Retrospective

A weeping willow mirrored in the face of a calm pool of water, the sun shining through puffy white clouds seen on the surface of a quiet lake.  These reflections have a beauty all their own but they are bound by time, showing only what is in the present. 
A year has past since my life was radically turned in a different direction.  A year ago I could only reflect, just as  mirror does, seeing only what was happening that day.  But, now I find my reflections are no longer limited but encompass a year of discovery and the gifts that has brought.  It has been a sensory year: a year that has delighted all of my senses filling them to the overflowing.

I've felt the touch of hot, dry wind as I stood enveloped in the deep of silence present in the sacred desert places of Monument Valley.

I've tasted the rich sweetness of just picked summer blueberries proudly displayed by farmers at the Eugene Saturday Market.

I've heard the pounding of  waves as they crashed with unbelievable force against the Oregon Coast, slowly chiseling shapes like a Michelangelo as he revealed the David he found hiding in a block of stone.

I've felt the bone- numbing Pacific waters  while wading  through the lowered to  examine starfish and anemones clinging to the sides of sea boulders near Brookings. 

And I've seen snow-capped mountains framed by a cloudless summer sky reflected in the rich turquoise of a crater lake that filled a long silent volcano. 













And today? Well today I reside in my native state, uncovering my roots as I search records for lost relations; gaining new perspective on my country and its people as I delve into the nooks and crannies of one of the  13 Colonies. 
So many sights and sounds have filled this past year and have become a part of me. And now as I reflect on them all, unbound by the constraints of time and space, I can  gratefully  exclaim,  "What Satan meant for evil, God has turned to good!"

Georgetown

My explorations into the  nooks and crannies of South Carolina have been influenced by an insatiable  desire  to uncover the quintessential "Southern" town.  It is interesting and very telling to read about and drive through these hamlets.  Some towns are quite endearing.  Others seem to have lost their soul, there identity erased by the flight of industry and a seeming sense of giving up and giving in to the reality of the changed  economy. Happily, one of our first discoveries nook and cranny discovery was the historic seaport village of  Georgetown. 

Georgetown (est. 1732) is South Carolina's 3rd oldest city.  It is sometimes referred to as "little Charleston" and after seeing its historic district I can say  that nickname is well deserved.  The wide avenues of this town are bordered on both sides by live oaks dripping with Spanish moss.  The tree's arms reach across to each other seemingly to hold hands.  Walking under them makes me feel like the bride at a military wedding under the rifled arch.  They are magnificent. 

In 1940 one of these was giants was estimated at over 500 years of age. It was registered with the American Forestry Associates as a South Carolina Champion.  At that time the circumference was measured 23 feet around. I continue to be in awe of these natural beauties.

But the trees aren't the only beauties this town has to offer.   Along the streets I see house after house  that has been lovingly restored to the beauty of its early years.  It's easy to get a sense of  how it feel to sit, soaking up the peace of a slow moving pace while rocking on one of the wide verandas.

The hook that drew us to Georgetown for our first visit was an ad promoting their annual Wooden Boat Show. Saturday morning event found Georgetown filled with all kinds of wooden boats on Front street, in the water and along the Harbor boardwalk.  The only prerequisite for a show entry is that the main structural strength be derived from wooden products.  Everywhere you look you see sail boats, row boats, kayaks, antique boats and even boat cradles for the youngest of yachtsmen.

They are gorgeous.  They are works of art.  The sun shining on the polished wood shows  depth and warmth when you look deep into the wood's grain.  To say it is brown doesn't come close to describing the velvet look that permeates the wood.  Many of the boats are accompanied by their builders, designers or restorers who are proudly waiting to tell me all about their passion. 
What a treat...can't wait till the next one.
Georgetown is now on the list of favorites. More about this town coming soon.

Conway, South Carolina, my Mom's hometown

Every year, until I was in high school, my family  traveled the road from Louisville, KY to Conway, SC to visit my grandmother. 

 Now that South Carolina is my new home,  it is fitting that my first exploration finds me on Hwy. 501, driving  into my past. 
Headed into town, the road is still shouldered on both sides by those well remembered swampy lagoons all soggy with black water. As a child I was afraid of that black water and its hidden mysteries. Looking into that swamp now   I can almost feel the ghost of Francis Marion (the Swamp Fox) peering from behind the trees. The swamp providing unlimited hiding places to wage his monumental campaign to help us win our War for Independence.
Conway, originally named Kingston in honor of King George I, is the last town on the road to Myrtle Beach. It's a river town, filled with pine trees, sandy soil and those oh so familiar black water swamps that border rivers in coastal South Carolina Even today the scent of damp pine needles and sandy soil conjures up memories of sitting on my grandmothers's screened porch, shelling butter beans as fast as I could, so we could beat a path to nearby Myrtle Beach.

Conway (est. 1734)  is one of South Carolina's oldest towns sporting streets peppered with one of my favorite trees, the live oak.  Bordering the road, they spread their arms wide to welcome my return.

Delicate strands of Spanish moss trail gracefully from their outstretched fingers.  They have a quiet dignity.  The breeze is warm.  The air is humid.  It is the Deep South.  It is home. 
A stop at the visitor's center and I'm loaded down with information about the Conway I remember and the Conway I have yet to meet.
But for today it is enough to enjoy the beauty of the oaks. 

The live oak.  It symbolizes all that is southern.  The oaks are Conway's oldest citizens thus are held in high esteem. It is the South's "postcard tree".  Antebellum plantation owners, well aware of their stateliness, planted avenues of them.  Leaves are leathery, shiny, evergreen.  Branches spread much wider than the tree's height giving them the look of an open hug. 

In shipbuilding days,  the  "knees" where the limbs join the trunk were prized for their strength and used to brace the sides of ships.
Conway has protected these "citizens" since the 1880's and continues to enforce a tree ordinance to ensure our enjoyment of these beauties for years to come.

Spanish moss is partial to the rough surface of live oak bark.  The sight of live oaks and Spanish moss existing hand in hand is so classic that a tree without its moss seems almost naked when not adorned by those tendrils.  It's interesting to note that Spanish moss is neither Spanish or moss.  It is an air plant (epiphyte) surviving on dust and water.  The  solid oak is there for support and is not hurt by its abiding presence. 

 I walk the streets my Mom walked as she grew. The same streets she stood to watch the circus parade as it marched through town.  The branches of the oaks  form an umbrella over my head just as they did my Mom as she walked home for lunch and a break from her vacation job "downtown". The Post Office is now a museum, the department store where she worked  no longer sells trendy dresses..  The Presbyterian church is still shouldered by the graves of founders of this town and those who fought for its freedom and to preserve its way of life.   Civil war veteran tombs are dressed with replicas of the "Stars and Bars".

 

It is an odd sensation to revisit places from your past.  You look at things through eyes of the heart, seeing not just what is there but what used to be.  Walking down the Main Street of Conway I am thrilled that this  Southern town has worked to keep the area vibrant and central to the heartbeat of Conway life.  Buildings wear new names but are still clothed in character and style luring shoppers  and diners to frequent visits.

  

 The black water Wacamaw river running through town is now framed with a river boardwalk.  People are everywhere, the town is alive, vibrant, keeping pace with the times yet walking hand in hand with its past.

As I explored Cottage Grove I learned some more interesting details that added to my picture of this town.  In 1926 Buster Keaton's The General was filmed here.  The final parade scene in Animal House was filmed on Main Street in 1978 and the 25th anniversary of the film was celebrated by a city-wide toga party !!!

There's gold in them thar hills!!!  In 1863, gold was discovered in the Bohemia Mountains west of Cottage Grove and there are still active mining claims in the area.

My time in Oregon has provided such close and easy proximity to all types of natural beauty.  The more I see and experience the more fail to understand how science can ever be separated from God.  Everytime I see God's handiwork, from the snail trail on the sidewalk at the park to the several glaciers crowning the top of Mt. Hood, I'm am astounded.
As I was researching information to set the stage for my Cottage Grove visit, I came across a piece of their history that fascinates and intrigues me.  It  involves a young lady named Opal.

mural on building in Cottage Grove

Opal Whiteley was born in 1897.  She grew up in the logging towns of Oregon but more especially in the Cottage Grove area.  As a 5 year old child Opal was already recording her observations and thoughts in a homemade journal created from miscellaneous scraps of paper.  Each page  expressed her love and amazement with the natural beauty that surrounded her.  Her teacher claimed she had genius and was at least 2 years ahead of her peers in school.
In 1915 she was acclaimed as a magnetic teacher and youth leader blending science and faith (this is the part that hooked me) in lectures to thousands .   In 1920, her childhood journal was published as The Story of Opal: The Journal of an Understanding Heart.  and quickly became the #2 best seller in the world read by presidents and kings. At 22 Opal was a major international success.  Unbelievably,  just a year later, her book was out of print and she was accused of literary fraud and lying about various aspects of her family life.Opal left Oregon, never to return. In 1948 she was placed in an asylum in London and after her 1950 lobotomy she never wrote again. Sadly, she remained here until her death  in 1992.
All her life Opal's greatest desire was to share the intrinsic beauty of nature with children through the written word.  On her tombstone is written "I spoke as a child"
Opal's story continues to intrigue.  Plays, musicals, and movies have been created to tell her story.  In recent years, interest in finding the truth regarding Opal Whiteley has resurfaced and many think the "fraud" allegation has been proven false. What was once labeled schizophrenia is not rethought to be Asperger's syndrome.
So the debate, continues and that mystery may never be solved.  However, none of this takes away from the fact that Opal's writings are a delight to all who enjoy the song of a bird, the rich blue of lavender in the height of its bloom, or the scent and cool shade of the fir trees. 

The following link gives info regarding Opal and a copy of writings.
http://www.efn.org/~caruso/fairyland/

Now, get this, as I was reading about Opal I came across an interesting website that tells about a woman, Nan Gurley, whose interest in Opal Whitely led her to write a one woman play telling her story.  Nan's performance of this play actually won an award at Charleston's Spoleto Festival.  As I read Nan's words and continued to peruse the website I learned that Nan Gurley lives in Brentwood, Tn.  So there I was, sitting in Oregon, reading insights to Oregon's Opal, written by a woman in Brentwood, Tennessee.  Amazing....the world gets increasingly smaller.
Nan's words are at:
http://opalwhiteley.com/

The Joys of a Covered Bridge

Centennial Bridge- built in 1997 by volunteer labor to celebrate Cottage Grove's centennial.  Materials came from earlier bridges that had been demolished.

I remember attending a delightful dessert party hosted by a dear friend.  When it came time for the coffee service she entered with a tray filled with an eclectic arrangement of delicate china cups and saucers.  No two were alike.  It was a treat to choose our favorite design from which to sip.
Exploring the small townships in Oregon has been like examining that array of cups and saucers.  Though the communities are connected by their northwestern heritage they each offer a unique piece to the picture I have come to identify as Oregon.
I visited another one of these towns recently, Cottage Grove.  Cottage Grove is about 25 miles south of Eugene.  I came to Cottage Grove because it is "The Covered Bridge Capital" of Oregon and I wanted to see the bridges. 

Covered bridges fascinate me.  Passing through them is like finding a little hideaway.  I love the sound made as you roll over the wooden slates of the bridge.  It makes me think of horse and buggy days.  I love to stand in the middle and look through the wooden slats at the rushing water below.  I love that I can hear the sound of the water flowing over the rocks.  I love to breathe deeply and take in the scent of the wood under, over and around me. 

 

I've always identified covered bridges as a symbol of bygone years in New England.  But I've learned that the many months of damp weather in Oregon necessitates the covered protection for a long and enduring wooden bridge life.
Most of the covered bridges across Oregon seemed to have been built in the '20's and  '30's.

Doreena Bridge-1949-Row River

Stewart Bridge-1930- best swimming hole in county

Currin Bridge-1925

 

Mosbey Creek- 1920-oldest in Lane County-still open for traffic

Gorging it in "the Hood"

Everyone kept saying "You've just got to drive through the Columbia River Gorge.  And be sure to take the historic highway, not the interstate."  So we got up Saturday morning and decided to make drive up to Portland and then take a right headed east, drive the gorge to Hood River and then loop back south of Mt. Hood.  We figured this would be about a 3 hour loop and then home to Eugene.  A long day, but definitely doable.  On the way we added a little to our trip by taking a detour to the outlets mall, but hey, sometimes you just gotta shop!

First stop along the historic trail was the Vista House.  Built around 1918 (to honor the Oregon pioneers) it is octagonal and 733 above the river giving it , you guessed it, quite a "vista" of the gorge. 

Now one thing we've learned on this foray out West is that, no matter how impatient we are to see the sights, it always pays to take to the info volunteers.  The info lady at the Vista House clued us into the fact that there are 90 waterfalls on the Oregon side of the gorge alone.  She advised us about the ones in the area that were easy to get to, so along the way we stopped to ooh and aah and take pics.  The most notable is Multonomah Falls.  It's the second highest falls in the US, falling from 620 feet.  Quite the tourist attraction.  They were even having a wedding on the patio of the lodge, complete with champagne and string quartet. 

We hiked halfway up the falls,(it was paved but a bit steep).  On the way up we passed an Hispanic family on their way back down .The mom was hiking in 4 inch stiletto heels.  Now, I'm the first to admit it is usually all about the shoes but how did she accomplish that feat? (or should I say "feet" )
Multonomah was the last of the falls on our tour and at Hood River(name of town) we took a right and moved away from the river.  The town of Hood River is on the Columbia River and is a well-known spot for kite surfing.  The wind comes down through the gorge at that point with enough power to buoy the kites and their passengers high in the air.  We caught a glimpse from the highway and it looked like so many butterflies riding the currents.
At the Vista House our info lady told us about the Timberline Lodge on the south side of Mt. Hood.  We headed that way thinking we would like to get dinner there.  At the turn off at Government Camp (another town) we made the climb up 6,000 feet to the timberline of Mt.  Hood. 

The timberline of a mountain is where tree growth ends, everything past that is rock and ice and snow.  The Lodge  was constructed in 1933, once again as part of the CCC (Civilian Conservation Corps) plan to put people back to work after the depression.  It is a giant ski lodge utilizing stone and wood, the best that the mountain had to give.  Inside there are wood carvings everywhere, emebbeded in the walls, on the newel posts of the the stairwells, in the furniture. 

The 3 story vaulted lobby/living room is anchored in the center by a massive stone chimney that vents the 4 back to back fireplaces that help heat the area during the winter when the snowfall averages 21 feet.  Almost everything inside is wood making the hugeness feel very warm and cozy.   Windows on both sides of the lodge take in views of Mt. Hood with its many glaciers and the rest of the Cascade Range and National Forest.

Furnishings and woven pieces have been restored and you really feel that you are touching a bit of history everywhere you go. Best of all, they had a vacancy.  So we spent the night on a feather topped bed under a down comforter in the middle of August and what should be the "dog days" of summer. 

One of the amenities advertised by the lodge is year round skiing.  I was a bit skeptical. But the next morning, while sitting at breakfast enjoying the view we could see the skiers and snowboarders lining up for the chairlift and a day on the slopes of the glaciers.
By the way....do you recognize this lodge?  Looking at the front of it, do you get a feeling of deja vu? Ever see the movie "The Shining"?  Shots of the Timberline were used for the outside of the lodge in that scary thriller.
It is absolutely awesome to think that our beautiful country has a place for  people to tan on a beach while others can be skiing down a glacier, all on the same day in the "dog days" of summer.  What a place!!!