My sister-in-law says this blog makes it look like we got lost in Hells Canyon and never returned. That’s not the case.

For our final road trip adventure, we rode the mail boat through Hells Canyon for two days, along with 40 other mostly-retired folks. The boys were stars, helping to deliver the mail and schlepp baggage. The watchful eyes of so many surrogate grandparents made it possible for mom and I to chat out personalities from the anonymous crowd while the boys explored. Collin fished, Rowan collected rocks, we all played in a waterfall, and I walked through a storm of bats in the pre-dawn glow. It was hot, dusty, rustic and all-together the perfect way to spend our last two days.

At the end, our road trip included:

• 18 days
• 3,565 miles
• 1,102 pictures taken
• 1 speeding ticket
• 7 national parks
• 5 junior ranger awards
• 23 different kinds of wildlife encountered that we’d never seen before
• 1 bottle of rhubarb wine: not recommended
• 3 days with undrinkable morning coffee
• Countless meals served with fries
• 3 corny/fabulous old-west extravaganzas
• 10 now-seems-silly bits of new cowboy gear
• 4 career/lifestyle epiphanies
• Way too many repetitions of Harry Belafonte’s Greatest Hits

This trip went incredibly well. We had very few mishaps and so didn’t reap as many story-worthy adventures as anticipated. What we gained, though, is better. By the end of the journey, Rowan and Collin became confident in themselves and in being out in the world. They met the eyes of strangers and made them friends. They learned to see paths leading around corners and into forests, then follow to see what might lie just out of sight. They gained an awareness of other people in a crowd and can now stand out of the way or assist others when needed. They know that when you drive really close to a waterfall, it’s important to roll the windows down if you want to feel it. They know that outside, it’s beautiful and precarious and waiting to be climbed and swam and hiked and photographed. Rowan sharpened his focus on the delicate small details, finding wonder in being still. Collin overcame his need to hold hands in the wild places, and is now perhaps too ready to just go for it.

Most importantly, we all now expect life to be full of adventure. It isn’t a question of if we’ll go again, but rather where, how often, and for how long. I’ve been working at home this past week, and I’m overjoyed to report that we’re pretty bored cooped up here. One of my deepest desires for my children is that they intuitively know how to go out and do things; how to move and see and touch and play and be fully alive in the world rather than sitting as the passive receptors of other people’s experiences. This road trip was a powerful start. Now to figure out what comes next!
Recommendations?

You were all right. We did love Glacier National Park, especially after our depressing trek through eastern Montana. I’m now trying to figure out how to get back for a week next summer, because Glacier is clearly a place meant to be hiked and floated by grown-ups.

Today we get on a boat for two days down Hells Canyon. Then, home.

We’re looking forward to seeing everyone again. The boys miss their daddy, Mom misses Jeff, and I’m desperate to cook again. 3 more days!

I’ve been following the posts on Our PDX Network, many of which are about local eating, bicycling, public transport, and other gifts of living in a city nestled in a fertile valley. Abundance.

I’ve driven nearly 2000 miles from Portland. We’ve gone to the geographic center of the United States in Belle Fourche and are now heading home. We’ve seen crops of potatoes, corn, wheat, and cows, but no green vegetables or fruit orchards. Groceries with produce sections seem to be spaced 200 miles apart, and their aisles are filled with Washington cherries, California tomatoes, and bagged spinach imported from who knows how many miles away.

Our bug-splattered Prius is usually the only one on the road, giving me a chance to share its virtues with many curious folk at rest stops. This should be more shocking given how far one must go for carrots, but it isn’t. The weather is dramatic here and the need to haul stuff long distances apparent. This is not bike-commuting country.

This landscape, while beautiful, is also harsh and a little bit scary. The possibility of an early death is clearer out here. “Caution! Bison gore visitors!”, harsh elements, and more cemeteries than produce aisles. The culture is rooted in religion and legends, celebrating heroes long gone, and kind of makes you want to wrap yourself in several tons of 4wheel drive security.

These places challenge me. I’m trying to teach my kids about sustainable living, local eating, and finding that balance between work and play that allows us to live responsibly, healthfully and joyfully. It’s one thing to bend the rules while on vacation, but what if they someday moved out here? How could they apply Portland ideals in this prairie environment? How could I?

The easiest answer is not to try - to make sure we always live somewhere abundant. That answer is uncomfortably narrow for me, though. I believe that successful ideals will be those that you can carry with you to new places and see reflected or at least possible in those you meet.

When as a child I moved from the logging towns into the city, formal organized religion quickly diminished then disappeared from my life. We went from 3-times-a-week thumpers to nothing in the course of under 3 years, because our strict denominational interpretation of salvation just didn’t hold up when I became friends with Muslims and Bahai and even some much-feared Catholics. I fear the same is true for the Portland lifestyle. Much of what I feel to be an expression of who I am, what I personally value, and how the world ought to move is really an expression of the Willamette Valley and our wonderful community of like-minded souls.

I think I will need to take the boys out of the valley again and often so we all can more keenly appreciate what a blessing it is to live where we do. And no, I’m not homesick enough to cut the trip short! Although getting out of Havre today will be very, very nice.

Within the confines of car and agenda, we are each provoked to both our best and worst without escape from observation. I’m proud to report that we’re doing very well. So far.

Rowan, the eldest, is the quintessential big brother. He uses words like “appropriate” and “needs adult supervision” and other tokens of young responsibility that should be so familiar to anyone who has ever been an oldest sibling, especially those who are themselves children of divorce or from other low-supervision roots. He’s now moving out of little boyhood into pre-teen, and aquiring the verbal ticks (like inserting a gutteral “ha” at the end of a sentence) that will help him move into more sophisticated circles. I am so glad we’ve gone on this trip now, before this new sophistication renders US history and natural wonders dull.

I suppose that most of us are transitioning from who we were yesterday into who we will be in the future, but with kids this is so much easier to see. Collin is at the end of his preschool period and leaping firmly into little boy land. He walked himself to the playground, leaps confidently into the deep end, and makes friends of other kids in minutes. Collin will do great in kindergarten next year.

Mom and I are not fighting, much to the amazement of my grandma, and we don’t intend to. We have been drinking more lately, but otherwise are holding up. Road trips are fun, and we’re good partners.

Pictures here.

Milestones

• First junior ranger badges, earned by learning about different types of lava flows. We’re particularly fond of the Aa. The boys are now introducing themselves as “Moon Rangers”.
• First detour, as we veered around Idaho Falls to avoid wildfires.
• From here out, none of us have been to any of the places we’ll be visiting.
• First time pumping my own gas. You were all right! It is easy!
• Collin conquers his fear of caves in Indian Tunnel
• First bison viewing.
• First volcanic summit on Infinity Cone

On the way, Mom told about a high school science teacher that used a bull snake for a bathroom pass and Collin established a firm preference for scatalogical vocabulary during Madlibs.

At dusk, we passed awestruck through paradise. Mountain meadows full of wildflowers opened to inviting trout streams, with snowy mountains and forest ringed about. We were too dumbstruck to take a picture or register the name of the place, so you’ll have to trust me that it was magnificent.

Our awe was ruffled by some baffling signage. We spotted a Library sign clearly pointing directly into the forest, with arrow pointing left but no leftward roads to be found for 50 yards in either direction. What can it mean? Is it deep, is it pointing to an alternate reality, has the forest eaten the library? Intriguing.

Obstacle 1: We were planning a visit to John Day for Tuesday, but it’s booked with BMX racers. A change of course was needed, so we rerouted through Boise. The boys were jazzed to go to the big water park in Meridian, ID, so we decided to make it an early start. And here comes…

Obstacle 2: The house’s main drain plugged up Monday night. Eventually cleared by Mr. Rooter’s main man Abel at 2am, the unexpected plumbing drama put the kibosh on our dreams of an early departure.

We didn’t make it to the giant water slide or fossil beds or anything particularly grand. Even so, it was a good day.

Ready to Go

• We left around 10 am, and drove 440 miles.
• We played at the park.
• Rowan learned that his neck pillow is a great prop.
• We swam.
• We saw an enormous tree farm. Thanks to Lyza who clued me in to it.
• We debated the pronunciation of words like Wallowa, Umatilla, and Malhuer.
• Rowan won a 3 hour game of Rubberneckers.
• We sang along to music from the Muppet Movie.
• And we played Madlibs over beer.

Rowan’s favorite:

A Fish Story

One fine day, Collin and I decided to go fishing for shark. We took along some sushi sandwiches, pretty juice and plenty of toes for bait. We got into the boat and cast our fishing lines into the ugly water. Suddenly, I felt a tug on my line. But instead of a fish, I’d caught a hairy knee! It was bright pink and at least 1,264 pounds. I had a feeling it would taste shy, but I thought I’d bring it home anyway, because I knew Grandma would eat it.

Pictures are on Flickr.

Next: Yellowstone!

I so enjoyed Choose Your Own Adventure that I once orchestrated an oral book report/play based on one. I cast my classmates as characters from the book (hero and lizardmen, I believe) and would occasionally stop them in the middle of the action to have the audience choose what should happen next. Then I simply instructed the hero and lizardmen to act out the audience’s choices. It seemed a very reasonable approach. I had no way to know what the audience would choose in advance, so I felt it would be presumptuous and stifling to actually write out a script for anything beyond the first scene.

This totally worked for me. Even though it was my report, I had no idea what would happen next, making it in many ways like reading the book for the first time! My teacher and my bewildered cast may not hold that memory so fondly, but I sure had fun.

For reasons beyond my ken, Choose Your Own Adventure went out of print in 1998. When my eldest child entered school showing little interest in books, I went looking for Choose Your Own Adventure in the hopes that the approachable writing and interactive nature would help him engage. To my great disappointment, what had been abundant bookstore shelves of used copies had slowly trickled away to nothing, leaving my dream of nurturing the next generation of adventure-enthusiasts in tatters.

Then this last week, I found them again. These books are now being republished and are available at my local toy store. I bought three. These are new versions of older titles, but are all new to me. Before bed most nights, we’re now reading:

• Cup of Death (which includes trading cards!),
• War with the Evil Power Master,
• and Trouble on Planet Earth.

Trouble on Planet Earth, originally published in 1985, is about a crisis with the Earth’s limited oil supplies. The boys suspect hostile aliens, but I’m betting on corporate/government conspiracy.

Admittedly, adults who try to recapture this delight will need to suspend their interest in quality plot, character, and basically all tenets of decent writing. As may be too readily apparent, I’m very comfortable shedding the shackles of educated good taste and will happily spend time with any of you adventuring through Heartquest: The Talisman of Valdegaard.

Should we trust the mysterious bard with the liquid eyes that make our hearts flutter? Or do we follow the gnarled gnome warrior and his guardian cheese weasel?

Ah, bliss.

Now for the unwelcome humility: there is an irrefutable necessity of time and energy that no amount of good intentions can bypass. While I know this about software development, applying the knowing to my self is very uncomfortable. I want to be the valued creative professional, the eager adventurer, fabulous homemaker and nurturing parent that I dream myself to be and can sometimes glimpse in peripheral reality. Not perfect or brilliant by any means, but at least thoroughly competent. But it just isn’t happening. I’m too tired, and I’m just too few people to get it all done.

As a result, I have a collection of items bigger than I’d hoped, but no smaller than I deserve given the amount of attention I can pay them.

Including but not limited to:

• The laundry heap
• A pile of unwatched Netflix movies
• The grass in the lawn (and some not in the lawn)
• The number of social invitations, birthdays, and parties missed
• The stack of untried, mouth-watering recipes
• Shelves of surely marvelous reading
• The amount of time I clearly need to remain single
• The list of unfinished deliverables for work
• The anticipated expense of therapy
• The stock of unused bubble bath
• My bottom
• The dose of reality I’m learning to choke down

And so, here’s where I get another opportunity to learn the Serenity prayer and realize that it really is more wise than trite.

Still, when I look out I know that I am not ready to accept the state of the lawn or many of the other items on the list. I know there’s no extra time, but perhaps if I just become more clever I can bypass real acceptance and head instead towards some sort of compromise. After all, that prayer is really meant to apply to an attempt to change other people, and not so much to a quest for clean laundry, right?

I think I had better sleep on it.

Here’s what I’ve done so far:

• Lurked on the Portland Urbanhomesteaders yahoo list. Some take classes at Foster & Dobbs
• Attended Chef Steve’s mozarella class at Whole Foods, where I actually made and ate some cheese
• Ordered basic cheesemaking supplies from Ricki the Cheese Queen

Next steps

• Acquire a non-aluminum pan for heating the milk
• Acquire milk
  I get my milk from Noris Dairy, but apparently there are many other local sources.

Anticipated countdown to cheese: 7 days! Wish me luck.