Tag: journal

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At Large Opinion

The Daily Days

Photo: John Martin | AdobeStock

Sunday, February 4th, 2024: Weight 162.4. Went to Home Depot to get birdseed, pansies, and some wood putty for Tatine’s project. Finished the Ebet Roberts profile for Memphis Magazine. I’m pretty pleased with it. It’s 3,500 words with lots of moving parts, but it all came together, and the photographs are amazing. Took the hounds on a 35-minute walk in Overton Park. Did Duolingo (150 points).

Made wide-noodle pasta with leftover filet, shallots, garlic, fresh herbs, and butter/olive oil sauce for dinner. Very tasty. We watched another episode of True Detective: Night Country. Still not sure I like it. Stayed up late and finished The Alienist. Entertaining read, but not enough to lure me into the second book in the series.

A little over a year ago — in January 2023 — I began keeping a daily journal. At first I called it “Cancer Diary” because I wanted to track the details of my health while I was undergoing treatment. I started every day’s post with my weight, then I chronicled what I ate, what medicines I took, my doctor visits — the good, the mundane, and the scary.

As my health got better over the ensuing six months, I found myself maintaining the journal out of habit rather than for health reasons. Now I just call it “The Daily Days.” I still note my weight and any health stuff that comes up, but mostly I just keep track of what happens: errands, editorial meetings, what I’m writing about in the Flyer and Memphis Magazine, conversations, walks, dinner, etc.

The entry at the beginning of this column is pretty typical, and I’ve piled up 40,000 words of this stuff in a little over a year. Unfortunately, there’s no plot, and as Larry David might say, I’m pretty, pretty, pretty boring. I can, however, tell you which birds came to the feeder on, say, July 6th (Go, downy woodpecker!). Or what day the first mosquito showed up last spring. Facts! But no one’s ever going to read this stuff.

Speaking of which … I’m also 25,000 words into a “novel,” a word that I’m still putting quotes around because I’m not sure if it will ever be ready for prime time. It’s a hobby at this point, with a plot that jumps from our hero’s college days in the 1970s to the present, and back again. Here’s a sample:

“I turn onto a gravel road that leads to a small bridge over the stream and then winds upward into the woods. As darkness comes on, I pull over and we get out, the dogs and I, stretching, sniffing the cool, piney air. The night feels crisp and new. I’ve had enough desert to last me for a while.

“I feed the dogs and we wander around through the trees. I discover a small clearing and pull the car onto the dry needles, away from the road. I don’t expect to have company up here but I can’t assume anything at this point. I unroll my sleeping pad in the back and we soon nod off.

“I’m startled awake by Doll’s deep, crooning howl — a primeval sound from deep inside her, reverberating in the closed car. It gives me the shivers. What time is it? What the hell? I grab her collar and shush her. She’s trembling, wide-eyed. Susie is growling, low. Out the car window, I see the moon hanging full in a black sky. The woods are dark and impenetrable. I pull the glock from the side-pocket and slowly open the door and then I hear it: coyotes, dozens of them, baying and yipping, distant and thrilling, a cacophony of hound-songs echoing down from the slopes above us.

“I let the dogs out of the car and within seconds they are both howling along with their mountain brothers and sisters, heads back, sending up cries from their ancestral hearts, full of joy and life and noise. I listen for a while, smiling big, transfixed by this crazy celebration, and I want in. I put the gun back in the car, strip, and stand naked beneath the brilliant sky, alive in the sound, the moon, the mountains. I tilt my head back and howl and howl.”

If I ever finish this thing, you’ll be the first to know. A-whoooo!

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News

Redding Where?

Quick: What comes to mind when you hear the name Redding, California? Did you even know there is a Redding, California?

I didn’t — not until I took a trip down the California coast and found myself marooned in Redding, in the heart of the state’s northern reaches. I had called the local Convention and Visitors Bureau, and the very nice woman I spoke with did her job beautifully: She promoted the town’s premier attractions, none of which I honestly cared about. But I did my job as well: I listened, took notes.

She picked me up at the bus station and took me around to said sites. Redding’s latest venture in tourism is Big League Dreams, a sprawling athletic complex with soccer fields; batting cages; an indoor facility for hockey, soccer, and basketball; and softball fields. But not just any softball fields: These are replicas of Wrigley Field, Fenway Park, and Yankee Stadium. To say the least, seeing Boston’s “Green Monster” left-field wall with the Cascade Mountains in the background is odd, but my host insisted the fields are full all summer with leagues and pickup games.

Next, we went to official Redding’s favorite place: Turtle Bay Exploration Park. It includes a butterfly park, arboretum, gardens, a play sculpture, a water sculpture, and a nature/history museum. A great place to spend the day with the kids or go for a nice stroll. I added it to my internal list of Things To Do in Redding, should I ever come back.

The crowning achievement of Turtle Bay is the Sundial Bridge: a steel walkway over the Sacramento River, with a sundial pylon 217 feet high built at a cost of $23 million.

But one big question: Why? I was wondering what some of the folks around town must think of this thing. So I asked the nice CVB lady. Turns out, most of the money came from a local, private foundation. Besides, every town needs a signature, right? I added the Sundial Bridge as an interesting attraction, but not something I’d come to Redding to see again.

Then something happened that changed my whole perception of Redding. I looked down at the Sacramento River and noticed two guys fly-fishing. “You have fly-fishing in town?” I asked. “You bet,” my guide said. “We have salmon in this river!”

A salmon run, from the ocean, in the middle of town. Now I was intrigued. And when she saw my interest in nature, you might say the hook was set. Soon she was handing me a brochure on the 11 major waterfalls within a short drive of town. Next came Shasta Lake, just up the road, with 365 miles of shoreline near Mount Shasta. Next was Whiskeytown National Recreation Area, just eight miles outside of town. Just beyond that was the Marble Mountain Wilderness, the wildly scenic Castle Crags, and the Trinity Alps Wilderness. Next up was Lassen Volcanic National Park an hour away. Six national forests. Nearly a dozen rivers for whitewater rafting. Ski areas. Scenic drives. Mountain climbing. Heck, the redwoods and the coast are only a couple hours away.

My head was spinning. California is amazing. Here’s a town surrounded by more natural stuff than most states offer. And as for the fishing, it isn’t just about fly-fishing for salmon. I asked a friend who’s a fishing guide, and he got all excited reeling off the names of blue-ribbon trout, salmon, and steelhead streams around Redding: the Trinity River, the McLoud River, Hat Creek, the Klamath River, the Upper Sacramento …

Finally, he just said, “We should go there sometime.” It was the first time anybody suggested a trip to Redding, but I intend to take him up on it. And I didn’t even tell him we can walk to a bridge with a 200-foot sundial and jack one out of Yankee Stadium while we’re there.

portlandpaul@mac.com

Visit Redding, CA on the Web

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News

Breakfast in Skykomish

Working through bacon and eggs at the Cascadia Inn and Cafe, it occurs to me that Henry, the guy who owns the place, has quite a challenge ahead of him.

It isn’t just that he’s alone in the kitchen with several orders, or that he also has some rooms to clean up, or that he’ll have to handle any check-ins that arrive, or that his lone, teenage staffer doesn’t seem to understand the cash register. No, even if he gets all that figured out, there’s still the fact that he, and his hotel and cafe, are in Skykomish.

Never heard of Skykomish? Folks in Seattle have. They take Route 2 past it on their way up to the ski hill at Stevens Pass, and 99 percent of them don’t stop. Just some old town along the road. “Sky,” as they call it, is a Chevron and a deli along the highway, a rusty old bridge, a few buildings across the river, and some big construction project. There’s good fishing in the river, but that’s lower down.

We had been on the Pacific Crest Trail, and when we walked out of the woods up at Stevens, we’d hiked 75 miles in six days, without a shower or a bed. We knew all about Skykomish because it was the closest place we could get clean and fed, and there were a couple of cheap places: one that lets you pitch a tent in the yard and the Cascadia, Henry’s place, where two people can share a room with bunk beds and a bathroom down the hall for $20 each. For another $5, Henry does your laundry, and there’s a TV room with cable. The only table-served food in town is just off the lobby.

Across the road from the cafe was evidence of all that Skykomish once was, for good or ill: the rail yard. The Great Northern built the town back in the 1890s, when giants hacked the line over Stevens Pass and then dug an eight-mile tunnel under it. They needed Skykomish to hold coal and water and extra engines for the long haul over the pass, and the town boomed.

Then came the diesel engine, and now the trains hardly stop in Skykomish. Amtrak hasn’t even slowed down in Sky for 30 years, and the cargo trains might stop to exchange a car here and there. Timber played out years ago.

Now the railroad’s mess supplies most of the work. Seems that for several decades, when they had oil to get rid of, they just dug a hole and poured it in — so much of it that Skykomish septic tanks were said to float on it sometimes. When it finally leached into the river and started killing fish a few years back, about 435 government agencies got involved, and now the whole town is a cleanup zone. They pick up buildings, some of them over 100 years old, and move them so they can dig up the soil underneath. They had moved the river when we were there. Of course, the construction guys are all from out of town, but some of them share rooms at the other hotel, and they keep the Cascadia busy at lunch.

So I guess the town is on the move again — in a sense. My friend pointed out that they could put the buildings back wherever they want, sort of re-create a town. Maybe they could run a scenic train through the valley. The trees are growing back now, the old railroad grade is a trail, and there’s some fish in the river. Of course, that’s a little lower down.

Finishing up a Wednesday breakfast and about to hit the road myself, I felt like the town felt: waking up from a long sleep, comfortable, clean, rested, feeling good … just not sure where I’m headed today.