Notable Summer

Thursday, June 15, 2023

Recently, I’ve felt very aware that we in Central Oregon live in a beautiful place. Maybe because this year’s spring, arriving late, seemed incredibly welcome. Everywhere gardens and wildflowers have begun popping. Butterflies are appearing, ducks and geese are in flight, and the local weather and natural daylight seem just right.

What also makes this small space on Earth seem wonderfully special is its semi-isolation from the larger world’s confusing politics and catastrophes. Of course, we who live here complain all the time about how much the city is growing, how awful the traffic has become, and how little sense our community leaders often make. Nonetheless, overall, it’s a beautiful area.

Maybe except for the embedded lava rock. A person working here to install an outside pole light is returning today with some sort of blaster drill to remove buried rock from where that light should stand. On the other hand, my house stands high on an embedded ridge allowing for great viewing of the Cascades.

Daily, I look at those Cascades and try to interpret what they’re telling us. How bright or dim is the light over them; might they be suggesting a chance of rain; is my current view of those peaks worth going to find a camera and capturing? And so on. The Cascades are part of my family.

I tell a friend, who’s lived here for many years and is planning to move to Portland, that afterward, he’ll be sorry. He laughs and says no, he won’t be sorry because he grew up in Portland and loves it. I say, “We’ll see.”

Dear Friends: Our high desert lately arrived summer will be all too short. Diana