Trust

Things are happening so fast here, it’s making my head spin. Every week, this is a different place.

“In God We Trust”‘s whole yard disappeared in a single high tide, and now is on the edge, with a huge log protruding underneath it.

11/22/14

In Log We Trust.

 

About 70 years old.

Craig’s driveway is gone now, along with his shed, and his foundation is in pieces on the beach.

11/22/14

Craig’s shed

But things aren’t all bad at Craig’s. Do you know why landscapers hate Pampas grass? Because it’s impossible to remove.

Over at Stanley and Resha’s, the lanai is gone now.

They were having a wake and had a guest book for people to sign. They had a blind gift grab. I reached into a box and got a wrapped blue mug with seagulls on it. They gave away piles of stuff, including their light fixtures, mirror and bed, and drove a U-Haul to Seattle with the rest. Then they came back for more.

Resha and Stanley 11/22/14

And with the cozy fire burning in the hearth, and Yoshi, the sweetly aging but still-puppylike big black dog chomping away on a stuffed penguin on the couch, and the sun shining, things just didn’t, and don’t, seem real.

Stanley and Resha’s 11/28/14

Others had come to mourn, too. I met Gary and Sue at the end of Spruce Street, about 50 feet from their “Belly-Acres By The Sea.”

Gary and Sue at Belly-Acres By The Sea

Seagull at Belly-Acres

Things are about the same at the end of Spruce. “The Ralphs” are hanging on.

One cool thing is that, next to the Ralph’s, there was this gorgeous, pristine vintage Boles Aero trailer, that looked like it was from the 50’s, about to fall into the ocean. It evidently was Grandfather’s, and his people came and saved it at the 11th hour. Yaaay!

The horribly stormy, then beautiful weather is confusing.

Stormy view

Vagabond view

The Yellow and Black house, next to the departed Yellow and Brown Compound, is being salvaged and/or looted, and appears to have been, in its day, a nice place.

OX OX

love

Whipple St. 11/22/14

“Smell the flowers. Blow out the candles.” I was on the bus recently, and this woman was talking about teaching her class of preschoolers to yoga breathe: in through the nose, out through the mouth. I’m trying to savor the moments, but the dread of impending doom looms, so I’m up for trying little tricks, like oxygen.

It’s December, so the Christmas music is here, which makes me think of Mom, which leads to unscheduled and inopportune crying jags. Vets of loss, when does this stop? This is fixing to be a long month.

By now, you may have deduced that my place is not a nice, picturesque house about to fall into the ocean, but instead a ragtag compound of trailers, shacks and outbuildings. So the loss will be multiple times. Buckle up! Since I don’t know if I’ll still be seeing these places next week,  join me now and bow your heads for the Lost Soles…

No fair, I’m still working on this side!

…and, sadder still, the Palace of Crossed Swords.

I got this idea from Karl Krogstad’s outhouse at the “Shrine to Circusanity” in Eastern Washington that burned up in the big Wenatchee fire a couple years ago. Wine bottles and mortar = stained glass.

Except that white wine bottles, which, as the diamond people say, have better color, cut and clarity, are not my beverage. Fortunately, at the time, I had glamorous, Prosecco-drinking German neighbors whose recycling I would raid. If I were to do this again, which I probably won’t, I would hit up a restaurant for materials, though drinking has its charms.

That last-minute rescue of the Grandpa trailer was inspiring. These things are wheeled! So, I’ve retained local talent to try to move my Vagabond, on its 1930’s wheels, to my tiny vacant lot a little ways down, soon. I need the gift of time. Please, send me all of your positive vibrations. The sun went down on the last of Craig’s shed. Smell the flowers, blow out the candles. Let us be gypsy wagons, transient as the beach itself.

Vagabond 11/29/14