lynden. Now days, modern farming doesn't include using draft horses for any significant farm work, so they have morphed into show animals. Imagine scouring the countryside for vintage wagons, and reconditioning and refurbishing them (to the tune of about $50,000), add 3 pairs of perfectly matched draft horses (price tag - an additional $20,000) (Clydesdales being the most famous thanks to Anheuser Busch) tricked out in silver and black jingling harnesses ($5000 more) pulling these refurbished wagons. The judging takes place on the show level. (A winner is the team of horses who are best matched, best sized, best synced when trotting, and cutest - each horse is curried and braided and decorated - all the same). Multiply this picture by 8 teams, and it was darn impressive. Then just to make it more fun, there is the "Free Drive" - 8 teams weaving in and out of one another as they free drive all together around the arena for about 15 minutes. I'd never seen anything like it, and apparently you won't see anything like it anywhere else - all the horses were LOCAL. I have no idea what you would compare this to. It was a demonstration of skill and camaraderie. I videoed this, and I'm trying to figure out how to send it out, so you can catch the flavor is this.

The other really fun event was the Alpaca Packing Competition. You take your curious, gentle, intelligent alpaca (the 3 top personality characteristics of this animal), add one 11 year old, and a cheezy obstacle course which includes 2 parallel sticks laying on the ground, a kiddy swimming pool, some fir branches piled on the ground, and a portable steps/ramp set up. Oh, and a set of side/side saddlebags that you pluck out of a kid's pup tent and load with rubber chickens. You lead your alpaca onto the course (not that easy) - then 'hitch' them to a car end and put on the pack holder. We first got the difficulty drift here when it became obvious that no respectable alpaca is going to stand still and have a pack holder put on them - it's kind of like saddling a horse. One poor girl never got her alpaca to cooperate at all. Now that you have the harness on - you lead the alpaca to the pup tent and put on the dual saddlebags and stuff them with rubber chickens. This was actually the easiest part. Finally, you lead the alpaca thru the obstacle course - having him walk between sticks, wade thru the kiddy pool (one competitor actually waded thru the pool himself, and he was the only one to persuade his alpaca to get its feet wet), walk over branches and climb either the steps or the ramp. Alpacas will walk over stuff pretty cooperatively, but they do not like to climb steps or wade thru water. Overall, this was very entertaining since it was very low key, and everyone was just having a lot of fun.

This was a fun fair, but it was much more commercial than our little county fair, the food was not as good - but we did get to support local charities with our lunch purchase. ON the plus side - those BIG HORSES were really, really something.

The other part of this tour is the old growth forest/glacial creek hike we took this week. This was in the Northern Cascades, and it was a wimp hike we got from "Hiking Western Washington with Kids" - my bible for hikes. Kid hikes are just about my speed. You can do some terrifying hikes here where you gain thousands of feet in elevation, ford streams, and hoist yourself over large boulders. This is not considered 'climbing' - this is considered hiking. So, the wimp hike we took was really, really gorgeous and you didn't have an opportunity to break your leg or die. I finally got my tootsies into the water here. OH GOOD HEAVENS. How did those miners or beaver hunters ever, ever stand in this water looking for gold or killing beaver? It was exactly like plunging your feet into a bucket of ice cubes. This was not like when it's cold when you first get into a pool, but then it feels great after you've been in for a few minutes. It was unrelenting, bone chilling, hurts horribly cold. I couldn't stand 2 minutes. Brrrrrrrrr.

Finally, the other interesting thing is I fell off my bike today. Well, perhaps not interesting, but novel. The last time I fell off a bike I was 10 years old and spun out on a patch of gravel at the bottom of my street which was a great gradual hill. That time I tore myself up really bad - both knees, both forearms - I still have the faded scars. This time I took a corner too fast, wasn't coordinated enough to squeeze the hand brakes to slow myself down, BUT I did miss the tree. I wound up hitting on my bad knee (left side, of course) and my forearm. Good news is my clothes protected both my knee and arm. I burned the skin off the front of my knee, but missed landing directly on either my knee joint or my elbow joint. I didn't tear either my jacket or my yoga pants. I'm going to be pretty bruised up, and I'm a little sore, but I consider myself fortunate not to be hurt worse. I also terrified Drake, and some nice lady who came out of her house and offered to let me come into her house to recover - I was laying on the street at this point rocking back and forth, holding my knee and trying not to cry. Hey, IT HURT. We're off to Vancouver tomorrow, so we can't let these little episodes set us back. In hindsight, I'm glad I was wearing my helmet. If I had hit my head on the pavement (easily could have), this would have been a hospital emergency room visit. On the plus side - doesn't it sound cool to say, "I fell off my bike." WOW - I sound like I'm 25.

Here are the pix of all these events except the bike accident - I didn't think to have Drake snap my picture while I was laying on the ground.

http://picasaweb.google.com/jalyss1/2010Tour7ForestHikeNorthwestFair?authkey=Gv1sRgCLG2187O5qqm0gE#

It's pig, cow, goat, sheep, chicken, turkey, duck and exotic time - The Skagit County Fair

The buzz about the Skagit County Fair has been almost non-stop for the past month. We attended on Thursday, and now I see why the buzz was so bright and insistent. The Skagit County Fair was a completely different experience than the Texas State Fair. First, it was postage stamp sized compared to the TSF. Second, it was attended almost exclusively by local people, a bunch of which were farmers. Third, the food portion of the fair run by the locals featured their own food products, and it was wonderful. I didn't have a corn dog or a funnel cake or cotton candy - there were so many better choices.

The first inkling we had that this fair was going to be quite different was the flower judging. One entire wall of an exhibition area was devoted to flowers. I now know who the premiere

gardener of Skagit County is. Her name is Judy Peppers, and her multiple entries all won blue ribbons as well as best of class ribbons and the overall best of show: Stem Lettuce. Don't ask, just look at the pictures - you'll pick it right out. Some of Ms. Pepper's winners were just amazing - from individual flowers to arrangements. I also saw flowers I've heard of but never seen (delphiniums), as well as flowers I haven't ever heard of and saw for the first time. I also learned about fuchsias - there are 8000 varieties, you know. It was a great kick-off to fair day. The exhibition of flowers, produce, arts and crafts was the most exciting portion of the fair for me, and up here quilting is NOT with the needlecraft - it's an art & displayed with original photographs and paintings.

The most enthralling portion of the fair was the Raptor Rescue show. This is an obviously named organization who save hurt and maimed raptors including falcons, hawks, owls and eagles. They travel with a set of show animals who are too damaged to be rehabilitated to the wild. The narrator was this young pigtailed girl who had an encyclopedic knowledge of raptors and was able to share it in an entertaining but serious manner. We were able to see some magnificent birds very close up. I had no idea that an immature bald eagle is a variegated black and whitish feathers. I learned that one owl can eat 2000 mice in a year. I was amazed to hear that falcons dive at 250 miles an hour after prey and have specially designed nostrils so their lungs don't burst from such a sudden rush of air. The handler of the birds - especially of the eagles - have to physically train to be able to handle these birds, as well as they have to form an emotional bond with the bird. The handler/bird bond keeps a mature eagle, who can exert 200 pounds of pressure using its feet, from crushing the bones in the handler's arm as it perches on the heavy leather glove.

Another charming aspect of this fair was the cat and dog judging. The dog judging went on all day long - from obedience to breeds, to classes of dogs (like hounds). My favorite domestic animal judging was the cat competition which included cage decoration. I mean, after all, what can you make a cat do? The cat cages were about 3 foot long by 2 foot high, and they were the homes of the cats during the fair day. We had cats lounging (and sleeping, of course) in miniature kitchens, and bedrooms, and in homemade settings that defy description - such as outer space. The 4H runs a cat club for the elementary school set, and they are encouraged to enter. There's also a bunny club as well as a dog club - well, you get the picture. We were baffled by the barn labelled "Exotics". Upon entering we discovered birds, turtles and snakes. Check out the picture of my favorite exotic.

And there were cows. Lots of cows. Every age, every size, every color. There were a few steers, but this is really dairy country. That means Holsteins and Jerseys. Big Bubba (a 3000 pound Holstein cow) with his 2000 pound friend Margaret Thatcher was displayed in his separate pen, so he and she could be admired. Big Bubba was so big that I couldn't get him entirely in the picture. My favorite part of the cow stuff was the Dairy Quiz Bowl. It was a long table set up in the cow barn around which sat 10 junior high school age kids. They each had buzzers which sounded and a light lit up when the buzzer was pressed. A mom was Alex Trebeck, and she was asking dairy questions. I couldn't answer most of them. (Like: What's the name of the web site for butter? Answer: Butternow.com). It was soon obvious that these are dairy farmers' children, and it was equally obvious that the boys just liked to press the buzzers.

Horse events went on all day long. I've also noticed this is horse country. There was every type of riding competition as well as racing competition. We saw pole racing - the first time I'd ever seen that. The horse and rider weave around a set of poles as fast as possible and then race back to the starting line.

Without a doubt though, my favorite competition was pig showmanship. Imagine a boxing ring sized pen with sawdust over the floor. To begin the competition 3 - 5 children arrive one at a time each herding a 300 pound pig using a cane slightly longer than a conductor's baton. What they really needed were tasers. Pigs don't exactly 'get along' in close quarters. They are smart and willful and they like to BITE one another. I'm certain they would bite people given a chance and the right circumstance

Children and pigs milled around the boxing ring sized area. Some pigs would just wander around, while others didn't like the show idea at all and kept trying to escape back to their individual pens. The judge would say, "Let's move them to this end of the pen." Children would begin tapping the snout and faces of their individual pig as well as slapping them with the flat of their hands along the pigs' spines - seemingly a signal to walk. The pigs had their own ideas about where they wanted to go, and protested by squealing madly when given any direction they hadn't thought of themselves. At some point, the judge would say, "Now show me your pig at his best." Then it was a mad scramble of trying to get a pig into a somewhat posed position, attract the judge's attention, and keep the other pigs off yours. This is where the dads, holding what looked like elongated tops to Coleman Coolers, would leap up and shove these 3x3 foot pieces of hard, thick plastic between 2 pigs busily biting one another. There was blood drawn - fortunately, pig blood rather than human. I can see where a bad tempered pig would be nothing to fool around with. My favorite pig showman was "Sean". He was about 6 years old and a Novice - this was his first competition. I tell you, the pig was twice his size and his face was red as a beet when he finished - but he was game. He never gave up, and he controlled his pig - well, mostly. The only audience were family members and close friends. Everyone knew everyone. I'm pretty sure we looked like $3 dollar bills sitting in the stand (notice 'stand' - it was about 6 feet long and had 3 tiers.) It was really fun though.

Entertainment was on a stage constructed by the local lumber company that was 3 steps higher than the folding chair audience of 200. You drifted in, sat down, ate, applauded, rested your feet, corralled your kids, visited with your friends all while the 'entertainment' occurred. I had two favorite acts. One was the Accordion Band - yep, all accordions and 2 tubas. Most of the accordion players were ladies of a certain age who all wore flower wreathes in their hair along with their big blue sequined vests. They were really good musicians. After their concert I went up to talk to them, and boy, were they thrilled. They were very excited that I wanted to take their pictures. I found out that "Hugo" - apparently in Mount Vernon he only needed one name - was a famous accordion player. (Don't ask because I don't know what the criteria for 'famous' IS for an accordion player.) Anyway, he formed the Accordion Band in 1935. It played for decades with Hugo teaching crop after crop of children how to play the accordion and drafting them as adults into the band. When he died, the band withered, but was reborn in 1995 and has been going strong ever since. They play at fairs, art shows, festivals, nursing homes, churches, and I got the feeling anyplace that would have them. They do a killer polka. The pictures show them smiling, but they smiled like this the entire time they played. I can hardly wait to see them again.

The other entertainment that captured us was Sterling, the Magician. We sat down on the folding chairs in front of the 'stage' to eat our grass fed beef burgers prepared on a home grill right before our eyes as this 19 year old kid walked out in a red satin ruffled shirt, black vest and black pants. He confided that he was from Lynden (a town 30 miles north). Drake and I just looked at each other. My expectation was a show slightly better than what you could hire for a child's birthday party. This expectation was reinforced by his slightly nervous start and faintly inept manipulation of the infamous metal rings. He certainly had enthusiasm, and it quickly became apparent that he had started with his least successful stuff working up to his magnificent finale of sleight of hand manipulations of several appearing and disappearing decks of cards. When his hour was up, we had been totally charmed and completely entertained.

Overall the musical entertainment had one common thread - all first class musicians who were locals. We saw one band and later complimented one of its members who played multiple instruments. He couldn't wait to give us a card and confide that his band played every 2nd Wednesday at the Rockfish Grill and Brewery - which we've been to twice. Yummy fish and micro brewed beer. We met the musician at the Wine Tasting venue run by the 3 local wineries in the county.

I visited for a long time with one of the winery owners and I really enjoyed two of the blends that they are making. This was dinner time, and to join the glasses of wine we had...........wait for it............. handmade crepes from one of the local food booths. Mine was a buckwheat crepe with home smoked salmon, spinach, fennel, lavender and blueberries. Drake's involved onions, homemade Italian sausage, tomatoes, onions. That was the 'fair food' I was talking about earlier. We polished off dinner with dessert from the Dairy Bar - run by the wives of the dairy farmers. Ice cream, anyone? We were stuffed, so we didn't enjoy the Swedish pancakes or the pulled pork BBQ (Remember the pigs from earlier? Trust me, their highest and best use.) Not to mention the chowder and other seafood delicacies. Corn dogs never looked so shabby. The locals were, however, shaking their heads over the fried twinkies being served at the carnival portion of the fair. They were agog when I described the fried butter I had eaten at the Texas State Fair.

Overall it was more than a fun day. It was a celebration of what they do best in this county. They should be proud of their flowers and their animals and their produce. I think us being from as far away as Texas was a real treat for them. We were new people, and everyone we met couldn't wait to share especially when they discovered we were going to be here until December. Their friendliness here is naive and charming. We were told many times about neighbors, friends, children, or old college mates who live in Texas. They would just beam when we would nod and say, Yes, we know exactly where Plano, Arlington, Kileen, etc. is. Then, this being farmer land, the conversation would turn to the weather and with much head shaking they would confide they wouldn't ever want to live where it was that hot. We would cheerfully agree that they were completely right.

We spent over 8 hours at a fair the size of a couple of football fields. There were no new cars. The commercial exhibition was so small and pitiful that I felt sorry for the vendors. We actually paid a reasonable price for excellent food. The entertainment was relaxed and people were appreciative. We watched the teen queens who were all horse girls in their tight blue jean short-shorts and their shin high cowboy boots hanging out front of their horses' stalls which they had individually decorated not only with the horses' names but with flowers and other homey touches. There were people lounging on blankets as their toddlers slept. The teenage boys were showing off their muscles. The test kitchens were filled with 4H girls being encouraged by their mothers. There was an entire building devoted to the arts and crafts of the 4H kids. Other kids were lounging on their cows, cleaning up manure, grooming their bunnies, showing off their cats or dogs or sheep or horse or cow. The ferris wheel was small. There were only 10 carnival rides. It was almost as if we had dropped into the 1951 movie "State Fair". This event was a snapshot of what are the most important things to the people who live here. Check out the pictures by clicking on this link:

http://picasaweb.google.com/jalyss1/2010Tour6SkagitCountyFairWashington?authkey=Gv1sRgCJC_rcny3NL7vAE

Driving to the top of a mountain

We live very close to the Cascade National Park and the Mount Baker Recreation Area. One of the things I've discovered being up here is that every populated area west of the Cascade Mountain Range has 'their' mountain. Our mountain (the Bellingham area) is Mount Baker. People are always referring to it such as: "Well, you can certainly see Mount Baker today." If you meet someone and ask for touring tips, it's always, always mentioned. "You know, you have to see Mount Baker." I'm rather amused because you can 'see' Mount Baker anytime you look up and east. It is impressive since it's about 10,800 feet tall and is surrounded by other equally impressive peaks that all top out over 9,000 feet. They are dark grey and the tops are still snow covered. The Mount Baker area is what you could call a casual skiing area. There don't seem to be formal ski resorts lining its base, and there are lots of references to places to snowboard, sled, snowshoe and cross county ski that are virtually if not totally free and accessible to whomever wants to use them. This is the kind of ski/winter sport experience you can get when the US Forest Service is managing the resource. You get the feeling that in the summertime, everyone is just waiting for winter to begin. We discovered that if you drive up into the Cascades around Mount Baker that winter has never left. We did have on mesh tennis shoes and ankle socks on the drive, but quickly realized that we needed to break out our hiking boots and wool socks just to walk around. You actually had to climb up a snow hill to get to the top for the pinnacle scenery

Western Washington is very beautiful and has great contrasts. This was very evident in our trip up the mountain. As you can see from the picture above, we found snow higher than our heads at the very end of the scenic drive (Hwy 542) on the 2nd of August. On this road we also found flat as pancake farmland planted in food crops, and Christmas trees, ice cold rushing rivers, towering fir trees, an old growth forest, and as we reached the end of the road - a hair raising highway driving experience as we wound our way up and up and up. You'll see from the accompanying pictures why the end of this road is called Artist's Point.

This Mount Baker Recreation Area, which is managed by the US Forest Service, was originally inhabited by the Nooksack Indian tribe who lived in bands along the Nooksack River. "Nooksack" is the English approximation of an Indian word for a type of edible fern that was a staple in the Indians' diet. This entire area was extensively logged (and still is - but sustainably) beginning in the 1880's. It took a 'donkey engine' (gas powered engine) that could cut up the big logs so they could get them off the mountains that really got the logging developed into a major industry in this neck of the woods. There was constant logging here all the way thru the 1920s. There's one small area, which today is a research station, where there is still old growth forest. It's a very small area, and I have no idea how it managed to escape the axes and saws. At this time of the year, the forest area was mosquito heaven. I could barely stand still long enough to have a picture made when we did manage to find the 'social trail' into the old growth forest. A social trail is one that people have established by simply using the same path over and over again, but isn't recognized nor maintained by the forest service. The log section to the right is in front of the Ranger Station. The picture to the left is a standing tree of about the same size. They are both about 700 years old. We exited the forest pretty fast due to the bugs.

Next stop was another contrast - a 100 foot high twin water fall where two forks of the Nooksack River meet. At this time of the year, the snow melt from the surrounding mountains are filling the creeks, and the river. There's lots of white water on the Nooksack, and some really treacherous white water rafting areas. Parts of this river are so difficult to raft, that it reminded me of the Animas River in Colorado which is a Class 5 (meaning only adrenaline junkies, teenage boys, and those with a death wish should attempt to raft it.) The water fall was loud and breathtakingly, but I really liked the fork flowing into the waterfall. This was some of my favorite scenery on a scenic overload afternoon. ( I'll send all the pictures under a separate email for those of you who want to see all the images from this day trip.)

This was a relaxing day of driving, pausing, ooohing and ahhing, picture taking, and marveling at not only the terrain contrasts but also the temperature contrast. It was 'hot' yesterday - yes, it's a relative term, but to these folks, it was hot - 78 degrees. When we reached the top of the mountain, it was 60 degrees. That's about as warm as it's going to get up there, and we feel like we had a perfect weather day yesterday. We topped off the day by finding the burger joint of Burlington. Even at 7 pm yesterday evening it was mobbed - and the burgers were good - not Cool Al good (best burger I've ever eaten), but good nevertheless.

Next trip will probably be a biking outing. We've been biking two mornings - looking for the best place for an exercise ride.

Festival Day in Washington

The last blog was told in pictures because I was too tired to write after hiking up Sauk Mountain. Today was more my speed - we attended two separate festivals. Festivals up here are like the spring festivals in Texas. The weather stays so mild in the summer (yes, I'm rubbing it in), that it's a joy to be outside - thus, festivals.

The first fesitval we attended today was the 18th Annual Chalkfest in Bellingham. Here's the premise: Anybody who wants to buy a square of sidewalk can create a picture using only chalk. You can refine it with your fingers and with water and you can use brushes, sponges, etc. - but you can only use chalk as your medium. You can be any age. A square of sidewalk costs $25 for adults and $15 for kids. To put on this festival, the city of Bellingham closes about 3 city blocks of their main downtown street to cars. The chalk pictures are drawn on the sidewalks along the main street as well as they shoot off onto the sidewalks of side streets. The pictures are no closer than 20 feet or so apart, unless it's a family project - then kids (whose squares are slightly smaller) draw closer to their adult supervisor/participants.

I'm sending the pictures out under a separate email, and you can either look at the pictures first and then read the blog or viceversa. (I think I'd look at the pix first. because the blog refers to them.) Stop reading now, and open up the pictures and look at them, then come back to the blog.

The first thing I noticed was the method of chalk application. The sidewalks were not the smooth as glass concrete we are used to in Texas. Instead, think of a concrete that has stuff embedded into it - in Oklahoma, it would be chunks of rocks - here it's bits of crushed shell. It's not pebbly, exactly, but it's not smooth either - it's pitted. Amazingly, lots of people - who must have the toughest fingertips in the universe - applied their chalk without the benefit of gloves. Application was interesting. Some people put down a heavy layer of chalk which almost seemed to stand on the concrete, and then sprayed it with water and smeared the resulting chalk paste into the concrete by smoothing it over and over with their fingers. This is a tricky application method since one small mistake is a disaster - if you slop the color over after you've wetted it down - well, you can't fix it. I thought the smartest people were the ones who were using gloves - some of which had pads built into the fingers, and knee pads. Oh, yes, everyone over the age of 20 had pads for their knees. The really experienced artists had special chalk, spray bottles, multiple pairs of gloves, knee pads that fitted onto their knees as well as pads to kneel on, AND a lawn chair to rest in.

This festival has two streams of participants - first group is about 50 artists 'invited' to participate. Everyone else was just Joe Blow (that's Okie talk for regular people). There was a certain skill level difference which is obvious from the pictures. Intriguingly, there were lots of people my age and older who were having the time of their lives creating their square. I talked for awhile to the "Hamster Farm" lady - that's actually her name (Hamster), and she laughed when I asked her if she raised hamsters. She's actually a beef rancher and sells organic beef from her farm in Ferndale. She was very proud of "creating the place I live and love". Her picture made me fleetingly think that perhaps she lives in the countryside around ToonTown - see the movie Roger Rabbit - to understand this reference.

I think my favorite contestants other than the hamster farm lady was the little girl who was about 3 years old drawing herself. Her picture is the stick figure who has a belly button. What isn't shown in that picture is her mom standing beside her encouraging her but not telling her what to do or draw. The kicker to the picture is that beside mom is the brand new (less than 6 weeks old) baby brother/sister in the pram - still too little for a stroller. I also liked the 'rooster' lady. When I asked her how she decided what to draw, she said it came to her just as she knelt down to begin. She confided that birds made her happy. The picture certainly shows it, doesn't it? From an artistic point of view, I think my favorite picture was the shockingly colored skyline of skyscrapers. Drake's favorite was the abstract guitar - done by a 20 something artist while her sister, using a serious camera, continually snapped pictures of her creating her square. Their two beaming parents were happily watching both of them.

This was a different kind of festival. There was an air of artistic achievement and gratification that is missing when you attend a traditional art show. There's a commercial element in the traditional show which isn't bad, but the joy of creation isn't necessarily witnessed. That's it exactly - as a patron of this festival, we got to witness the joy of creation by the artists. That kind of excitement just thrums in the air. The artists (pro and amatuer alike) were just thrilled when I asked if I could photograph their squares, and every one of them was eager to engage in any conversation I initiated. Many of them have participated for years. It was obviously a summer highlight for them individually and for this city. It was just crowded enough to be fun without being a crush.

The center of the street of chalk art was the traditional outdoor art festival. We saw some really excellent affordable art. We are now on the hunt for a new piece that will represent this adventure in the northwest. We found a potter today that had a really whimsical touch - creating pottery with elements from nature - both subtle and direct (like a covered pot that looks exactly like a turtle), and I'm wondering if I should have bought one of her pieces. We also saw a photographer whose photographs transcended the usual sky/water/tree/building type of work. I didn't inquire about the one I really, really wanted - I'm sure it was too expensive. I am ordering a handcarved magnet in wood from another artist since she sold the one I really, really liked.

Overall, this was a great festival. If I get to go again, I'm going to do a square myself. Of course, when I'm finished with it, a portable crane will have to be brought in to get me back on my feet! However, moving onward - we weren't finished with this day. Our next festival of the day was called "A Bite of Skagit". Gosh, that sounds like the title to a horror film, doesn't it? Actually, this was several restaurants inside Skagit County donating their food and skill creating "bites" that you could buy for $1 each. All the money collected went to the area food bank. Yes, hunger is a problem here too. Everyone knows how important I think this is, so I wasn't going to miss supporting this effort. It was in downtown Mount Vernon, and was even more local than the Bellingham festival. This was a community effort, and we had the added bonus of learning about the food coop that several famers in the are belong to and that Drake and I can join for $2 a month. The coop is actually a store where you can buy local food. Another bonus was that we got to sample several of the local restaurants and farms (yes, there was a farm selling berry shortcake - and I had TWO helpings - one raspberry and one strawberry - YUM).

The final picture is of our new bikes. I should have mentioned that we started the day with a short bike ride in Burlington. Aren't these cute! I got BOTH bikes for $50. Now, that's a deal. Of course, they are 18 years old and they are 10 speeds, but I think they are really, really excellent. You should see me in my helmet (are you listening, Sarah?). My final word is that I would like some petitioning prayers for my safety. I'm a bit wobbly (understatement), and I'm scared I'm going to fall. However, my fears or not, we are going to be biking the San Juan Islands and Lummi Island in the next week or so.

And, yes, I'm having a wonderful time. This week I've played bridge twice, eaten at 3 new restaurants, found a dozen more that I want to try, gone to two festivals, did a couple of short driving tours, and bought 2 bicycles. Oh, and did I mention that the temperature never hit 80 this week?

Mount St. Helens and Tacoma Washington

I have to start this posting with a few commments about the family wedding. First, we pushed ourselves really hard to get from Mississippi to Washington State in time to rent an apartment and move in prior to the wedding. It taught us that we don't want to ever do that again. There were too many things we passed by simply because we didn't have time to stop. When you think that we left Mississippi on June 27th and arrived in Washington on July 6th with 3 days out of that time spent in Rowlett, Hurst and Tulsa, you can see what I mean. We had an apartment rented by the 9th and we moved in on July 10th. On the 15th we left for Portland, Oregon to pick up Sarah and Jay and then on to Black Butte Ranch outside of Sisters, Oregon for the wedding of the cousin closest to Sarah's age.

Fortunately, the wedding was terrific. This resort had everything - multiple pools, golf courses, bike rental, surrey rental (wierd combo of a wagon and pedals for 2 bikes), tennis courts, and a bunch of other stuff. The entire Perez/Smith families had condominiums rented for us courtesy of Drake's sister and brother-in-law. We were able to share early breakfast (our condo), late breakfast (in-laws condo) and after hours food and drinks (Drake's sister/brother-in-law condo). We went to lunches and dinners together and shopping. We biked. [This was very good news for me - rode about 15 miles in 2 days and didn't have any physical repercussions! That means I will be biking here in Washington.] The wedding itself was lovely and the reception afterwards involved salmon and steak perfectly prepared and lots of dancing. The highpoint of the reception for the Perez/Smith family was when Sarah caught the bridal bouquet! Oh, we had a lot of fun with that. We teased Jay, Sarah's boyfriend, that the Perez brothers would be calling on him SOON to inquire about his intentions. Vincent, the other unmarried cousin in Sarah's generation, declared repeatedly that he was now 'off the hook'. Sarah took all the ribbing good naturedly, and she gave the bouquet to the 7 year old flower girl who was a niece of the bride. That little girl was so happy, she never put the bouquet down the rest of the party. Sarah and I both remember the weddings she attended as a little girl, and the highpoint was always hoping against hope she would be able to catch the bouquet.

After the wedding weekend, we went back to Portland and sent Sarah and Jay on their way to a 10 day vacation up here. They headed for the Oregon seashore. I hope their experience was better than ours. We headed to Long Beach which is a peninsula off the west coast of Washington. It's a 28 mile beach, and it was terrible. First, it's gray sand. Second, there's NOTHING to pick up. There are no shells, no rocks, nothing interesting to collect unless you are into brown seaweed. The only remotely interesting thing was that this is birder heaven. Scores of birds winter and summer here. I guess the best part of the Long Beach trip was this cheesy place called Marsh's Free Museum. It's filled with every bad souvenir you can imagine. The ceiling is covered in the owner's collections. He has a stuffed everything from polar bear, lion, bear, every type of deer, elk, moose, as well as sheep, 2 headed cow, and "Jake" the alligator man. It was so funny to look up and see collections (think washboards, unusual tools, stuffed birds and animals, china, crystal, etc. etc. etc, while the shelves are filled with stuff children (and me) can't live without. He also had the biggest collection of machines you shove a quarter into and receive knowledge of your future or how strong your kiss is or your grip. It was a hoot, and it saved Long Beach. I didn't get over to see the lighthouse on the tip of the peninsula or the Lewis/Clark interpretive center - both of which would have probably been worth going to. There's only so much time in this life.

We actually went to Mount St. Helens on the way down to Portland just before the wedding. Now, that is a very interesting place. For you younger readers, this is a volcano, and it exploded in 1980 flattening a large portion of the area around it. Actually, it was a several part event: First the blast that collapsed an entire side of the mountain, The blast along with the tons and tons of rocks and mud knocked down countlesss acres of trees. The lava flow which changed the courses of several waterways and created new lakes. Finally, there was the ash plume that covered the cities to the east of the mountain in 2 feet of ash blotting out the sun for days. This was an amazing event of nature, and due to the monitoring of the mountain prior to the eruption, scientists can now predict when an volcano is going to erupt. The science generated by the Mount St. Helen's eruption has saved countless lifes around the world. Even 30 years after the eruption, you can still see the marks on the land, but surprisingly, nature is recovering at a much faster rate than predicted. It was definitely worth the 100 mile detour over mountain roads to reach it. The Johnson Ridge Visitor's center has some wonderful scale models that showed 'what happened' in each event - the picture at the top is the lava flow. The tree picture is an example of what happened to trees in the blast path of a mountain exploding. The water picture is a new lake created by the eruption, and the picture to the right of the broken tree is a shot of the mountain today and the landscape leading up to it. There were actually people accidentally trapped on the mountain at the time of the eruption in 1980, and one fascinating wall recounts their experiences in trying to get off an exploding mountain. There were very few people actually killed. There's also a great movie of the actual explosion, lava flow and ash plume because it was being monitored carefully as it started to belch prior to the eruption.

After we left Long Beach (I'm back to after the wedding now), the drive to Tacoma was visually very interesting. The coastline here is nothing like anything else I've seen. The closest comparison is to some parts of the Louisiana coastline prior to Katrina and prior to the oil spill. Lots of it is marshy with this tufted grass that seems almost like a peat bog. There were new wildflowers, and the scenery was excellent. Our Texas license plates seem to generate interested conversation with locals every time we stop for gas. We went to Tacoma because I persuaded Drake that what we wanted to see was the Glass Museum in Tacoma.

We were quite impressed with the lovely downtown area of Tacoma, and had a great lunch at Woody's - outdoors overlooking the glass museum and the marina which is in the middle of downtown Tacoma. Glass art became this city's signature thanks to a glass artist - Dale Chilhuly - a Northwest native. His pieces are world renowned and he has inspired glass artists from all over the world to come to this town. He has almost single handedly started the Glass Museum which includes a Hot Shop - a place to create glass art pieces. The City has gotten on board and constructed an elevated bridge connecting two main downtown streets. The bridge is filled with Chilhuly pieces as is the renovated Union Station which is now the home of the United States Courthouse for the northwest. You can see the blue ballon like sculptures (glass) which mark the bridge. To the left and right as you start across the bridge are walls of glass creations by Chilhuly. I first heard about this artist from my friend Margie who loved to collect pieces of glass. The last portion of the bridge is glass art overhead. This left picture is representative of about 50 feet. It was like being under a sea filled with magnificent creatures.

We saw three amazing exhibits inside the actual musuem - each a wonder in its own right. The one I only went to because it was there was the exhibit in which children designed pieces (made pictures) and glass artists in the area created a glass piece based on each child's inventive picture. It's a pity they wouldn't allow us to take pictures - some of them defy description. Imagine a banana riding on a hotdog bun with flames shooting out of the back of the bun. A glass artist created this design in glass, and that was one of the tame ones. I think the artists had as much fun as the children. It was apparently a state wide contest, and the winners got to see their creations come to life in the Hot Shop at the museum. This exhibit just won me over with its whimsy and creativity. There were children at this exhibit and you could feel their excitement as they looked at the 50 pieces. This is just the type of exhibit that needs to travel around the country. It would be a wonderful introduction to musuems and art for the elementary age group. The other two exhibits were more traditional in that they appealed to adult patrons. Both were outstanding. I felt like I'd seen pieces of art that will be with me forever.

The museum supports glass artists in that it has this Hot Shop in which they can work. Large pieces need large fire boxes to keep the glass malleable, and lots of special tools. In return for getting to work in the Hot Shop, each artist agrees to be watched by an audience. There are theater seats above the shop floor, and a commentator telling the museum patrons what they are seeing. This place also had a killer gift shop. I actually got three small pieces of glass art. They are flat disks about the size of 50 cent pieces with flotsam and jetsam embedded in them - including Mount St. Helen's ash - a nice tie in for us.

Overall, this was a wonderful trip combining family and fun with touring new sights. What could be better?