Tuesday, August 21, 2018

2018 Nevada motorcycle trip

Continuing our 1st dirt road of the trip 

In the last two weeks of July, we went on our annual two-week motorcycle trip. This time, we toured Nevada, as well as parts of Oregon and a wee bit of California. We spent 13 days, going over 2657 miles / 4276 kilometers. We stayed at the historic hotel in French Glen, Oregon, rode around Steens Mountain, rode most of US Highway 50 in Nevada (the "loneliest road in the USA"), visited Eureka, Ely, Rachel and Tonopah, Nevada, stayed two nights in Great Basin National Park, stayed a night in Cathedral Gorge State Park and took the Extraterrestrial Highway.

You can read the travelogue or go straight to the photos.

As always, my goal isn't so much hey, look what I did! as it is here's advice if you want to do something similar.

Saturday, August 18, 2018

Milestone

As of this week, I have lived in the town where I live in Oregon longer than any one, single place, since I moved from Kentucky. The previous record was Sinzig, Germany - I lived there, in one place, for 4 years and 7 months.

I have already lived in Oregon longer than I lived in any other state, except Kentucky, and longer than I lived in Germany.

And, yet... the town where I live isn't home. Oregon isn't home. It's just where I live.

Part of the reason I feel this way is probably because I have moved so often since I left for university when I was 18. After just three years, I start feeling restless. It's not that I enjoy packing and unpacking - I don't, at ALL. I hate it. But I love getting to know a new place, discovering new places to see and new things to do. However, inevitably, I run out of new things to see and do. In addition, I don't seem to be able to find something to keep me tied to a place for long: jobs end, organizations close, volunteering fizzles when a leader changes, friends move, relationships fizzle, people turn out not to be who I thought they were, favorite places close up...

While Texas didn't quite suit me, I never felt like I didn't belong there, that I was unwelcomed there. I never got any attitude from native Texans about not being one myself. And you would think that wouldn't be the case, since no state has as many songs celebrating it as that state does. I love the Lyle Lovett Song That's Right, You're Not From Texas (but Texas Wants You Anyway). It so sums up how I felt there. If it weren't for the heat of the summer and Fall, I would have stayed. I made friends in Austin that are still my friends to this day - though I met all of them because of an online community for a particular kind of music we all love, not just through everyday interactions.

By contrast, in Oregon, if you aren't born here, you aren't wanted here, and those who are born here will say it online and to your face without hesitation. If you moved here from California - oh, heaven forbid you moved here from California. And Oregonians take it further: if you aren't born in the town where you live, they resent any actions you take to influence how things are done in the town: how the police conduct their business, how neighborhoods are defined, how schools are run, whatever. I have never lived in a place where politicians who aren't from a place have to emphasize how many years they have lived here, as if to justify their getting to live here, let alone run for office.

Since moving to Oregon - and particularly since moving to the town where I live in 2013 - I have looked for online communities and offline, onsite groups to join, volunteering, live music venues and arts scenes that would give me what I had in Austin: a feeling of belonging, a feeling of home. I have never made such a deliberate effort to get to know as many neighbors as possible. And nothing has worked out to make me feel like, yes, this is where I love living, this is where I belong. 

Days after moving to Oregon, I felt like I had made a colossal mistake. The state, and Portland, weren't at all what I had envisioned or what people said about them. But after a year of floundering and whining, I decided I was going to be deliberate every day in finding something to like about where I'd chosen to live and deliberate in finding something enjoyable. That deliberation has lasted a full eight years. It's taken work and determination and I'm glad to have done it - I have found some amazing things in this state, including right here in Washington County where I live. Most native Oregonians haven't seen most of what I've seen in their state. I am frequently told by people right here in the town where I live, after telling them about something nearby, "Wow, I never even knew that was there. You know this place better than me." Treating Oregon as a place to explore, just like I do when I'm traveling, has been a great way to approach living here.

But my determination is wearing thin. Once again, as I've done so many, many times in my life, I am wondering, where do I belong? Where is home? That place that feels safe and welcoming and comfortable... that place you go for rest after the travel and adventures - where is my place? Because, after all this time, if it's not here, it never will be.

I still long for that moment of going to a place and thinking, yes, this is where I want to live, for the rest of my life, absolutely. And I know that it is a privilege to be able to choose where you live, one that is denied most people on Earth. So I feel selfish - unbelievably selfish - for feeling this way. But it's how I feel.

I do love my house. I just wish I could move it.


Friday, August 17, 2018

When Father's Hurt, Even Kill, & Their Family Defends Them

Last month, a man in Utah was arrested for domestic violence. Hours after he was released from jail, he flew a small plane into his house. His wife and son escaped the house after the plane crash, but he died.

The day after the incident, I heard a comment from his daughter: "He’s not this person that’s being portrayed."

It's a jaw-dropping, but typical, comment from family and friends of men who attempt to harm or kill a family member or colleague or even a stranger, and it infuriates me.

This man attempted to kill his wife and, very possibly, wanted to kill his son as well. That's not a media portrayal, it's just the facts: the man drove to an airport, he boarded a plane his company owned, he got clearance for takeoff and he flew that plane into his family's home.

I'm always stunned by family members and friends in denial about a person that commits a violent act. It's a denial that results in comments like what his daughter said. Or comments by a woman that is frequently the target of her husband's physical or mental abuse. You don't know him. He's not always like this. He's more than this. This isn't him.

This IS him. A violent family member can be a very nice, supportive person sometimes, even most of the time. Just like a co-worker may be a fantastic colleague, someone you trust absolutely, and later you find out that person subjected another co-worker to sexual harassment. The good times are, indeed, who they are - but the oh-so-bad times are too.

Sometimes, the news hits too close to home. And this is one of those times. I wonder how many family members are silent as they hear this daughter deny her father's violence, who think, This is exactly who he was. But they will never say so...