Back to the Beach

Today, I am back on the central Oregon coast, to revisit the Sylvia Beach Hotel, where Margot and I stayed several weeks ago, then to make my way south by camping on the coast. The weather here is cold and stormy, and reminds me a bit of the old saying, “The coldest winter I ever spent was a summer in San Francisco,” which Snopes.com assures me Mark Twain never uttered. (Still, I like to imagine him, pipe in hand, shivering on the Golden Gate Bridge.)

A few little things have happened since my last entry.

One is a PO box and an accompanying physical address in Oregon.

A week ago, I found a wonderful home to sublet just north of Ashland. This area has so inspired me that I have decided to pause in my travels and rest here for a while, perhaps even permanently. I have very much fallen for Oregon, and the Ashland area is particularly wonderful. It reminds me a bit of Santa Fe back in the early ’90s, when it still felt like a small-town community, everyone knew each other, and a certain congeniality still existed.

Chuck Palahniuk has written a fun little volume called Fugitives and Refugees: A Walk in Portland, OR, about his hometown that pretty much sums up how eccentric folks up this way can be. And Ashland has lots of wild, radical hippie energy, mixed with “rugged individualists,” hardcore Fundamentalists (don’t spin that radio dial too fast), Pacific Crest Trail thru-hikers, pagans, musicians of absolutely every stripe, people who don’t mind living in isolated cabins for 6 months at a clip, brazen jaywalking deer, environmentalists, rednecks, militia, women walking down the street holding hands and singing, religious cult members, mountain-climbers, punked-out students, shrieking thespians…all of whom seem to turn up at its awesome co-op at once, quaffing kombucha and tossing organic Rainier cherries into their backpacks. It’s people-watching at its finest, and if you stop for a few minutes and eat your lunch outside on the ledge, the gestalt of the place reveals itself, somewhere between the doddering toddlers in tie-dyed onesies and the bearded hippies standing in for Dumbledore.

People seem very happy here, and the week I’ve just spent (several nights of yurt camping and others in the dorm at the Ashland Hostel) has been extremely pleasant. It feels much like a spiritual/creative/musical playground, with so many things happening at one time that it can be hard to choose. On Friday, I stumbled onto the First Friday Artwalk, near the railyard, where several galleries have shows and musicians give impromptu concerts on the streets. Terribly cool. Another night, I sat next to the creek in 99-acre Lithia Park, had a sandwich, and enjoyed a young band jamming on some blues and prog rock tunes.

I feel like I’ve discovered the place I thought Santa Fe would always be. It’s rough around the edges, sincere, friendly, deep, playful, spirited, and kind. I’m ready for this.