Anacortes

     After leaving Bellingham, I traveled to Anacortes. I spent the Spring camping in an abandoned duck blind in the overlooking the oil refinery. At least, I was out of the wind and weather. It was secluded enough for my taste below the roadway. This blind was built before the refinery and any development on this lonesome road. No one even suspected me of being there.

     One night, as I was falling asleep in that space between alertness and subconsciousness, I became aware of a small winged creature perching on my chest. This little girl was dressed in a leaf skirt and had a lupine flower hat.   She was tiny in my vision. She turned around. Bending over, she wiggled up to my nose so that I could smell her flowery butt. 

     This is typical of these other dimension creatures to disarm you with a charm offensive. Not knowing who she was since I was not remembering my childhood storybooks, I was puzzled and extremely charmed.   

     All I could think of was Tinkerbell from the movie Peter Pan.   She was not exactly like her but the resemblance was close.   She had a wonderful smile and a delightful personality in the short time we were together. I slipped into sleep with a smile. I was facing impossible odds.  This creature was the one bright light in my life at that moment.

        The very next morning, as I walked to Anacortes a few miles away, I spotted a newborn rabbit on the roadway that somehow was lost. These critters mew like kittens so I knew it was calling out for the mother to find him. I placed him far enough away from the traffic deep in the bushes so that mom would be able to find him again. I was wearing gloves.

       There was an abandoned farm below the roadway. I would go there to have some lunch and pick some crab apples. I could imagine myself as the farmer taking a break from the day's events.
      The Community Center in Anacortes had potential. It attracts people from many lifestyles. I met Liz and her kids when hanging out there one afternoon.   She invited me to stay at her rental with her husband Scott and the kids. She just had birthed a new baby in the dead of winter. She needed all the help she could muster.  I was trying to get to Alaska to make some real money. This family had just arrived from Palmer, Alaska.  They told me what to expect.

    The social worker I talked to said not to go but stay in the area.   Since he was giving me food stamps, I had no choice but to stay in the drafty old house Liz and Scot had rented.
      Liz was playing with a startup Irish band.  I wanted to be a part of this music since I am Irish by right of birth. They rehearsed as much as they could. We played a set at the Sons of Norway Lodge one cold night near the docks. 

       Scott and Liz were mountaineers who lived at high elevations during the good weather of summer.  They would go on outings to the rich highlands of Washington State with the kids in tow and enough food for the short summer of the north country. 

        Scott was a climber. He was lean and fit.  He stayed that way by jogging and other methods relying on his instinct for survival to protect his family from the wilderness of life. 

       Liz too, was extraordinary.  Skilled at foraging, she taught me how to gather fennel and yarrow for tea.  The best way to skin small game and other survival skills.  Like others of the Wilderness, I knew she was capable about how to survive in almost any situation. 

    These folks came down from Palmer, Alaska where they were trying to homestead. However, being Irish was a non starter since they were viewed as foreigners.   I felt right at home for the brief time we all were together.
   Coming to Anacortes from Mt Vernon one passes fields of tulips and daffodils. You can almost support yourself if you are healthy, young and able to bend over all day picking daffodils and tulips.   Any labor work you get can be considered hard work because your life will be eat, sleep, work for the rest of your employment. The image of the colorful flowers will stay with you for a lifetime.  One could do worse. The Spring breezes are really cold. There is frost which the sun thaws speedily. 

     I met Cordia at the same Community Center.  She told me about the possibility of a job out on Orcas at Moran State Park working with the Rangers. I joined Cordia on Guemes Island to prepare for the Orcas adventure which lasted 10 years.   She took me to a beach party on Guemes which led to many other friendships.

   One such fella drove an old army truck with a winch on the front that said 'Move It'. He had a many acre farm in Anacortes we visited on occasion.  He grew the best pot around in foil lined sheds scattered around his land. Out of sight, out of mind. 

    Cordia met Mark, on his Grandma's farm. Dixie was a fiesty one.  Her favored name was Poker because she would tend the fire with a poker all winter. Cordia was there to help care for Dixie.             

      She eventually married Mark. He sold the farm after Dixie's passing and moved out to Eastern Washington where he continued farming where land was cheap.  

   This is when Judy and I became an item.  Paul had abandoned Judy for the short summer to go to the many gatherings during the Apple harvest. Apples are created by workers who are called thinners. Apples grow in huge bunches which eventually turn into Crabapples if left alone.

      A thinner selects two or three of these green apples out of this bunch so they can recieve all the nutrients to swell and grow to the full size of marketable fruit that attracts housewives.

   This has been done the same way for centuries all over the world. One can always find employment in an orchard. You are taught how to do safe ladder sets. How to handle the fruit as not to bruise it.  Golden Delicious are the hardest to harvest and are easily bruised. You develop strong and quick hands which the girls admire.

  Anacortes was the ferry town. I say was because the Alaskan ferry has set up in Bellingham.  The islands are still serviced through the ferry 5 miles outside of Anacortes. You have go to Friday Harbor then drive to a wealthy seaport on the other side of the pennisula. This was a small port service for yatchsmen.

    You could also go to Port Angeles by car on the Olymplc Pennisula and catch that ferry to Victoria BC. I did this. You had better study up and bring plenty of money.