Airport purgatory

Crowds flying home after Christmas, airline workforce decimated by a spike in Covid-19, and an airport unaccustomed to heavy snowfall and sub-freezing temperatures.  Stir these ingredients together, and you have an explanation for why I arrived back in Seattle over 51 hours later than originally scheduled.

My train ride from Seattle to Oxnard went off without a hitch.  I had an enjoyable couple of days with my brother and his wife at their coastal home in Oxnard.  We drove to his daughter's home in Glendale, about an hour to the south, where we celebrated a beautiful and merry Christmas.  

And then Sunday, December 26, arrived.  The date on which began the Great Snowfall of 2021 in the Pacific Northwest.  The date when more and more airline employees began phoning in ill from Covid-19.  The date and day of the week on which large numbers of holiday travelers were scheduled to travel from Los Angeles area airports -- including Burbank -- to Seattle-Tacoma International Airport.

My brother drove me -- innocent as a lamb -- to Burbank Airport at 10 a.m.  I always insist on arriving early for my flights, in this case for a flight scheduled to depart at 11:59 a.m.  Through the undeserved grace of Alaska Airlines, I had earlier been bumped up to First Class, and I was looking forward to a luxurious flight.  Almost immediately, however, we were advised of a half hour delay.  I thought nothing of it.  In holiday periods there is often a short delay because of the crowds.  

But one delay followed another.  

With all due respect, I should make you aware that Burbank airport has few forms of amusement for passengers awaiting flights.  Its Terminal B has one small, crowded café and a few stands selling snack food.  But finally, at about 3:30 p.m., we boarded our flight.  I settled into my First Class seat, and watched the pathetic coach class mobs file past me.  The doors were closed; we pushed back from the gate; the engines warmed up.

And continued warming up.  The crowds began squirming nervously.  Finally, after about a half hour on the tarmac, the pilot announced that Air Traffic Control in Seattle was refusing to authorize our departure from Burbank because Sea-Tac airport was closing for the day.  Disbelieving, we returned to the gate and deplaned.  A lengthy line formed at the gate desk.  Luckily, I was third in line.  They had an available seat on Tuesday -- was I interested?  I didn't try to negotiate for something better -- I grabbed it.  

I walked past the long line of my fellow passengers.  I recalled how long it had taken for the first three passengers to be processed.  But am I my brother's keeper?  I turned my thoughts to reserving two more nights at my Glendale motel.

After dropping me off, my brother had returned to Oxnard.  His daughter -- our hostess in Glendale -- was flying off with her daughter to Minneapolis.  It was just me and an inexpensive motel, situated in a mixed residential-commercial neighborhood.  The hours that followed while awaiting Tuesday's flight gave me a premonition of Purgatory -- not fun, not hellish, just long and gray and seemingly endless.  Starbucks got a lot of my food-consumption business, as did -- for one interesting dinner -- Carl's Jr. 

I returned to Burbank Airport on Tuesday at 11 a.m. -- my welcome at my motel having expired --  awaiting a flight at 1:40 p.m.  Same experience.  An additional series of delays, which -- as I posted with horror on Facebook -- seemed to be "déjà vu all over again."

We boarded, just as we had two days earlier.  We backed away from the gate.  We paused.  I held my breath.  Had I become a character out of "Groundhog Day"?  Another lengthy delay ensued, because Burbank's traffic control staff had gone home for the day, and we were being controlled from elsewhere.  But, in due time, we took off.

I was once more seated in First Class.  I drank wine and ate a small dish of salted nuts.  A complimentary cheese and fruit plate followed, with crackers and dark chocolates.  The flight was great, the service was impeccable, and the time passed swiftly.  I have no criticism of Alaska Airlines, which did everything possible for us passengers with the hand they'd been dealt.

We arrived in Seattle at about 8 p.m.  I had only to pick up my baggage and summon an Uber car. 

My baggage!  Well, some other time, folks.  This story has drifted on too long already.

Christmas carols

After a year's absence, thanks to Covid-19, it was a delight to be in the audience last night for "A Festival of Lessons & Carols," presented by the Northwest Boychoir, together with their teenage cousins, Vocalpoint! Seattle.

The performance was presented in St. Mark's Episcopal Cathedral, to an audience carefully checked for proof of vaccination and the wearing of masks.  

This Christmas festival is performed (in normal times) annually, and is based on a similar service offered by King's College, Cambridge.¹  The boys file in from the rear of the cathedral in total silence.  They halt in the aisle, half way to the front.  Suddenly the cathedral is filled with the sound of a solo boy soprano, singing the haunting first verse to "Once in Royal David's City."  With the beginning of the second verse, the entire ensemble joins in, as they continue filing forward and take their places facing the audience.

Covid-19 still lurks, and there were some changes.  The boys (and girls in Vocalpoint) were all masked.  Their voices still soared, but the masks seemed to blur slightly the enunciation of the lyrics.  (Or maybe my hearing is just going bad!).  Also, the audience/congregation was not invited to join in the singing of well-known carols, as in past years, in order to limit viral spreading.  

As the program notes reminded us, the choir members were unable to practice singing together until last summer -- a year and a half during which each singer practiced alone, sitting in his bedroom, singing to his computer.  The quality has held up remarkably well.

As in past years, after singing four carols, nine young lectors from the two choirs read nine "lessons" -- scripture readings from the King James Version of the Old and New Testaments.  After each reading, the choirs sang one carol, and then a second popular seasonal carol (where the audience would ordinarily have joined in the singing).

The performance ended with an ethereal singing of "O Holy Night," and then "Joy to the World" as a recessional.

Despite the masks, the singing was beautiful and moving.  My only complaint -- and it's very subjective -- is that I could have done without the piano accompaniment during many of the carols.  It was unusually loud, and I would have preferred to hear the carols sung a capella.  An insignificant complaint.  Welcome back to live performances, boys (and girls).

----------------------------

¹A YouTube recording of their inspiration: Service at the chapel of King's College Cambridge

South for Christmas

One week from this moment (5:48 p.m. PST), I will find myself about half an hour east of Eugene, Oregon.  I'll be climbing eastward across the Cascade mountains, aiming for Chemult, Oregon, where I expect to arrive at 8:13 p.m.

Aw, shucks! You guessed it!  I'll be once more traveling south by rail, en route to Oxnard, California, on Amtrak's Coast Starlight.  This will be my third trip on the Coast Starlight during 2021 -- some sort of new single-year record for me.  

I've discussed this route before.  Most extensively, and longingly, perhaps, in November 2017 when I was headed to Oxnard for Thanksgiving.  I'll just repeat that it's a train ride that lasts 34 hours, with two lunches, one breakfast, and two dinners on board.  Because I'll be traveling in a roomette, all the meals come free, including one alcoholic drink (wine, beer, cocktail) (second and third alcoholic drinks cost $7.50 each, which isn't bad for a restaurant).  

The dinner menu has been upgraded since the last time I traveled Amtrak, and now consists of a choice of appetizers (e.g., lobster crab cake), main course (e.g., grilled Atlantic salmon), and dessert (e.g., flourless chocolate torte).  I emphasize meals, because they are the main events of the day aboard a train.  Against a background activity of watching scenery, reading, snoozing, or chatting with other travelers in the lounge car.

But enough (can there ever be enough?) about the train.  I will spend a couple of days with my brother and his wife in Oxnard, walking the beach (in December!), and then drive with them to their daughter's home in Glendale for Christmas.  I'll fly home from Burbank on December 26.

Last year, as you may remember, I "celebrated" Christmas alone, in Covid-induced isolation (other than my two recently-acquired cats, of course), "feasting" on a turkey TV dinner.  Like Scrooge eating alone in his office, right?  This Christmas, I join the entire Bob Cratchit family for convivial family festivities.  (Probably no dancing, however.)  I'm eagerly looking forward to it.

But first -- I have some gift wrapping to take care of.    

Christmas cards

It's become an almost annual tradition on this blog.  My supposed farewell to the sending of Christmas cards.  

It began in 2008, when I observed how few people sent cards anymore, and how I hated to be the last person to abandon the custom.  Jumping ahead to 2016, my annual farewell was entitled "Happy whatever."  In 2018, "Dying custom."  In 2018, "Moribund."  And last year, the deceptively upbeat, "Just like the ones I used to know."

Who needs this annual downer?

This year?  Yes, I cheerfully admit I'm sending Christmas cards.  To the same folks I sent cards to last year.  About twenty, all in all.  Far fewer than my card lists of a decade or so ago, but at least the list -- this year -- isn't shrinking in size.  I bought twenty cards a few days ago.  I've now written my Christmas greetings on all but two of them.  My handwriting's getting bad, so -- if my message on the card is longer than a couple of paragraphs, I type it as a letter and enclose it in the card.

I bought Christmas stamps -- no more sticking plain old American flags on my Christmas card envelopes.  Two kinds of stamps, because the post office seemed to be running out of them-- one type secular, and the other an image of a religious painting.  I worry briefly about which person should get which, a concern my mother never had.  I use some nice looking return address stickers sent to me by a worthy charity -- even though I ignored the request for a donation.  

Starting this year, whether I receive a card from someone will no longer be a factor in deciding whether that person is worthy to be on my list.  In fact, although I'm using last year's list this year, starting next year I may actually add persons from earlier lists -- folks dropped for the silly reason that they didn't send me a card.

Yes, this is the new me, the new "true Christmas spirit" me.  No more eye for an eye.  No more measuring out my meager favors with an eye-dropper, applying exacting standards of worthiness on friends and acquaintances based on their reciprocation.

I don't mean that everyone I know gets a card.  Not even everyone I'm fond of.  I'm not a masochist, eager to spend my pre-Christmas days bent over a desk, quill and ink at hand.  Nor, on the other hand, do I propose to use a program that automatically churns out electronic cards to every address in my address book.  Amazon Customer Service won't be startled to receive an electronic card from yours truly.

But my decision of who gets a card that year, and who doesn't, will be wholly subjective.  There will be no algorithm that I can provide you.  I want to return to a perhaps-imaginary day when people sent cards to people because those were people they just felt like wishing a ... well ... an especially Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas to all (card recipient or not) and a Happy New Year!  

On-campus living

Saturday, after dinner, I found myself walking in the dark across the University of Washington campus.  (During our current period of heavy rains, I've had to pick and choose the time of minimum rainfall each day to walk!)  My route took me past McMahon Hall -- the dormitory I lived in during my years of post-graduate work.  Although you might expect the dorm to be half-empty on a weekend evening, the window of virtually every room was lit up.  

It was a warm and cheerful sight, as I pushed my way along the dark and wet sidewalk, braving a slight drizzle.

And, as I've rhapsodized in earlier posts, I once more felt a strong nostalgia for my dormitory days.  And a bit sorry that -- although virtually everyone in my family has attended college -- I'm the only one, for various reasons, to have actually lived on campus.

Why?  One reason is that it's usually cheaper to find an off-campus apartment, or, if possible, to commute from home.  Another is that, at least until recently, few colleges have provided housing for married couples.  Also, many students, in my experience, come to college rather suspicious of association with the academic world -- at least full time association.  They are familiar with the high school routine of  putting in their hours at school each day, and then having the rest of the day free from school, free to enjoy on their own.  Even if many of those hours away from school have to be spent in studies and doing homework.

Perhaps the most persuasive argument in the minds of many students is a craving for independence: They're finally escaping the firm grip of their parents, and have no interest in accepting whatever other rules they feel may be imposed by university housing authorities.  

I found none of these arguments persuasive in my own case, but I understand how others feel.  And, in any event, my own university required all freshmen to live on campus.  Where, like the overwhelming majority of students at my school, I was happy to remain in the years that followed. 

Although I vaguely understand the desire to live off-campus, I think it's a mistake to decline that opportunity if you can afford to live in a dormitory.   You have an entire life after college to live privately in a house or apartment of your own, and on your own.  But you will find it difficult to ever find a group living experience again, once you leave the university.  And it's a valuable experience.

Although I hardly realized it at the time, I learned as much from the fellow students with whom I shared our common room and dining hall as I did from the lectures I attended and the books I read.  Of course, we shared our experiences with the courses and professors we had in common.  But even more important, I found myself sensing the enthusiasm that students with totally different interests from mine brought to their majors.  Many interests I have today came not from my own course work, but from rubbing shoulders with dorm mates.  (Specifically, just offhand, I think of a liking for certain forms of classical music, and an appreciation for the goals of formal landscape architecture.)

Learning comes not just from osmosis -- although formal course work sometimes consists primarily of that process.  Argument among students over issues as disparate as politics and religion, theories of history, the existence of space aliens, and the ideas advanced by various authors engaged in various forms of literature can force the student to reconsider his own opinions and assumptions -- reconsidering them in light of the success or failure of his own arguments.  The argumentative process can lead to ways of thinking that are far more permanent and sophisticated than does the mere studying for finals.

Dorms -- and by "dorms" I'm including throughout this essay fraternities and sororities and -- in my own undergraduate university -- a hybrid called "eating clubs" -- also provide purely social activities that strengthen the ties of friendship, friendships that encourage these more intellectual exchanges.  (I became a pretty fair bridge player and (I declare proudly) member of my house's bowling team!)

So, if any high school seniors bound for college next fall blunder upon this essay, let me repeat for emphasis:  If your individual situation, financial and otherwise, makes it at all possible for you to choose on-campus living -- DO IT!.  In whichever form most appeals to you.  Be one of those bright lights shining out into the darkness from McMahon Hall.

Years later, you'll be glad you did.

Leonardo da Vinci: Inventor

It had long since come to my attention that people of accomplishment rarely sat back and let things happen to them.  They went out and happened to things.  
--Leonardo da Vinci

Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519) painted, of course, the Mona Lisa. He was one of the great painters of the late Italian Renaissance.  But he was also an inventor of incredible originality, often drawing up plans for devices that no one got around to implementing and trying out until centuries later.

And it is primarily his record as an inventor that is on display in a visiting exhibit now on display in Seattle's Museum of History and Industry (MOHAI), which I visited today.

Leonardo kept a record of his inventions primarily in long-hand written notes, notes illustrated by his own drawings, and notes kept on whatever scraps of paper happened to be at hand at the time.  After his death, these pages were later combined into bound volumes, called codices, which are now scattered among a number of major museums.  It was pages from these codices that are on exhibit at MOHAI.  His writings were impossible for me to read.  He not only wrote in a tiny script, in 16th century Italian, but, being left handed, he wrote backward from right to left.  

As far as I could tell from observation alone, he might as well have been writing in Saxon runes.

More impressive to the non-expert visitor than his codex pages are the physical exhibits.  Modern Italian craftsmen have built the devices that da Vinci envisioned in his notes.  Many of these are interactive exhibits, where we as museum attendees are invited to turn cranks, pull levers, and in these and other ways thus put into operation the devices ourselves.

Some of his inventions seem quite basic -- screw drives, various gear combinations. But many seem unbelievably prescient -- plans for helicopters, self-driven vehicles, air-supplied diving suits, and a large number of military weapons, weapons obviously designed to interest his patrons -- a steam-driven cannon, multiple-barrel rifle combinations, devices for scaling and breaching fortress walls, even a submarine.

One exhibit is a scale model of an ideal city, one that would avoid traffic congestion, disease, and pollution.  (I wasn't particularly impressed by the result, although I was impressed by Leonardo's desire to address these issues six hundred years ago.)

Leonardo da Vinci was obviously a genius, a more multi-faceted genius than we see often in history.  His energy and initiative were legendary.  It's sad that, at the end of his life, he considered himself a failure for not having achieved more with his many talents. 

Few of us would have felt so humble.

---------------------

Photo -- Three wheel vehicle powered by turning of hand crank.

Freedom to be stupid

In law school, we used to joke that being a trial lawyer was a tougher job than being a brain surgeon.  Why?  Because while a surgeon struggled to save a patient's life, he didn't face another doctor on the other side of the table trying to kill the patient.

Somehow, that joke has come to mind as I watch what's happening in America and -- to some extent -- in other parts of the world.

We have governments making every attempt to defeat the pandemic and, at the individual level, to save their citizens from illness and, often, death.  And in America, we seem to have approximately 40 percent of the population supporting 50 percent of the politicians in their effort to frustrate every such action taken by those governments.

Requiring immunization, with a vaccine whose development was supported by Trump himself?  Those who are now considered the moderate opposition say that vaccination should be a personal choice, disregarding the effect of each person's illness on the entire population.  The more radical right-wingers claim that the pandemic is a hoax, and that vaccination is a covert governmental method of inserting all kinds of nefarious substances into our bodies -- DNA modifiers, electronic chips to control our thoughts, you name it.

Well, we might suppose, if folks won't get vaccinated, for the sake of themselves and of their neighbors, at least they can wear masks.  "Whoa!  Over my dead body!  No one tells me I have to walk around with a mask on my face!  No one puts a mask on my kid, and denies him the wholesome oxygen his young body requires.  Don't tell me that I can't sit in a cramped airplane, shoulder to shoulder with my neighbor, without a mask!  Who do you think you are?  

Our grandparents fought wars to protect our liberty to be spoiled, selfish, self-centered, ignorant fools -- and we will fight now for that same liberty!  My neighbor?  Hell, every man for himself, I say!" 

Not only do many in the minority oppose having to wear masks themselves, they are infuriated when they see other persons wearing masks.  Thus the incidents -- admittedly only occasional -- of some lout trying to rip a mask off a stranger he encounters in a bar or even on the street.

Some Democrats mutter darkly that the Republicans want to keep the pandemic alive and kicking until the next election, in order to discredit the Biden administration.  I'm not given to such conspiracy theories.  I instead see some serious deficiencies in both the intelligence and the character of a large percentage of our population.  No intentional political chicanery is needed to bring these deficiencies to the surface -- they bubble to the surface by their very nature.

Our democracy was founded by leaders who prized rationality and good citizenship, and who grew up among fellow colonists who -- while perhaps largely uneducated -- possessed these qualities in large measure.  And when our founders entertained any doubts about the existence of those qualities, they put some limits on pure democratic government.  Hence, the original concept of the electoral college, intended -- probably too optimistically -- to serve as an elitist group of semi-aristocrats who would act in the best interest of the entire population.

However implemented, do we still have confidence in the concept of democratic government?  The irrational reaction of large portions of the American public to the pandemic, and to every effort to combat the pandemic,  leave me wondering.  

Dear Old Man ...

Where did I get the idea?  I have no idea.  Maybe it's an idea that occurs naturally to a lot of teenagers with an introspective bent.

Anyway, I was 17 years old.  And one day, I sat down and wrote a letter to myself.  To myself as a "middle-aged" 30-year-old man.  A letter not to be read until I reached that age.

As I recall, it was a reasonably long letter, but not book-length!  Maybe several handwritten pages, pages in which I poured out my heart.  I sealed it in an envelope, with something original written on the envelope -- something like "Do Not Open Until 30 Years Old."  I tossed it into the bottom drawer of my dresser, a drawer crammed with the paper effluvia of my life -- including, memorably, a little notebook from second grade filled with weekly spelling tests.

And that was the last I ever saw of my letter.  Years later, after my family had moved to a different house, while I was still in college and long before I turned thirty, I checked to see if the envelope was still waiting for me.  It was gone.  Everything else that I remembered having packed into that drawer was still there, but not my letter.

What happened to it?  I'll never know.  Maybe the same Kindly Elves who often erase adult memories of childhood embarrassments and humiliations also act on occasion to remove hard copy documentations of such silliness?

I can't remember one single thing that I said about my life, my hopes, my dreams.  Nothing.  All I remember was the preamble.  At the beginning of the letter, I more or less congratulated myself for having lived to the ripe old age of thirty.  I told my future self that I reckoned he probably was well settled into whatever career he ended up pursuing, and that I supposed he must be accustomed to showing up for work on a daily basis.  

This person I was addressing was of such an Old Age, and existed so far in the Future, that it was difficult to believe I would ever be he.

In my preamble, I added that, as I wrote my letter at 17, I dreaded ever finding myself at the age of thirty.  Nor was I all that eager for regular work hours and daily routines.

I needn't have worried.  When I actually became thirty -- yes, it happened despite my fervent wishes -- I was taking the LSAT and applying to law schools.  After considerable delay, I was somewhat belatedly preparing to enter a profession.  And by the time I reached that goal, I had found that going to work daily was -- for the most part -- a pleasure.  And the long hours I worked were nothing I begrudged.

Many 17-year-olds -- at least those who end up entering major professions -- are already licking their chops as they contemplate their future professional status.  I was not one of them.  And looking back, and comparing myself with those who were already so single-minded at 17, I have absolutely no regrets.

But I do regret the loss of my letter.  I'd give a lot to read it now. 

November rain

The best thing one can do when it's raining is to let it rain.
--Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

All summer we prayed for rain. The moderate Northwest Corner, where even in summer the rains visit occasionally, was scalding hot and parched, week after week. In usually cool and rainy June, we had a long string of ultra-high temperatures, reaching as high as 108 degrees (42.2º C).

Then came November, and our prayers were belatedly answered.  The "Pineapple Express" -- an "atmospheric river" from the area of Hawaii.  Two of them already.  The rains were continual, day after day.  Not were continual, but have been and are continual.  My gutters are clogged.  The water overflows them, and falls in sheets upon the ground.  It overflows the gutters where two gables meet, dumping water down an unused outdoor stairway, water that then flows under an unused doorway into my basement-level garage.

My garage has water several inches deep in places, but the water luckily does not submerge the entire garage.  Why not?  Because the garage floor is slightly uneven, and at a certain depth, water seeps under the door into the basement.  From there, it crosses from one side of the basement to the other in a winding stream, ultimately disappearing into the floor drain that an architect, now long dead, cleverly thought to install near the laundry area.  

The water therefore never fills the entire garage.  Sooner or later, someone will come to unclog my gutters.  Until then, my basement drain is sufficient to maintain the status quo in the garage.

But enough of my hydrological calculations.

The days have been getting darker.  Of course they've been -- this is November.  But the dark cloud overcast has exaggerated the usual November darkness.  Not just for a day or two, but for close to two weeks.  And the rain has continued unabated -- at times, heavier than others, but virtually never ending.  The Seattle Times saw fit to devote a feature article to the inability of Seattle residents to take their daily walks.  Walks important to us not only for fitness, not only for relief of tension, but also as daily markers around which we arrange our other activities.  For some, mainly the elderly, the daily walk is their only activity, as necessary to them as a daily visit to a grocery or coffee shop might be to others.

Less daunted than many others by water, I've been walking each day even while it's raining.  I keep my eye on my phone's weather app and choose a time when the rainfall is predicted to be less formidable than others.  I've learned how misleading predictions of rainfall can be in the Northwest Corner -- even predictions over just the next two hours -- but in general the app has been helpful, even if hardly infallible.  And as I've pointed out on other occasions, I can tolerate being drenched.  I'm insoluble in water.

But life has been nevertheless gloomy.  My cats agree -- sometimes braving the elements and returning with sodden fur, other times lying listlessly about the house when they're not snapping at each other.

But today -- after heavy rains in the morning -- the gloom lifted.  The sun emerged from the clouds.  The sun! The Golden Orb of legend!  Within minutes, some of the water was already draining from the sidewalks.  The temperature rose to 61 degrees (16º C).  My cats perked up and hastened to the window to check out developments..

I slipped on a jacket -- I didn't trust the rain not to slyly return -- and went for a walk in the Arboretum.  My God!  It was beautiful!  Everything stood out, so crisp and fresh!  The trees -- many of which still retain much of their autumnal color-- stood out against a partially blue sky.  Birds were flitting around.  

And for at least the first half hour, the normally well-trod paths of the Arboretum were empty, except for me.  I had beat everyone to the outdoors, and enjoyed a short time of solitary communion with nature.

Since then, we may have had a shower or two, but it's predicted to be generally clear skies until Thursday, and then more clear skies from Friday through Sunday.

Yeah, I know.  My weather app lies.  But I'll believe it for as long as I can.  Dryness!  I hope for dryness!  And sunshine!

Here comes the sun do, do, do
Here comes the sun
And I say it's all right.

--The Beatles

من در اردیبهشت ماه به ایران می

Eight months ago, I announced in this blog that I had signed up for a trip to Iran in October 2021.  My post received a surprisingly large number of hits.  Possibly -- no, probably -- because I titled it in Persian (Farsi).

In July, with tail between my legs, I announced that I had postponed the trip a year, until October 2022.  I was concerned partly by the Covid-19 situation in Iran, but primarily because I wanted to join relatives in Italy at about the same time.

I am now happy to announce that I've moved the Iran trip up to May 2022 -- just six months from now.  The trip is being organized by a major adventure company.  I inquired how many travelers had signed up for the trip for the two dates.  I was told that only I was signed up for October, but that they had one person already signed up for May.

Now, with my decision, the May date has two eager tourists signed up.  The trip can handle six to sixteen members, and will not run with fewer than six.  So I have to hope that in coming months four more persons are interested enough in Iran -- an extremely interesting country, both for its history and its present position in international affairs -- to sign up.

As I mentioned in my earlier post, this will be the second time I've traveled in Iran.  I know from first hand experience what a beautiful and fascinating  country  it is.  I look forward eagerly and hopefully to a May visit.
--------------------------------
Photo -- School kids clowning around in Tehran. (2011)

Light rail delirium

So.   I hopped on the light rail at the U-District station earlier this afternoon, and rode downtown.

Frequent readers of my blog can sense it coming -- another meditation on rapid transit.  They have seen all too often my obsession with all forms of rail travel, from transcontinental railroad travel to short urban streetcar rides.

And they would be correct.  Until a month ago, I would have been unable to write that initial sentence, because until October 2, there was no functioning U-District station.  Sound Transit's one light rail line in King County -- recently renamed somewhat grandiosely the "One Line" -- I say "grandiosely" because so far the One Line is the only line -- extended only as far north as Husky Stadium on the southeast corner of the University of Washington campus.

But, after years of preparation, tunneling, and construction, the One Line has finally pushed 4.3 miles farther north to Northgate -- the site of the allegedly first indoor shopping center in the nation, and of North Seattle Community College.  Besides Northgate, the One Line has new stations in the U-District on Brooklyn Avenue just off N.E. 45th (a station that will be more convenient for most students at the UW than the one beside the stadium), and the Roosevelt station at 12th Avenue N.E. just off N.E. 65th.

The rail line goes underground at the Chinatown/International District station, just south of downtown, not to emerge until just before reaching Northgate.  Construction above ground -- both surface and elevated -- is far faster than tunneling underground, and the One Line will be extended another 8.5 miles above ground north to Lynnwood by 2024.  The extension will include two stations in Shoreline, and a station in Mountlake Terrace.

Needless to say, I wriggle with delight at these developments.  And I'm not even discussing the Two Line, whose initial route will also open in 2024, serving the eastern side of Lake Washington, with nine stations strung across east Seattle, Mercer Island, Bellevue, and southerm Redmond. 

The day the Northgate extension opened, I was on an early train from the station nearest my house (University of Washington station) to Northgate.  I milled about the new station with other enthusiasts, and followed the walkway and the new footbridge from the station across I-5 to the community college.  I then rode back as far as the new U-District station, from which it was an easy walk home.  (I knocked off the remaining Roosevelt station within a day or two later.)

Last month's extension, together with the 2024 Lynwood extension, is expected to serve a large number of commuters from north Seattle and its northern suburbs -- workers traveling to jobs in downtown Seattle, and students traveling to the UW. With the concurrent addition in 2024 of the line serving the east side of the Lake, the light rail system will reduce the burden on the existing highway system and allow travelers to skim right past (or under) traffic jams that have in recent years become almost constant.

Our light rail system still won't allow residents to get around to all parts of town as easily as New Yorkers do on their subway system, or even as folks in Boston can on their much smaller system.  As a consolation, I suppose, our cars are much cleaner, quieter, and more comfortable than those of either New York or Boston.

None of these extensions will be particularly useful to me as a practical matter.  The route as it existed before last month already permitted me to ride to my two primary destinations -- downtown and the airport.  But you can bet that I'll be riding the rails to each new station as it opens -- but strictly as the railroad tourist that I so obviously am.

----------------------------------

Photo:  Northgate Station on the first day it was open.

Autumnal Melancholy

October 31.  Halloween.  And, of course, the last day of October.

What's up, you ask?  Why is this my first post in eleven days?  After an early start that had seem to promise another great and prolific blogging year, this will be only my fifth post in October.  Making October 2021 my poorest monthly showing -- quantity-wise, at least -- since October 2019.  October must, at least for me, have some miasma hanging about it.

September?  Different story.  September had a lot going for it.  There was my bruising but exciting climb to Rachel Lake.  The tense and hopeful excitement of my pre-travel Covid-19 test.  My fantastic week on the shores of Lake Como, Italy.  My first attendance in person at a Seattle Symphony concert since the pandemic began.  And, at the end of the month, my eagerly awaited Pfizer booster shot.

And October?  Well, there was an enjoyable visit to Boston in mid-month.  Otherwise, the month was flat and listless.  Like a return to pandemic isolation and inertia, but without the pandemic justification.  No wonder I've had a hard time finding something worth writing about.

But of course that's not really an excuse.  In past years, my posts have often displayed considerable enthusiasm for the most trivial of subjects.  An example?  How about my posted fascination over my state's changing slightly the numbering system on its auto license plates (6-29-2010)?  No, there were things to write about in October -- they just didn't capture my attention, they didn't interest me.  I just stared out my window blankly, gazing at the rain and gray skies. 

I had brain fog, I guess.  Even without having had Covid-19.

I just came back from an afternoon walk through the Arboretum, near my house.  Two miles on paths through beautiful changing foliage.  The sky was dark blue, the sun was shining, the trees had just reached the stage that makes for beautiful photography -- predominantly yellow foliage, punctuated occasionally by the bright scarlet of Japanese maples. Some trees are still completely green, and others completely bare.  Nature's diversity on display for my enjoyment.

And I did enjoy it, but with an enjoyment tinged with melancholy.  The way as a kid you enjoy the last day of Christmas vacation; the way I enjoyed my last day at Lake Como.  The sense that the Universe was putting on one last display of fireworks for me, one last celebration before the end.  The end, at least, until the first buds of spring, an event that on October 31 feels like a lifetime away.  The remaining green leaves will soon turn yellow, and the yellow leaves will fall.  A month from now, all the deciduous trees will be skeletal, the blue sky will have faded to the perpetual winter gray of the Northwest Corner, and the rainfall will be constant.

In fact, the blue skies of yesterday and today were already a mere interlude, following 36 hours of continual rain, rain that managed to flood my basement garage.  More rain tomorrow has been planned, rain that will get November -- and the winter of 2021-22 -- off to a proper start.

Yes, I know.  Thanksgiving will come in a few weeks, and then Christmas.  Oases in the desert of melancholic gloom, but oases at which we can't linger indefinitely before trudging out once more across the barren sands.

At least I have my cats, who have become notably more affectionate since the temperatures began falling.  I take comfort in their affection, even though I know deep in my heart that it's a faux affection, a seeking for a warm lap, a comfortable bed.  But I take whatever delusional solace I can get from their hard feline hearts.

But we'll get through this, both my cats and I.  Melancholy is derived from the Greek for "black bile," and the change of seasons has probably had a physical effect on my emotions.  It will pass, as my hormones -- my "humors" -- are adjusted.  As the black bile is replaced by the happier, summery humors of "blood" and "yellow bile."

But, meanwhile, Halloween?  Bah!  Humbug!  Those little brats will get no candy from me.  I'll turn off the front lights and spend the evening reading in a back bedroom.

A long weekend in Boston

As I posted on Facebook last Saturday, "If I had to leave Seattle, I could survive in Boston."  I was half way through a brief -- four days, including air travel -- visit to the Boston area, a trip that was living up to all my expectations.  I find that I feel comfortable and at home in Boston (as a tourist at least) -- more than I might in many other American destinations.

I stayed in the same Cambridge inn (bed & breakfast) as on past visits.  Only a couple of blocks from Harvard Yard, which I crossed frequently on my way to and from the Harvard subway stop.  Each crossing giving me a reason to wish again that I were still a bright eyed and bushy tailed college student.  Or even a tired and exhausted one.  

The only real pre-planned portion of my visit was a visit to Concord -- an expedition similar to my side trip to Salem at exactly the same time of year in 2018.  Massachusetts Bay Transit (MBTA), which runs the buses and subways in Boston, also runs commuter trains to outlying suburbs.  I took such a train from North Station to Salem three years ago, and I took a different train from the same station this year, a 40-minute ride to Concord.  Both Salem and Concord are full of historical and literary allusions.

I had visited Concord once before, as part of a rental car tour of New England in 1992.  This time, my travel was solely by public transport and by foot.  After a brief ramble around Monument Square -- in the heart of Concord -- I walked some 45 minutes out Walden Street to the "pond" made famous by Henry David Thoreau, now part of Walden Pond State Reservation.  

You need to walk that distance to appreciate how close Thoreau's cabin retreat, built on land owned by his friend and fellow author Ralph Waldo Emerson, was to the town.  The park itself is fairly large, and very nicely maintained.  The "pond" itself is fairly large, more a lake, but one that can easily be circled on a 1½ mile lakeshore path.  The site of Thoreau's cabin is clearly marked, and excavations have determined its exact location.  The site has become something of a literary shrine; Thoreau worshippers have brought stones, over the years, and constructed a stone pile and a number of cairns next to the place where the cabin stood.

To simplify matters for automobile-oriented visitors, an exact replica of the cabin has been constructed near the visitor center on the main road, and furnished exactly as the author himself is believed to have done.

So I visited the cabin site, and walked around the lake.  The path on the far side of the lake passes within feet of the track from Boston, at a point that the train passes shortly before it arrives at Concord station -- a development against which Henry probably would have protested vehemently.

I returned to town, had lunch at an excellent coffee house, visited the  Old Hill Burial Ground -- scary Halloween-appropriate tombstones climbing a steep hill adjacent to the town center -- and walked out to Orchard House, the childhood home of Louisa May Alcott, which served as the background of the family in Little Women.  I have never read the novel.  If I had, I might well have taken the offered tour of the house, but I suspected I would have missed most of the literary allusions.  So I satisfied myself with an exterior photo, and trudged back into town, taking the next train back into Boston.

Next time I visit, I'd like to explore the road from Concord to nearby Lexington, and the Old North Bridge, where the shot was fired "heard round the world."  But I'd really need a car to do that.  Or even better a bike, as some guidebooks suggest.

The rest of my time in Boston was largely spent re-visiting favorite spots from earlier visits.  I had dinner Friday night in very enjoyable outdoor seating adjacent to the Quincy Market near the waterfront.  I spent a morning at the Museum of Fine Arts.  I explored the waterfront from South Station to the North End.  I prowled about Beacon Hill, dodging a number of small tour groups, their members' eyes glazed with exhaustion, and arriving finally at that apex of Boston residential life, Louisburg Square.

My final morning, Sunday, was spent wandering the Esplanade, along the Charles River, eying the sailboats and the occasional swan, until I reached Harvard Bridge.  I crossed the bridge, partly for the river view and partly to observe how MIT fraternity members back in 1958 had calibrated the bridge in "smoots" -- each smoot being about 5'7" (in conventional measurement) -- the precise height of Oliver R. Smoot, the shortest member of their pledge class that year.  The paint is still fresh on the sidewalk, marking off every ten smoots.  "The past is never dead," as Faulkner once said.  "It's not even past."

And with that deep thought in mind, I returned by subway to Cambridge, picked up my baggage, and headed back south again to the airport.  

Yeah, I really like Boston.  In some ways, in its history and its traditions, it is quite different from Seattle.  But something in its spirit feels similar.

-------------------------------------

Photo:  Memorial Church, taken at night from Harvard Yard.

Outside the box

 

If, like me, you're a bit of a science buff -- maybe leaning toward science fiction -- you may recall something unusual that happened four years ago this month.  Something odd entered our solar system, shot past us, and departed.  Not unusual, of course, for a comet.

But this differed -- apparently -- from ordinary comets.  It made strange accelerations.  It left no tail.  It was shaped flat like a pancake.  It was -- as this month's Smithsonian magazine puts it -- "unlike anything astronomy had ever seen."

Everyone was interested, of course, and various scientists suggested various theories.  One of those conventional theories may be shown in the future to fully explain the observations..  At present, however, they all seem unsatisfying.

One prominent scientist -- Braham Loeb, a Harvard professor who has made major contributions in the study of black holes and in other areas -- says out loud what we laymen have all been thinking.  Maybe the object was an alien visitor? Maybe, he suggests, its unusual shape was attributable to a light-powered sail.  The scientific community was, for the most part, aghast.

The thrust of the Smithsonian article -- aside from presenting interesting biographical background and a personal profile of Dr. Loeb and his co-workers -- is to show how conservative scientists can be when presented by observations that don't fit within accepted constructs.  Dr. Loeb takes care to say that he is not advocating for a conclusion that Oumuamua (the name given the object) is of alien origin.  He just feels that it's a viable theory, and that any theory that isn't contradicted by the factual observations needs to be considered.

Loeb notes the outraged refusal by some fellow scientists to even consider the possibility of Oumuamua's being an alien craft.  "The level of vitriol can be like a middle-school playground," he observes.  I myself am reminded of the early refusal by physicians to consider Joseph Lister's theory that infections are spread by physical contact.  I recall a "You Are There" mock-documentary from the early days of television in which physicians were portrayed as highly insulted by the suggestion that they should wash their hands before surgery. 

In 1869, at the meetings of the British Association at Leeds, Lister's ideas were mocked; and again, in 1873, the medical journal The Lancet warned the entire medical profession against his progressive ideas.

--Wikipedia.

This past summer, Loeb initiated a project to coordinate a large number of telescopes worldwide to seek out other Oumuamua-type objects.  He doesn't know what he'll find.  He calls the project a "fishing expedition."

Fishing expeditions have prompted many advances in scientific knowledge.  If he finds nothing, he finds nothing.  The alien theory still won't be disproved, but continuing to pursue it -- at least with our present level of knowledge and technology -- will seem less urgent.

Of course, we all hope he does find something, that some contact with a superior civilization will not only be a scientific coup, but will have a dramatic effect on how we all view the meaning of life, and of the universe,  and of our place in it.

It would be wonderful.  Or would it?

Star Trek ("IRL")

Space: the final frontier. These are the voyages of the starship Enterprise. Its five-year mission: to explore strange new worlds. To seek out new life and new civilizations. To boldly go where no man has gone before!

Those of us who were sentient during the late 1960s recall the voice of William Shatner, in his role as Captain James T. Kirk, commander of the USS Enterprise, introducing each episode of Star Trek. Shatner was a household name back in the days of those first three seasons ("The Original Series").  Among certain groups of fans, he probably still is.

Shatner is still alive, over a half century later. Looking a bit stouter, perhaps, at the age of 90, but probably still capable of taking a starship out for a whirl.

We'll soon find out. Shatner is scheduled to blast into space on Wednesday, October 13, at 9:30 a.m. (EDT). He will be flying in the New Shepherd NS-18, developed by Blue Origin, the space travel company owned by Jeff Bezos. Shatner probably won't captain the ship, of course, but at age 90 he will certainly be an impressive and adventurous crew member.

Blue Origin's motto is “Gradatim Ferociter” (“step by step, ferociously”). I love it.

I'm impressed that Shatner is about to experience in real life the adventure he portrayed so memorably as a young man.

So impressed that I'd like to imitate his feat.  In high school, I myself played (I blushingly admit) a leading role in our school's grandiose production of Around the World in Eighty Days.  I'm tempted now to achieve the same feat in real life, just like Shatner.  Circumnavigate the earth in eighty days.  

Of course, in Star Trek, Shatner traveled throughout our galaxy.  Wednesday, he'll ascend only 63 miles above the earth's surface.

Maybe I should similarly lower my sights.  Maybe I'll just drive from Seattle to Spokane.  In one day.  

Tempting the Fates

Sometimes, I tempt the Fates.  Not through bravado.  Usually through stupidity, through not thinking through the consequences of my choices.

As I've discussed before, I more or less glided through my visit to Italy last month, testing negative both before flying to Rome and again before flying home from Milan.  I had endured eighteen months of pandemic, and had apparently escaped contact with the virus.  Two weeks ago, I prudently sought out the flu vaccine.  One week ago, I even more prudently received a Pfizer booster shot for my Covid-19 vaccination.

I seemed to be in great shape.  In great shape, and making choices.

Then, Saturday, I had a couple of sneezing spells, along with a tingling in my throat.  That night, after lying down in bed, I had some coughing, which was easily controlled by a cough suppressant.  My throat continued to feel odd on Sunday and Monday.  I was able to talk myself into imagining a mild headache. 

Some of these symptoms could have been side effects from my booster shot, but not the sneezing.  They all could have been simply signs of a cold.  But sneezing has, in fact, been one of the "breakthrough" symptoms afflicting those vaccinated against Covid-19.  Oh no, I thought, a breakthrough infection just days before my booster would have made me immortal.  Monday, I made an online appointment with a mass testing effort run by a partnership between the University of Washington and the City of Seattle.  Because I claimed I had "symptoms" -- real or imagined -- I was given an appointment just two hours after I applied.

Before I'd really thought this through.  Do I really want to risk a positive test result, despite minimal symptoms, shortly before I'm scheduled to fly to Boston?  My symptoms are so mild as to be ignored in better times.  But, of course, these aren't better times.  

So I go to the campus outdoor field where the tests are being administered.  I was assuming that I'd be given an antigen test, as I had for my Italy travels, with a result within fifteen minutes.  But -- I had "symptoms."  Therefore, I had to be given the far more sensitive PCR test, a test that picks up the slightest presence of the Covid virus.  And, because the lab work is more complex than that for the antigen test, I wouldn't know the result for one to three days.

Even with an appointment, the scene of the testing is crowded and has more the flavor of a county fair than a doctor's appointment.  But the lines move fast, and before I know it I'm given a swab and told to collect my own sample from my own nose.   Which I do.  It tickles a bit, but isn't painful.  

And then I wait.   Why did I do this, I wonder?  I wasn't ill, or close to it.  I didn't need to risk a positive test result, and be forced to stay in my house for ten days while feeling in perfect health.  Possibly risk my planned trip to Boston.

This morning, I receive a text telling me that my result is available.  I go on-line, using a secret code they provide me, and pull up a page.  The result:  "None detected."  "None" being no viruses, I surmise.  I read further, and am assured that this is a "negative" result.

I'm relieved, but I feel that I unnecessarily tempted fate.  The three Greek goddesses, the three Fates, continue weaving at their looms.  They smile gently at me and wink.  

They let me get away with it this time.  

Lee Quarnstrom, 1939-2021

In 1947 or 1948, Lee Quarnstrom somehow got his hands on one of my leather shoes as we were walking home from school.  He of course threw it into the nearest dense growth of blackberry brambles -- not out of malice, but simply because it seemed on impulse to be the thing to do.  We joked about it for the next seventy-plus years, with never an apology from Lee, despite my explaining how my mother and I had spent an hour among the blackberries, trying to find the errant shoe.

The joking has finally ended, however.  Lee passed away quietly, early yesterday morning, at his home in La Habra, California.   

The obituaries are now appearing.  They'll tell you how Lee was part of that group of followers of author Ken Kesey, called the "Merry Pranksters."  The Pranksters toured the country in a beat up bus, from which came Kesey's cryptic saying, "You're either on the bus or off the bus."  When not bussing the country, they were holed up in  a rustic cabin in the mountains above Santa Cruz, sampling the various drugs that were becoming popular with the sixties generation.  

Lee is credited as one of the originators of Kesey's "Acid Tests," and he readily conceded that, in his day, he had departed on roughly 150 acid trips -- until a final unnerving trip suggested to him that he'd had enough.  The group's experimentation with LSD was the subject of Tom Wolfe's best-selling book, The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test.  Inescapably, Lee was eventually the victim of a Bay Area drug bust in 1965, along with Kesey and Neal Cassady.

Lee more or less settled down with age, as most of us do, becoming first an executive editor of Larry Flynt's Hustler Magazine, and then -- more prosaically -- an editor and columnist for the San Jose Mercury News. 

In 2014, Lee looked back on his chaotic career in his memoir entitled, When I Was a Dynamiter! Or How a Nice Catholic Boy Became a Merry Prankster, a Pornographer and a Bridegroom Seven Times. His magnum opus not only was a memoir but has already become an original source material for research into the late 1960s sub-culture. The title pretty well sums it all up, although it ignores what became a rather solid and respectable journalistic career, as well as a very close and loving marriage -- yes, his seventh -- to his wife Chris for the last twenty years or so of his life.

It's all there -- in his memoir, in his writings, and in the obituaries that will be forthcoming. But beneath all the sensationalism, all the historical interest, lived a highly intelligent, witty, and thoughtful human being. After being out of touch for decades, Lee and I re-established our friendship at a gathering in our home town in 2008, after which we emailed each other two or more times a week throughout his final thirteen years.

A classmate who had known us both in elementary school commented to me recently that he couldn't imagine a friendship between two more disparate human beings. But I suppose he didn't know either of us well enough.

To me, Lee was never -- and never will be -- simply the wild guy of the legends, although he certainly was that, too. He and I were best friends from first grade through sixth grade, when his family moved back to the Washington, D.C., area. And we renewed our friendship each summer for another three years when he returned -- either with his family for the summer, or for a stay at my own family's house. When I was 14, I memorably traveled alone by train to his new home in a north Chicago suburb for a three-week visit -- the first blossoming, perhaps, of my lifetime love of travel.

During those years, through ninth grade, we spent hours poring over our stamp collections, sorting through our piles of comic books, playing lengthy and complex variations of Monopoly (did we invent hedge funds? I'm not sure), and talking endlessly about politics, philosophy, religion, and our dreams for the future. And joking hysterically about everything, as only kids of that age can.

As I've mentioned in an earlier post, we seemed to live in each other's houses and shared each other's families. He was one person around whom I never felt any social discomfort. I could discuss any subject with him, argue any point of view, indulge in any fantasy -- as could he with me -- without worrying that I sounded crazy or "weird" or uncool. We rarely reached rational conclusions, eventually piling onto our arguments increasingly baroque embellishments that led us both into some crazy joint fantasy.

Meeting him sixty years later -- after all his acid trips, journalism awards, successful career moves, and numerous marriages -- we found that little had changed. Our conversations took off from where they had trailed off, back when we were a couple of 15-year-olds.

Lee will be justifiably praised and celebrated for his amazing life. I remember him best, however, as the close boyhood friend who -- I'm convinced -- cheated routinely at Monopoly.

And we never found that damn shoe!  Never mind, Lee.  Keep it to remember me by, buddy.

Grabbing that booster

Tomorrow morning, I'm scheduled to get my Pfizer booster shot at a local pharmacy.  It's been about 7½ months since I received my second shot, and I'm relieved to be able to get the booster at this time.

I'm convinced that the Pfizer vaccine itself is safe, and I've seen no evidence or suggestion that receiving it as a booster makes it less safe.  I'm less sure of the efficacy or need for a booster -- studies seem to go both ways -- but if it's safe and if it may possibly strengthen and prolong my immunity, I'm all for it.

Looking at boosters from a global standpoint, on the other hand, I certainly admit that there are ethical and epidemiological reasons to question giving any priority to booster shots.  There's a shortage of vaccine worldwide, and, in terms of ending the pandemic, I agree that giving the basic two shots to as many people as possible is more important than giving a booster to a guy who wants to be safe not only from death or serious illness, but from any illness at all -- and even from symptom-free infection.

But in this country, we have accumulated more vaccine than we can use, because of the incredible recalcitrance of a large percentage of our population.  We are donating some of that excess to countries that want it and can use it, but we need to keep a certain excess on hand to meet unpredictable demand.  But the vaccine has a fairly short shelf-life, and if not used within that period has to be discarded.

My own physician discussed the issue with me a month ago, during my annual physical.  He disagreed with the national policy of giving booster shots at this time, but -- on the personal level -- recommended that I get the shot if I had the opportunity.  The vaccine I receive wouldn't have been shipped overseas if I didn't receive it, he pointed out.  It would be trashed.

Kant's categorical imperative might suggest to me that this argument is rather self-serving.  What would be the effect on the world if every eligible American grabbed for the vaccine as a booster, as I'm doing?  

I'll mull that troubling question over later -- like after I get my shot tomorrow. 

Symphony in a time of pandemic

Despite having maintained my subscription each season, last night was the first time I'd attended the Seattle Symphony since February 2020 -- just before the Covid-19 pandemic reached Seattle via China and Italy.  The music, as always, was excellent.  But some things had changed.

Benaroya Hall has a number of food and drink establishments on the street floor, open to the public, before one enters the auditorium proper -- excellent places for a last minute cup of coffee to keep one awake past 8 o'clock.  These were all closed, and the hall which they line was dimmed.  Instead, I found something analogous to TSA checkpoints at the airport.  I was required to show my proof of vaccination and a matching proof of identity (driver's license).  Also, one could pass no farther without wearing a mask.  Which everyone of course was doing -- classical music fans, at least in the Northwest Corner, don't tend to be anti-mask rebels.

Ticket purchasers were also required to sign a waiver of liability at the time of purchase, although I don't recall that being a requirement last winter when I paid for my own season's ticket.  

Having survived this novel -- but reassuring -- set of requirements, we proceeded further to the auditorium lobby entrance, where we presented our tickets.  Also new this time, although unrelated to the pandemic, was our ability to avoid using paper tickets, and instead use an iPhone app to present a QR code.  A minor change, important only to people like me who also became ecstatic at being able to order Starbucks coffee on an app.

The program?  Interesting, but not one of my all time favorites.  It began with a contemporary work by Natalie Dietterich entitled (in all lower case) aeolian dust.  The music was atonal, but oddly soothing.  The composer described the work:

The idea of aeolian, or atmospheric, dust could be considered an analog to the passage of time within a world where unrelated events coexist and have potential to become something bigger than itself, or perhaps simply occupy a space together with nothing to bridge them but the moment in which they occur.

Maybe.  If one concentrates enough.  In any event, the work elicited some odd sounds from the full orchestra, sounds that I didn't realize were possible.  The composer was in the audience and came to the stage and took a bow at the conclusion.  I'd like to hear more of her work.

The second number was Ives's Three Pieces in New England, (1931), also atonal at times but at other times a rambunctious interpretation of various patriotic songs from the Civil War period.  The three movements are programmatic, and reading the composer's intent in composing each movement was helpful to appreciating the work as a whole.

After the intermission came the major work of the night, Schumann's familiar Third ("Rhenish") Symphony.  A crowd-pleaser that brought the audience to its feet at the conclusion.

It was a small audience, however.  The lobby -- usually packed during intermission -- seemed oddly spacious and quiet last night.  I looked over the crowd after most of us had returned to our seats, and estimated that the auditorium -- usually at or near capacity for a Saturday night performance -- was more like twenty or thirty percent full.

I think we're all still adjusting to being comfortable in large crowds.  Even the Mariners games drew sparser than average crowds, and they were held outdoors.  But we're getting there.  My next ticket is for November 6, featuring Tchaikovsky's Violin Concerto.  I suspect Pyotr's warhorse will draw a larger crowd.  

Happy days at Lake Como

"Wow, isn't it dangerous traveling to Europe during the pandemic?"

This was the response given by most people -- explicitly, or by facial expression -- when I told them about my impending trip to Italy's Lake Como.  It's a fair question, and a question that each person must answer for himself, based on his own reading of the evidence and -- especially -- his own tolerance for risk.

But I was convinced -- am convinced -- that travel to Italy is safe and reasonable.  The flight over?  Italy requires full immunization and negative Covid-19 test results, requirements enforced by the airlines.  And the U.S. also requires all passengers to be masked.  While in Italy?  Italy is now experiencing 6.9 cases per day per 100,000 population, down from 10 cases before I left for Italy.  America continues hovering in the 45 to 50 case range.  Even King County, including Seattle where I live, is experiencing 25 cases.

And there is the matter of national culture.  Italy's population is 66 percent vaccinated, compared with 55 percent in the U.S.  Italians treat masks as just another item of clothing, not a political statement.  Everyone is masked in stores, hotels, and restaurants.  Teenagers and children, less apt to be vaccinated, are commonly masked even outside while playing.  Adults usually mask up in outdoor crowds, and wear their masks on their arms otherwise, ready to be slipped on when entering a building.  Sanitizing of hands is emphasized far more than here, with hand sanitizer dispensers available everywhere.

Draw your own conclusion about the relative safety of the two nations.  I've drawn mine.

But let's talk about the trip itself.

I flew to Rome on September 8, where I spent a couple of days re-exploring some of my favorite places -- the area around Santa Maria Maggiore (where my entire family had stayed during a visit in 2001), the Borghese gardens, the Spanish steps, and, especially, the narrow, twisting streets of the Campo Marzio.  I left Rome early on Saturday, September 11, by high speed train to Milan, where I met up with my sister and our cousin.  

We had planned to rent a car in Milan, and drive that afternoon to our rental house on Lake Como.  Unfortunately, your correspondent managed to destroy the vehicle before getting it out of the parking garage -- the details reflect poorly on said correspondent, and will not be provided herein -- and so we stayed a night in Milan.  We left Milan early on Sunday for Como (city) by train, where we caught a ferry for the 2½-hour ride to Menaggio on Lake Como's west shoreline, some half way up its length.

The manager of our rental sent a taxi to Menaggio, which carried us another three or four miles northward to the village of Rezzonico, where we were escorted on foot through twisting cobblestone streets and steep stairways to what was to be our lakeside home for the week.

The ancient streets and houses of Rezzonico were apparently once included within the walls of the Castle of Rezzonico, built by the Counts Della Torre in 1363.  (The descendants of the Della Torre have been illustrious, including Pope John XXIII.)   The castle towers remain, rising high above the town, and are occupied by their owners.   The town is extremely picturesque, with narrow, cobble-stone streets winding up and down the hillside.

Our house was equally picturesque, with views of the lake from every window, balcony, and porch area.  Built into the hillside, its four floors contained three bedrooms, one of which had a loft with additional beds.

Not having a car proved highly beneficial, forcing us to master the lake's excellent bus and ferry services.  Rezzonico has a small convenience store, but the nearest supermarket was located back in Menaggio, and we made frequent use of the bus between the two towns.  (Menaggio also had excellent gelaterias, which proved a major attraction to our group.)

Much of our time was spent in our house, preparing meals and staring at the changing moods and colors of the lake.  But we also did a six-hour, 8½-mile hike from Menaggio up into the steep hills behind the town.  Part of the trail was a rugged and somewhat precarious climb, but other parts were strolls through small villages and farmlands.  We also spent one day taking the ferry across the lake to Bellagio, a hot spot for wealthy residents and visitors.  (No, as we have replied to many inquiries -- we did not meet George Clooney.)  From Bellagio, we ferried to  the pretty shoreside village of Varenna, which we all agreed was -- after our own Rezzonico -- our favorite town on the lake (not that we came close to visiting them all.

Our last full day, we took a ferry from Menaggio to the far end of the lake at Colico.  As you travel northward from Menaggio, the lake becomes less and less intensely populated and visited by tourists, and we did little in Colico aside from eating lunch.  But the scenery en route -- as the lake increasingly digs its way into the Alps -- was well worth the trip.  We returned to Menaggio by hydrofoil.

I felt sad leaving Rezzonico, and hope to return to the same house some future summer.  We returned to Como by ferry, and by train to Milan where we spent one final night together before I flew home.  My two companions planned to spend several more days in Italy after I left.

This was my first visit to the Italian lakes, and I was impressed.  A beautiful area, no doubt improved by visiting during September rather than at the peak of the tourist season, and at a time when the pandemic limited the number of foreign visitors.

-------------------

Photo No. 1 (top) -- View of Lake Como from one of our several porches

Photo No. 2 -- Rezzonico Castle towers

Photo No. 3 -- View from my bedroom window

Photo No. 4 -- A street in Rezzonico

Photo No. 5 -- Hiking above Menaggio

Lago di Como

After 1,431 posts, I suppose you have to expect a certain amount of duplication.  Certain repeated themes whose posts all sound a bit the same.  One such theme is the "Soon I leave on my trip" theme.

You know what, though?  It's my blog, and I'll repeat if I want to.  Sometimes I just want to note an occasion to prompt future memories, not entertain you, my faithful readers.

So, yeah.  Wednesday, finally, I leave for Italy.  My flight to Dallas-Fort Worth leaves at 7:30 a.m., meaning I pretty much have to Uber myself to the airport at about 4 a.m.  Three hours in advance has always been recommended for international flights, but especially now when so many requirements for the flight have to be documented and verified.

Yes, I have had my vaccinations, and here is my white CDC card.  Yes, I've had my COVID-19 test (today, in fact), and it was negative; here is the lab report.  Yes, I have submitted my Passenger Locator Form, and here is the computer print-out acknowledging receipt by the Italian government. 

There are bound to be folks ahead of me in line at check-in who are horrified to discover that they are missing one or more of these documents -- as sure as there are folks ahead of you at Starbucks who can't decide whether to add caramel to their Frappuccino.   Hence, the three-hour lead time.

I haven't begun to pack, but I have drawn up a packing list.  Apparently, the list suggests, I'm moving to Italy for a year or so.  My sister advises me she is taking a dress (probably unneeded) and a pair of jeans.  My cousin is bringing a small carry-on bag, and all her clothes will be black.  We do have a washer and dryer in our rental -- I really don't need to bring a fresh ensemble for every day of the trip.  I recall my days of backpacking throughout Europe lugging a mammoth backpack; I should have learned my lesson.

My flight to DFW lasts four hours.  I have slightly over an hour to regain my poise in the airport, before leaving for Rome, a ten-hour flight.  I arrive in Rome bright and early in the morning, at 8 a.m.  Which of course is 11 p.m. and time for bed in Seattle.  My hotel has a check-in time of 2 p.m., which means a few hours of walking around the Eternal City in something of a sleep-deprived daze, melting in the Roman late-summer heat.  But I've done all that before -- and fortunately, hotels always allow early arrivals to check their bags until check-in time.

So I have most of Thursday and all of Friday to re-acquaint myself with the wonders and beauties of Rome -- I was last there two summers ago -- before taking an early morning three-hour train ride from Rome to Milan on Saturday.  My sister and cousin will have left San Francisco at about the same time I left Seattle, and will have been familiarizing themselves with the sights of Milan.  We will meet at their Milan hotel, a block from the train station, after which I'll secure my rental car, and the fun begins.

The initial fun will be trying to get out of Milan's crowded maze of streets, aided by my iPhone's GPS.  But the more substantive fun will be the drive to Menaggio on the western shore of Lake Como (henceforth, Lago di Como), and then proceeding three miles farther to the small village of Rezzonico.  Rezzonico, where our rental house awaits us --  three stories high, and overlooking the lake.

But I can say no more.  Once we arrive at our rented house, there is no further advance itinerary.  The itinerary will evolve over the coming seven days as our moods and interests dictate.  Hint -- for my own part, my moods and interests will dictate a couple days of lake exploration by the excellent village-to-village ferry system and at least one day hiking into the hills above the lake.  Our plans will be determined partly, however, by the weather: at present, there is a 50 to 60 percent chance of rain for at least four of the days we'll have our rental.  

Seven days of playing countless games of "Sorry!" as the rain pounds on the window panes?  Hopefully not.   

But all will be made clear, grasshoppers, upon my return.  Maybe even with some cool photos.  

Ciao, e fate i bravi!

Rachel Lake

Rachel Lake has to be one of the most beautiful lakes in the Northwest.  Either that, or fatigue was causing me to hallucinate the lake's virtues yesterday, as my friend Pat M. and I sat on a rocky plateau a few feet above lake level, eating lunch and taking in the view of the lake and the surrounding mountains.

The turn-off to the lake is on the east side of Snoqualmie Pass, not far beyond the Hyak ski area.  There's a bit of a drive in from the I-90 Kachess Lake exit, first on paved road and then on well-maintained gravel.  Once on gravel, there's a rather odd intersection with a number of Forest Service signs, none of which indicate the proper direction -- take the road to the right, which leads to the trailhead and a parking lot.

The trail is pleasant for some distance.  Pat and I naively remarked on how more trails should be so easy to hike.  And then it began -- long rocky patches, often steep, which made footing tricky.  When the trail wasn't rocky, it was often a mass of tree roots which had to be maneuvered through -- often threatening to grab your foot, especially as you were coming back down. 

On-line articles describe the trail as "heavily-trafficked," but on this first day of September we encountered only two other parties going up, and a few more coming back down.  Hikers may be hiked out by now, and are already looking forward to skiing.

I can offer no real advice on negotiating the difficulties of the trail, except to urge you to persevere.  The lake is large, a deep blue, and is surrounded by impressive peaks.  In most part of the country, you'd expect to hear the whine of motor boats, but Rachel Lake is well within the Alpine Lakes Wilderness Area (self-register at the beginning of the trail).  It's definitely doable as a day hike, but we saw at least one tent on the lakeshore.  

Another mile up the trail leads to Ramparts Lake, which would be fun if you still had the energy.  A good reason to camp at the lake, if you have the time.  The lake is  large enough to make a circumnavigation an interesting possibility, although the opposite shore, in places, presents a rocky cliff leading right down to lake level.  Some high level hiking would be required to work around those cliff areas.

The round trip to Rachel Lake is 8.2 miles.  The elevation gain is only about 1,600 feet, but it took us three hours to climb up, and 2 hours, 50 minutes to hike back down.  Those times reflect the difficulty and roughness of much of the trail.

But you finish the hike not only with good pictures imprinted on both your camera  and your brain, but a sense of exhausted accomplishment.