Excursions

Sometimes, she surprises me. Today, for example. After a sluggish morning, both of us still in the recuperative stages of bronchitis, I asked if she was up to sitting in the car and watching as Sam and I walked around the soccer fields at a local park. She ‘lowed as how that would work, and together, we gathered up her knitting, pouffers (our term for albuterol inhalers), cigarettes, binoculars, and coffee, and with one last trip to the restroom, we were on our way.

Since I’ve been in Salem, part of my usual morning schedule has been to head out with Sam (a female beagle-mutt that lives and loves with abandon; I want to be like her when I grow up), to find a place where 1) there’s no cigarette smoke, and 2) she can run, explore, sniff, chase, and react joyfully when I ask if there are squirrels nearby. Although I don’t know where the term came from, I have humorously begun referring to it as our morning constitutional. We have been to Minto Brown, where blackberries were discovered, picked, and transported home to be rendered into a delicious pie; Silver Falls, where she has, against all logic (and knowledge of beagles) ventured into the very cold water in an attempt to cross to the other side; Wallace Marine Park, where I’m reminded of ‘The Sound of Music’ when she comes running down the little slope and across the grass of the soccer fields, and the Willamette River Greenway, which allows us a most transcendent ramble through old woods and new growth, to the cliffs over the river, and a peacefulness that harkens to me from the other side. And just yesterday, Sam was so unnerved by her startling of a snake that she refused to join me for a little wade in the water.

Off we all went, to sit (Mom) and to wander (me) and to find out what had been there throughout the night and morning (Sam). After a walk around a couple of fields, Sam and I got back into the car, and I asked Mom if she was up to a bit more of a drive, to see the Greenway entrance that Sam and I had found, and to continue on for a bit more, if she was up for it. Indeed she was, so north we headed.

While we were turning around in the parking lot of the Greenway, Mom said that she’d like to come back when she felt better and do part of the walk with us. My first reaction, and yes, I said this, was, “I don’t think you’re ever going to feel good enough to do this,” but she insisted. I reiterated to her how beautiful I had found it to be, let her know that there was a bench part way through the walk that looked out over the river, and reassured her that if she couldn’t make it back to the car, I’d just put her on my back, piggy-back style, and carry her the rest of the way. She laughed at that.

We agreed to continue on our northward journey. It was pleasing for me, to be able to transport my Mom to someplace other than the chairs in which she sits, and to hear her appreciation of the beauty of the Willamette Valley strewn before and around her. She remarked about the changing colors, the lifting of the fog, the flatness of the farmland and the various stages of harvesting that she saw. I asked her to be on the lookout for a uniquely western site, that of a bird-of-prey’s nest built atop a modified telephone/electric pole. With the first one, we were both amazed with it’s size, how high the walls of the nest were built from the base of the platform. Although we made a couple of u-turns and driveway stops, we didn’t see any life in or around the nest, and I wondered out loud if she knew the nesting and/or migration seasons for eagles in the area. I know that at one point in her life, she would have been able to tell me, but she’s visited that knowledge so infrequently that it’s gone away from her now. We passed a couple of more, both times slowing down to see if there was anything to see, but all were empty of visible life.

At a small park wayside, knowing that the 50’ walk would render her breathless, I ignored the handicapped parking area and drove my Mom up to the door of the restroom. And when she was done, I showed her how Sam (and I, to some extent) had managed for her to get some exercise on our cross-country drive. I let her out, and slowly drove around the park. Sam would stop when she encountered a smell worth investigating, otherwise, she was running behind and off to one side of the car; I kept track of her in my rearview mirror, and showed Mom how we’d done that.

We came home by way of the Wheatland Ferry, which was the last of what was pleasant about our drive. The rest of the trip was through suburb and town, and I think both of us, already weary with our outing, were done in by the assault of color-light-glass-noise-traffic-cars of civilization. We arrived home to rest, lunch on leftovers, and quietly watch the latest Charlie Rose interview.

For both of us, for differing reasons, these trips have turned into something more than just a drive in the country. Conversations uninterrupted by television or phone go on until complete, ideas that are sprouting as seeds become fodder for sharing, and rememberings are thrown back and forth with pleasure in the company, and care that one’s memories aren’t made out to be mistaken or wrong. For all of these reasons, I look forward to more of this with my Mom.